For too long the guqin has been aristocratic, and even deified, what "the first of the four arts", "literati musical instruments", "not for the ears", It is not for the pleasure of the ear", "to cultivate the body and nourish the sex". These adjectives are all right, but these words make many people dare not say their true feelings about the guqin in public, as if saying it reveals their own realm is not high.
The difficulty of listening to the guqin has never been an unspeakable topic. People who learn the qin know a self-deprecating words, called "difficult to learn and easy to forget not in the hearing", visible in the playing of the qin people, the guqin "difficult to hear" are a **** knowledge.
Why? Because traditionally, easy for people to feel "good" music should have these characteristics: melody moving, rhythmic,
Can trigger people to more obvious emotions (happy, sad, melancholy, depressed, uplifting), etc. The last point is a combination of the first two points. The last of these is the effect produced by the combination of the first two.
We think about the pop songs actually understand, the most people like the square dance song, is not there these characteristics?
But there are some people who are not satisfied, and feel that it is too "vulgar".
Some niche ballads became popular, such as "Miss Dong" (董小姐). They became popular, such as "Miss Dong" and "Nan Shan Nan".
These songs are melodious and can obviously trigger a melancholy mood, but the tempo is not very distinctive and is more soothing.
So square dancers don't like these songs.
Other people like rock. Rock is characterized by a distinctive rhythm, but, again, not very melodic. You can indicate a rock verse with head bobbing and beatboxing, but have you ever seen anyone indicate rock by humming a melody?
So, by this niche stage, melody and rhythm have to be one or the other. When both are distinct, they are easily remembered, and the ones that are easily remembered become mouthfuls of songs. This is why even some classical music is divided into those that are easily popular and those that are not. For example, everyone can hum Mozart's Little Star, but many people can't hum Chopin's Nocturne. (I'm not familiar with classical music, so I'd welcome corrections from those who are.)
Then you get to the stage where it's even more impossible to remember a niche.
Take the example of modern music. How many people like death metal, for example? Most people think it's "bad", right? But those who like it love it! Why? Because it's not melodic, it's not rhythmic, it's not even a thing, it feels more like noise.
So where does guqin fit in? Gugen is about the same stage as death metal, but a little more popular.
Why?
Guqin, like death metal, doesn't have a distinct melody or rhythm.
But the guqin has one more "nice" sound than death metal, and that's what I didn't mention earlier: the tone.
The timbre dimension is a matter of opinion. Violins and pianos, for example, have a naturally beautiful tone, so more people like them than wind music. And the tone is easy to send out a crisp and bright sound, easy to be popular with the public. The tone of the guqin is more in the middle and low tones, so it is not as popular as the guzheng pipa.
To give an example of the human voice, you will understand, the most popular Chinese female singers are more on the high side of the range, such as Faye Wong, Faye Leung, if the high and low tones can be mastered, it is rare, such as Zhang Huimei, Sun Yanzi, but it seems that the same as the diva is not as popular as the first two. And only the bass and midrange, such as Cai Qin, Wang Ruolin these, is not more niche.
The guqin is the equivalent of a female singer who basically only has a mid-bass voice. But at least its tone is "normal", and its bass and mids are perfect, clean and rounded (see the twenty-four experiences in the Xishan Qin Condition), which is one of the rarest things about the guqin, because often the bass and mids can be raspy and magnetic, but it's hard to make them rounded, sweet, and clear (I feel like I'm in an advertisement), but this kind of tone is to be savored. tone is to be savored, and is likely to be ruined by recording techniques, so it's often eliminated on the first listen.
Death metal fails in this dimension because the tone is "hard to hear".
But death metal wins in another dimension, that of "evoking strong emotions". The guqin bucks the trend of the times in this regard. For example, in the brightly colored Tang Dynasty, there is the poem "although the ancient tune is self-love, today's people do not play". This is because the guqin is meant to be "neutral and peaceful" and to "nourish the heart". If death metal can stimulate the listener's "anger", "mania", "excitement" and "euphoria", then the guqin, as a result of its "neutral and peaceful" nature, is not the most popular instrument in the world. If death metal can inspire "anger", "mania", "excitement", "excitement", then guqin, because of its bass, because of its soothing, can inspire only, "tranquility", "faint melancholy" (this kind of faint is ten times lighter than the melancholy of the pop songs), "hidden worry", "open-mindedness", "peace", "peace", "happiness", and "happiness". "Tranquility", "light melancholy" (this kind of light is ten times lighter than the melancholy of pop songs), "hidden worries", "open-mindedness" and so on. This kind of emotion is not really an emotion for many listeners. Because there may be some people whose lives are originally very dull and tasteless, without waves. Then this kind of music can't form a contrast for him, so he doesn't feel rare. Some people just want to refresh themselves, so this kind of "light and open-minded" is a kind of hypnosis for him to hear. The people who like the guqin may not always have peace of mind, but it may be because they don't have a lot of peace of mind.
But if you listen carefully, the structure of the guqin music is rigorous and very organized. As long as you listen in, in fact, the guqin song as much as there is a main theme, the beginning of the development of the climax of the epilogue. But the main theme of the tune is often not popular, the first time is absolutely difficult to catch, to listen to many times before catching, after catching, you can produce **** Ming. When the variations of the main theme appear, you will be able to feel it together physically and mentally, and when the climax appears, it will also be very exciting. For example, "Xiaoxiang Shuiyun" is just too good and wonderful a piece of music. The composer is full of wisdom and emotion. If you can hear this layer, the guqin is actually not neutral and calm. The "Autumn Moon in the Han Palace" and "Remembering the Old Man" are all heartbreaking, the "Yang Guan San Diei" is unusually sad, and the "Flat Sand and Falling Geese" is full of fall - some people ask if there are any joyful tunes. I would say almost no, because the context of the guqin music and Chinese poetry, literati painting is too much like the overall aesthetic interest in the implicit, lonely, melancholy for the beauty. This is the case of Lin Mei, who could also put powder on her hairpins and be sharp from time to time, but could never be Wang Xifeng.
So if you find the guqin music "hard to hear," please speak up, and if the other person also finds it hard to hear, you can spit it out together. If the other person thinks it is very good, then I hope to hear a heated debate, so that this instrument in the process of "the more the truth is debated, the more clear", to get more attention.