July 23, 1949 Wuxi liberation, Bing and his "Two Springs Reflecting the Moon" and other music to get a new life. 1950 summer, the Central Conservatory of Music teachers and students in order to explore, research and preservation of folk music, commissioned by Professor Yang Yinyu Liu, etc., made a special trip to Wuxi for him to record "Two Springs Reflecting the Moon", "Listen to the Pine", "the wind of the cold spring song", the three erhu and the "Great Wave", "Dragon Boat", "Zhaojun Out of the Seaside", three Pipa Songs.
Hua Xuemei is well versed in a variety of instruments and Taoist music. The string was strangled on the blood marks, fingers also pulled out a thick callus, Bing played with the outer strings of the erhu than the general strings much thicker, which is inseparable from his years of practice. 17 years old, Bing formally participated in the Taoist music blowing, he looks talented, there is a good voice, was known as the "little master of the sky".
On December 4, 1950, Bing died at the age of 57 years.
Bing's life was full of drama. It is said that the only image of his life that has survived is a standard photo on a "good citizen card" taken during the period of Japanese colonial rule in Wuxi. In the photo, the middle-aged man with blind glasses and a thin description, his face under a broken felt hat, reveals the hardship and vicissitudes of life. Perhaps the trials and tribulations given to Bing by fate were the reason for the realization of his stirring music. The illegitimate son of Hua Qinghe was born deprived of the right to family love. When his birth mother reluctantly ended her own life to resist worldly discrimination, some hidden parts of the boy's character were already visible. When the teenager who has been in foster care for several years returns to his biological father, Hua Qinghe, there may be more than a few unanswered questions wherever his eyes look. I know from the information that he came to his father, who was a Taoist priest, calling him "Master". Hua Qinghe, who called himself Xuemei, was proficient in all kinds of musical instruments. Bing studied hard and soon mastered the art of playing many instruments, including the erhu, sanxian, pipa and flute. At the moment, Bing thought of himself as an orphan who was being cared for by kind people. However, when he reached the age of 21, Bing suddenly realized his own life before Hua Qinghe died of illness.
The days that followed were saddening to say the least. Hua Yanjun, the new Taoist priest in charge of the Leizun Temple in the Dongxu Palace, a Taoist temple in the city of Wuxi, seems to have let himself go, eating, drinking, whoring, gambling and even smoking opium. The absurdity of his life brings absurd results: he is blinded by syphilis and loses control of the Taoist temple. After living on the streets, his clan arranged for Dong Caidi, a rural widow from Jiangyin, to take care of him. Such are the contradictions of the world. In his agony and despair, Bing did not break the mold. In the days that followed, a creative folk artist, known as "Blind Bing," who sang about current events and sold his art on the streets, was born. According to an article written by a witness at the time, after the Japanese invaded Wuxi, Bing and Dong Caidi took refuge in the Shanghai kunqu troupe Xianni She, where they worked as pianists playing the three-stringed instrument, and even performed a crowd-pleasing role in the movie Seven Heavens, shot at the time.
It was during this period of selling his art for a living that Bing composed some of his most moving music. There are many stories surrounding the circulation of the erhu piece "The Moon Reflecting in the Two Springs", and I read one of them by chance, which said that Lai Songshou, a professor at Nanjing Normal University, was a neighbor of Bing as a child, and that he liked the erhu when he was a teenager, and that he was often given pointers on playing techniques by Bing. Later he was admitted to the Nanjing Arts Institute, Department of Folk Music. One day when it was cold, he moved his fingers outside the teacher's room and played a piece of music that Ah Bing had taught him. At the end of the piece, a man came over and asked him what piece he was playing. The teacher told him that the gentleman who asked him was Professor Yang Yinliu from the Central Conservatory of Music. Mr. Li Songshou said that this piece was taught by a folk artist in his hometown and had no name. Yang Yinliu said the music was good, and added that they were collecting folk music, and would use a wire recorder imported from abroad to record such good folk music. Lai Songshou and Prof. Yang made an appointment to return to their hometown and waited until September before Yang Yinliu and Cao Anhe came to Wuxi. This time they brought with them the task of recording the Taoist music of Wuxi. After recording the Taoist music, Li Songshou insisted that they record Ah Bing's music. When Ah Bing finished playing a piece, Prof. Yang Yinliu asked softly for the name of the piece, and Ah Bing said he didn't have a name. Prof. Yang said he could not do without a name, he had to think of one. Ah Bing then said, "Two Springs, Two Moons". Prof. Yang also said, "Yin Yue" this name with the Guangdong music heavy, or called Ying Yue, Wuxi has Ying Shan Lake, Bing said, good, your learning is great, listen to you.
On this matter, Mr. Lai Songshou said in his memories: September 20, 1950, my wife and I accompanied Mr. Yang Yinliu, Cao Anhe, and the two gentlemen to look for Bing's recordings, and that day has been recorded until 7:30 p.m. before the end. At the time of the recording, Ah Bing was in poor health, his hands were not strong enough, and his violin was improvised, so the recording of "Reflecting the Moon in Two Fountains" that was preserved was not the most effective. Ah Bing's last performance was on September 25, 1950, the 23rd day after the recording, which seemed to be a literary performance for the inaugural meeting of the Wuxi Dental Association. Ah Bing went out supporting his sick body, and because he walked slowly, the performance was almost over when he arrived at the venue. I helped Bing to walk up to the stage and sit in front of the microphone. This was Bing's first and only performance in front of a microphone in his life. Bing began by playing the lute, and then some people on the stage called out for Bing to play the erhu, so my wife and I told Bing to pay attention to his health and not to play. Bing said, "I'll play for the folks in Wuxi, and I'm happy to die playing." Then he played the song "Reflecting the Moon in Two Springs", which he had played many times. I remember the audience was full of people, even the windows were full of people. At the end of the performance, the applause and shouts of applause from the stage, Bing heard it and took off his hat on his head and nodded his head.
More than 80 years ago, the streets of Wuxi were often filled with the sound of Ah Bing's piano as he sold his art and begged for money. His improvisation not only accomplished the self-referential lament "Two Fountains Reflecting the Moon", but more importantly, it got rid of that enjoyment mentality and rose to a sense of **** destiny that is with me. The care for the world, the contemplation of self, and the trials and tribulations suffered have made it easy for some to compare him to Beethoven. It's not about how hard it is to be alive, or the old saying, "God will do what he wants," but rather, it's really about your own behavior. A great work is a history of the heart, which reflects the reason why people have to stand. What I often feel in Bing's music, in that moment, is the ability to distinguish between right and wrong in so many ways. I have a memory of a passage introducing the Japanese conductor Seiji Ozawa, saying that he told someone with tears in his eyes when he first heard the piece Two Fountains in the Moon, "A piece like this should be listened to on one's knees."
Bing kept six of his compositions because of that recording in 1950: the erhu piece "Two Fountains Reflecting the Moon", "Listening to the Pines", "Cold Spring Winds", and the pipa piece "The Great Wave", "Dragon Boat", and "Zhaojun's Exit from the Plug", which are well known to the world today. It was a blessing in disguise. As a folk artist, his grueling life may have been just one of the countless bloody and tearful lives ever lived. Fortunately, he had an opportunity to not only express with his own hands, with notes, but also to infect other hearts with the tool of music.
[Editor's note]Anecdotes
People say that Ah Bing is three endless: a poor man's will is not poor (not afraid of power); a poor man's mouth is not poor (not eating white food); a poor man's name is not poor (integrity).
In the city of Wuxi, a landlord raped a 13-year-old girl in his home, and when Bing found out about it, he immediately sang the lyrics to expose the landlord's evil deeds, which aroused public indignation, and the landlord fled for several months, not daring to return home.
Once, the KMT warlord Tang Enbo asked Bing to sing a birthday song for his 13th aunt, and Bing flatly refused, and was severely beaten, but Bing didn't give in, and made up the lyrics, and played the erhu to scold them.
During the war, the Japanese occupied Wuxi, and a man named Zhang Shijun became a traitor, and Bing knew it and made up words to scold him, and he was beaten again. Later, this traitor was killed by the Japanese, Bing clapped his hands and made up a song "the end of the traitor" sung along the street, Wuxi people all applauded.
[Edit] Musical Works
Huishan Spring in Wuxi, Jiangsu Province, known as "the second spring in the world". Named after the "Two Springs Reflecting the Moon", the piece not only introduces people to the quiet of the night and the cold of the moon, but also makes them feel as if they are seeing their own people - a straight and tenacious blind artist pouring out his difficult life to the people.
After the short introduction, the melody moves up from the merchant to the horn, and then stops at the zheng and the horn, ending with the Gong, a microwave-shaped melodic line that resembles the author's contemplation of the past as he sits beside the spring (excerpt 1). The second phrase is only two bars long and appears six times in the whole piece. It begins on the high octave of the last note of the first phrase. It circles up and down around the palatine, breaking the previous silence and starting to soar, revealing the author's infinite feelings of emotion (fragment 2). As we enter the third phrase, the melody flows over the upper register and new rhythmic elements appear, with a soft melody and a more emotional mood. The theme gradually changes from calm and deep at the beginning to excited and high, profoundly revealing the author's inner life feelings and his tenacious and proud will to live. The frequent use of nicknote in his performance makes the music a little bit sad, which is the emotion of a blind artist who has tasted the sorrows and pains of the human world.
The theme is varied five times throughout the piece, with the music stating, extending and unfolding, the emotions expressed are more fully expressed. The variations are mainly through the expansion and reduction of the phrase length, and combined with the rise and fall of the melody's active registers, in order to express the music's development and meandering progress. Its many variations are not to express different musical moods in contrast to each other, but to deepen the theme, so the musical image shaped by the piece is relatively single and concentrated. The tempo of the whole piece does not change much, but its intensity changes greatly, from pp to ff. Whenever you play a note longer than the quarter note, the bow is light and heavy, strong and weak, and the music ebbs and flows, which is very heart-warming.
Hua Yan Jun's Tomb
Hua Yan Jun's Tomb (hua yan jun mu) is the tomb of Ah Bing. It is located in Wuxi City, Xihui Park, Hui Mountain, the eastern foot of the Yingshan Lake. Hua Yanjun, that is, "blind Bing", folk musician, died in December 1950, buried in the western suburbs of Wuxi, at the foot of Mount Can, "one and the mountain room," the tomb of the Taoist priests. 1979 May, the tomb was destroyed by the Wuxi Museum of in situ pick up the bones in 1983, moved to the funeral! Huishan east foot, two springs south of the current site. Cemetery area of 742 square meters, the main body consists of tomb walls and wing walls, like a music stand; old tombstone is now hidden in the city museum, color tombstone by the China Music Research Institute, Wuxi City Federation of Literature, Yang Yin Liu book, the tomb of the blind Bing bronze statue, sculpted by the Qian Shaowu.
1986 by the Wuxi Municipal People's Government announced as municipal cultural relics protection units.
"Two Fountains Reflecting the Moon" is an erhu piece composed by the famous blind folk artist Hua Yanjun (Bing) and recorded in 1950. Since the song came out, not only in the form of erhu solo Hua Yanjun is China's outstanding folk musicians. He was born in Wuxi, Jiangsu Province. He was born in Wuxi, Jiangsu Province. Since his childhood in the sound and also be adapted into various forms of instrumental music, with its beautiful lyrical melody and deep touching musical connotation and famous at home and abroad.
Huishan Spring in Wuxi, Jiangsu Province, is known as "the second spring in the world". The author named the piece "The Second Spring Reflecting the Moon", which is related to Bing's misfortune in the old society. From the music, we can feel that the author was expressing his feelings and lamenting his life through the scenery, and he was also expressing his resentment against the old society. In the "Bing song collection" has been introduced: "he was blind after ...... with musical images to depict his imagination in the old days had witnessed the beautiful scenery," "but then felt the surrounding darkness, which made the In the beautiful melody, he was always in a sentimental and bleak mood.
The compositional structure of Reflecting the Moon in Two Springs is a traditional variation. The music begins with a short introduction and a downward-scaled melody that is like a soft sigh of mixed feelings, bringing people into a deep mood. The theme music reminds people of a blind artist with a bamboo stick wandering and roaming on the bumpy road of life, infinitely sad and endlessly desolate. Two Fountains Reflecting the Moon" is in the above tone of the many variations of the gradually unfolding composition of the whole song, it through the variation of the musical image to deepen layer by layer, so that people feel subjected to the Bing with uncontrollable feelings, over and over again to tell people about his sufferings and encounters. The second half of the piece, the music to get further development, the accumulated feelings burst out, the music to the climax, strong and angry, showing the unique temperament and vigor of Bing. This is the voice of the author's angry complaint against the old society, which profoundly reflects Bing's stubborn and resolute character, and expresses his uncompromising resistance and struggle against the dark forces.
The Two Fountains Reflecting the Moon
is layered and integrated, melodic and simple, but the music is touching, but it is even more inspiring. It is the heirloom masterpiece of a poor blind artist in China, loved by audiences at home and abroad.The moon is cold and the music is touching
- Appreciation of Ah Bing's "The Moon Reflects in the Spring"
By Xiao Qianyong
Ah Bing (1893-1950), who occupies an important place in the history of Chinese music, was very unfortunate in his personal encounters. His original name was Hua Yanjun, and his nickname was Ah Bing. He became a Taoist priest at an early age, a drummer in his youth, and lost his eyesight in his middle age due to an eye disease that he couldn't afford to treat, and from then on he lived on the streets, selling his art to make a living. He struggled in darkness and poverty for decades and tasted all the sorrows of the world. He lived in hunger and cold, but he was poor in spirit and never groveled in the face of the bullying and obscene power of the evil forces, but always fought against them and denounced them. In the art of music, he has always taken a wide range, study hard, y rooted in the music of the folk soil, so that his own playing and singing everything, creation also has made a difference. As a result of the above circumstances, Bing's music and the sound of the instrument has a strong national style, and naturally carries a melancholic and indignant mood and the spirit of a man who will not be bent. These, perhaps, is the "two springs reflecting the moon" so can be widely circulated, the reason for the enduring, but also this piece of music touching charm. In China, it is known and loved by almost all men, women, and children of all social strata, and it has had a wide influence abroad. The famous Japanese conductor Ozawa Seiji had in Beijing to listen to the erhu player Jiang Jianhua play "two springs reflecting the moon", listening to, the feeling of heartbreak, can not help but tears.
After the founding of New China, the Institute of Music of the Central Conservatory of Music sent music historian Yang Yinliu, Cao Anhe and other comrades to go to Wuxi on Bing's musical works were recorded, notated, organized, and published by the relevant departments, broadcast. Since then, "Reflecting the Moon in Two Fountains" has taken on a more vibrant and moving luster: he has been adapted into solo violin, folk music ensemble, folk music repertoire, melodic quartet, Western melodic ensemble, erhu and orchestra, gaohu and harp, and other forms of performance, all of which are colorful and interesting in their own way. This piece was later brought to the screen and became the theme music of the movie "Reflecting the Moon in Two Springs".
Why is the erhu music of this blind artist so compelling and regarded as the treasure of our national music?
First of all, Ah Bing's rough life and miserable situation is a microcosm of the old society's toiling masses, which naturally aroused people's concern and sympathy for him. Ah Bing's unyielding, loyal and patriotic character and temperament show a national temperament and spirit, which is admirable. Ah Bing's "two springs reflecting the moon" and other musical works, to a certain extent, reflecting the people's inner world and spirituality, revealing a healthy and deep breath from the bottom of the people's heart, will inevitably cause people to deep in the heart of the great **** song.
Secondly, the tone of "Two Fountains Reflecting the Moon" has a deep connection with the folk music and opera music of the south of the Yangtze River in China, which gives people a very intimate feeling. The structure of the song is a cycle of variations. Through the technique of variation, i.e. the expansion and reduction of sentence length, combined with the rising or falling of the melodic range, the music advances and develops layer by layer, thus creating a single and focused musical image, which gives people a particularly deep impression. Its melodic development, the use of Chinese folk music phrase head and tail convergence, the same tone to carry the spinning method, so that the music presents a flowing clouds and water-like undulating continuous rhythmic beauty, as if it is the endless words of bitterness, the flow of sorrowful tears, giving a person "sighing for the world's misery," "alone in pathos, but under the feeling of tears! The feeling of "alone in sorrow". In addition, the artistic beauty of the music is also expressed in the deep with simple, sentimental see the power, just and soft, moving. This is rich in national style, national style of the erhu song how can not make people intoxicated, never tire of listening to it?
In addition, this piece of music embodies the law of focusing on the depth of feeling and the intention to convey the spirit, which is reminiscent and memorable. If he is compared to the song, it is not Wang Mochizuki's "bright moon shining between the pines, the clear water flowing from the stone" and other important description of the scene, but there is Du Fu's poetry in the sighs of concern for the people, Li Bai's poetry in the "difficult to the road to Sichuan" of the feelings, Qu Yuan's poetry in the anger of the cries. Compared to the painting, never the Qing Dynasty "four kings of landscape", but there are eight Yangzhou sharp, firm edge. By no means "Pinghu Autumn Moon" a kind of Tao works of love, but there is Beethoven "moonlight" sonata in the implied indignation.
"Two springs reflecting the moon" the title of this piece of music, but also scholars often argue for it. In the western suburbs of Wuxi City, Jiangsu Province, there is the famous mountain Huiquan Mountain. A clear spring on the mountain was tasted by Lu Yu, the "God of Tea" in the Tang Dynasty, and rated as "the second spring in the world". Bing often went here before and after he lost his sight, and he was full of affection for the landscape of his hometown. However, in the face of the moonlight although bright, the world is dark, although the spring is sweet, the world is bitter, although the water is flat, the reality of the world is not flat. His heart moon cold, spring water pathos cool. So he used the scene to express his feelings, melting feelings in the scene, pouring out his sorrows, so he named "Two Springs Reflecting the Moon".
"Two springs reflecting the moon" since its inception, the players rise, each show their strengths, colorful. The understanding of the music is not the same. But all the players have grasped the "form of both God, God in the form" principle of performance, thus leaving a deep impression on the listener's heart and soul. What is the "God" of "Reflecting the Moon in Two Springs"? It is the state of mind of a loner, the sadness of a nocturnal traveler, the unyielding character and the hope for light.
Appendix: Verses of Bing
"Remembering the Folk Musician Hua Yanjun"
The sunset is with the sunset, and the huqin and the blind staff are begging for the end of the world.
A song of two springs reflecting the bright moon, who does not know the artist.
-- (Shanghai) Zhang Zhizhen
[Edit paragraph] Artistic style
"Two Springs Reflecting the Moon", Bing's masterpiece. Bing often in Wuxi two springs side of the zither, the creation of this song has been blind, according to Bing's family and friends and neighbors recalled, Bing sells a day of art is still not enough to eat, late at night when the return to the alley, often pull this song, mournful and sad, especially touching.
Bing's friend Lu Hui once described the scene when Bing played "Two Fountains Reflecting the Moon" as follows: "The snow drifted down like goose feathers, and the park across the street was piled up with broken rocks and jades. Bleak and mournful erhu sound, from the street came ...... only to see a pudgy old woman with a small bamboo pole holding a blind man in the park road from east to west, in the dismal light, I vaguely recognize is the two Ah Bing couple. Ah Bing held the small bamboo pole with his right hand, carrying a lute on his back, with his erhu hanging over his left shoulder, babbling and whimpering and pulling, in the pattering, maddening, flying snow, emitting a mournful and desperate curling sound."
This piece of music began without a title, Bing often in the streets and alleys on the way to play, not playing this song when selling, Bing had called it "from the cavity", his neighbors called it "Yi Xinqu", and later in Yang Yinliu, Cao Anhe recording associated with the famous Wuxi attractions " Later, when Yang Yinliu and Cao Anhe were recording the piece, they associated it with the famous Wuxi attraction "Two Springs" and named it "Two Springs Reflecting the Moon" (Huishan Spring in Wuxi, Jiangsu Province, known as "the second spring in the world"), and that's when the score was finalized. He Luting once said, "The elegant name of 'Reflecting the Moon in Two Springs' actually contradicts his music. Instead of depicting the scenery of the moon reflecting on the two springs, the music is a profound expression of the pain of the blind Bing's own life."
In the late fall of 1950, at a concert held in Wuxi, Ah Bing played this piece for the first and last time, winning endless applause from the audience; in 1951, Tianjin People's Broadcasting Station broadcast this piece for the first time; on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the National Day in 1959, the Chinese Association of Foreign Cultures gave this piece to international friends as one of the representations of China's national music. Since then, this song has been widely circulated both at home and abroad, and has been highly evaluated. 1985, this song was recorded in the United States, and ranked first among the eleven popular Chinese music songs in the United States.
Later, Peng Xiuwen adapted the piece for ethnic instrumental ensemble; Wu Zuqiang adapted it for string ensemble; Ding Zhinuo and He Zhanhao adapted it for solo violin; and Ding Shande adapted it for string quartet and so on. China Record Society has made a wire recording of Ah Bing playing this piece in the summer of 1950 into a record, which sells well both at home and abroad.
From beginning to end, the piece reveals the thoughts and feelings of a blind artist who has experienced the sorrows and pains of the world. The piece demonstrates unique folk playing techniques and styles, as well as an unparalleled depth of meaning, which demonstrates the unique charm of the Chinese erhu art, and it broadens the expressive power of the erhu art. It was awarded the "Award for Chinese Music Classics of the 20th Century".