Chapter 8 Music of the Five Dynasties and Song Dynasties

During the Five Dynasties period, the warlords in the Central Plains were in chaos and the society was in turmoil. However, Bashu, which was located in the southwest, was relatively stable. Wang Jian, Wang Yan and his sons, Meng Zhixiang and Meng Chang established two kingdoms here, the Former Shu and the Later Shu. During the pre-Shu and post-Shu periods, the city of Chengdu was prosperous, and the fashion of singing, dancing and playing was very popular.The prosperous Yan music in the Tang Dynasty was inherited and carried forward, and the new popular music form - Ci was favored. On the banks of the Sandong Bridge in the west gate of Chengdu, facing the Qintai Road of the Twelve Bridges where Sima Xiangru plays the piano, is the mausoleum built by the former king of Shu, Yongling.

Walking into the tomb, there is a huge coffin bed.On the east, west and south sides of the coffin bed, there are twenty-four exquisite music and dance sculptures, four on the front and ten on each side.Except for the two dancers, the other 22 pieces are playing music.They are playing Jiegu (2), playing cymbals, blowing shells, blowing sheng, blowing leaves, playing harp, blowing bamboo (2), playing zither, playing panxiao, blowing chi, clapping (2), playing pipa, Hitting the Dutan Drum, Hitting the Qi Drum, Hitting the Waist Drum, Playing the Flute, Hitting the Chicken Lou Drum and Shaking the Drum, Hitting the Dala Drum, and Hitting the Maoyuan Drum.This is a fairly complete system of palace bands, similar to the system of Kucha, Gaochang, Tianzhu, and Shule in the "Ten Music" of the Tang Dynasty recorded in "Old Tang Book·Music History". The music form of the Han nationality is basically retained, and the Qingyue system is different, with bells, chimes, qin, and se as the main instruments. "The music is full of beautiful people all day long, and the sound of the orchestra is in the middle of the day" (Ms. Huarui's "Gong Ci"), "The golden cup is full, listen to the stringed pipe" (Mao Wenxi's "Xixizi"), which are the portrayal of the prosperity of music in Shu during the Five Dynasties .

During the Song and Song Dynasties, literature was valued over military affairs, and the country was weak. After Jingkang, half of the rivers and mountains north of the Yangtze River were lost, and they settled in a corner of the south of the Yangtze River. However, culture and art were extremely developed. No matter poetry, calligraphy, painting, music and dance, they all reached a high level. Level. The metropolises of the Song Dynasty were extremely prosperous, not only the capital of Bianliang (now Kaifeng, Henan) in the Northern Song Dynasty and Lin'an (now Hangzhou, Zhejiang), the capital of the Southern Song Dynasty, but also other metropolises, such as Chengdu, Jiankang (now Nanjing, Jiangsu), Yangzhou, etc. It is very prosperous, with dancing pavilions and singing stages everywhere, and loud and clear songs.The ruling class indulged in the enjoyment of sensuality, and lived a life of luxury and luxury with daily tours, banquets, and nightly singing and dancing. With the increasing development of industry and commerce, the ranks of the citizen class continued to expand. The demand for Baixi is also increasing.

First of all, more singing words became the mainstream in Song Dynasty. Words are more closely related to music than poetry.Theoretically speaking, there are poems that cannot be sung, but there are no words that cannot be sung.The rise of Ci was originally due to the four, five, and seven-character poems being too uniform in form and unable to adapt to the increasingly colorful music.As a result, a new form of poetry with different sentence patterns and large or small systems emerged, forming different Cipai. The popularity of Ci in the Song Dynasty far exceeded that of poetry in the Tang Dynasty.As the representative literature of the Song Dynasty, almost all emperors, generals, literati, and even some reckless heroes and common people can write lyrics with their voices.

If poetry can be sung but not sung, then words must be sung. Even Su Shi’s bold and unrestrained words, which were criticized by some people, are also suitable for "Kanxi Dahan" who sings with "bronze pipa and iron Chuoban" .Of course, not every word has ever been sung, just like the Zaju and Nanxi operas of later generations, not all scripts have been reproduced on stage. The prosperity of cities in the Song Dynasty also enabled the growth of the citizen class.What they like is folk music such as folk song, dance, rap and opera juggling popular in Goulan tile houses and even open-air places.

Goulan Wasi (also known as "Washe") in the Song Dynasty was a place where entertainment venues were concentrated in big cities.There are many sheds built in the tiles, and a number of railings are set up in the sheds, which are used as places for singing, dancing and opera performances.There are often dozens of Goulangs in large tiles. These Goulans vary in size, and the largest can even accommodate thousands of people. There are many such Goulan tiles in a city, and you can imagine the grand performances. The performances in Goulanwasi are quite rich.There are history books, dramas, sumo wrestling, scriptures, novels, Hesheng, kicking bottles and playing bowls, rod puppets, hanging silk puppets, teaching birds, pretending to be gods and ghosts, dancing fan music, water puppets, movies, selling purine singing, singing Earn money, rap and sing Zhugong tunes, Joe sumo wrestling, talk dirty, play, learn local dialect, etc.

In addition to Goulan Wasi, restaurants, teahouses, song halls, and brothels all have different forms of performances of singing, dancing and acrobatics.The status of performances in restaurants and teahouses is a little higher, which is called "catch up with people".There is also a kind of artist called "Luqiren" performing on the side of the road or in the square, called "Dayehe", with the lowest status. The rap music in the Song Dynasty was very developed, and those closely related to music included Xiaochang, Puchang, Calling, Changzhuan, Zhugongdiao, Taozhen, Guzici and instrumental music performance, etc.Besides Yaci, business riddles, history narration, novels, scriptures, playing and singing karma, singing "Dialing Constantly", chanting, and connecting chambers, etc., all of which have a part of chorus singing.

Drama is a comprehensive art, which includes literature, music, dance, painting, sculpture, architecture and other artistic elements, and has a strong ornamental value, but it appeared late in China, and it was not until the Song Dynasty that it had a real meaning drama emerges. The operas of the Song Dynasty are mainly Zaju popular in the Central Plains (including Lin'an area) and Nanxi opera popular in Wenzhou area in the south. Some new musical instruments appeared in the Song Dynasty, and some old musical instruments were further improved. The new wind instruments mainly include: Gongchenguan, Guandi, Qiangdi, Xiaogudi, Partridge, Husheng, Qixing, Hengxiao, and Vertical Xiao , times four, silver character middle tube, middle tube times five and so on.The new stringed instruments mainly include: spade qin, gourd qin, Bohai qin, double rhyme and so on.

The Xiqin and Guzheng that appeared in the Tang Dynasty both use bamboo slices as bows, and the timbre is not too beautiful.During the Northern Song Dynasty, the horsetail huqin, a stringed instrument with a horsetail as a bow, finally appeared, and it was introduced to the Central Plains along with the ethnic minority captives.This is a very big progress. On this basis, stringed instruments have gradually developed a huge family of drawn stringed instruments with horsetails as bows.