"Speak Your Heart", "Don't Say Nothing", "What Are You Doing as a Soldier", "Little Poplar", "Family Harmony", "Shaolin Shaolin", "Playing My Beloved Pipa"... For most Chinese people, seeing To these song titles, the familiar melodies seem to linger in the ears.
On the Spring Festival Evening, in the "Heart to Heart" condolence performance, in the stereo of the street shop... For half a century, the singer Yu Junjian has sang these unforgettable songs for the people on various stages familiar to the Chinese people. melody.
1. Use five monographs to answer questions and doubts about the national singing method
The year 2021 just passed is the 50th anniversary of Yu Junjian's career in art, which coincides with the second year of the outbreak of the new crown pneumonia epidemic. Yu Junjian, who had retired from the transfer unit China Federation of Literary and Art Circles in 2016, began to write and work in the study.
"I remember that my biggest ideal when I was a child was not singing. My favorite was astronomy and geography, history, and writing. I really didn't expect that singing would become the 'ferry' of my life." In the dead of night, Yu Junjian thought of himself from time to time. On this road of fifty years, "suddenly bursts of pride and pride, bursts of bitterness and heartache..." Compared with the brilliance in the eyes of outsiders, he is well aware of the difficulty of his artistic life. Books, as a form of commemoration, "a form of commemoration that is very self-contained and less troublesome to others", can be regarded as an explanation for myself.
A year later, these "pride and bitterness", through Yu Junjian's "handwriting", turned into five books with a total of 1.5 million words: two monographs on vocal music, two collections of prose, and one collection of ancient poetry.
Except for "Yu Junjian Vocal Music Notes", which was organized according to the shorthand of the class content, everything else was handwritten by him word by word: he got up at 4 o'clock every day and insisted on writing for seven or eight hours.
"I was working on several books at the same time. When I was writing, the manuscripts of the five books were placed on the table, and I wrote to the place where they got stuck. Writing another book is equivalent to changing my brain."
People who have read the book do not think that this is just a "gift" from Yu Junjian. People's Music Publishing House commented on "Yu Junjian: Questions and Answers on Ethnic Singing 131 Cases": The question and answer context is clear, and it is professional, instructive, and practical in ethnic singing. , Realistic and forward-looking.
After studying and reading it, people's doubts about the development and reality of ethnic singing suddenly become clear.
It not only combs the history, but also faces the present.
Yu Yinping, a peasant singer from Gansu Province, said: "After class, when I heard Wupan (a student of Yu Junjian's vocal music charity classroom) sing "The Song of Two Places", I suddenly felt very cordial, and my voice seemed to be much closer to people. It's close to people's hearts." The "class" in Yu Yinping's mouth happened in the vocal music public welfare classroom that Yu Junjian opened in Beijing to teach hundreds of students for free, because Yu Junjian put the video of the class on the Internet, like Yu Yinping " Foreigners” are also benefited.
The valuable vocal experience in these classes was collected by Yu Junjian into a book, another of the five books - "Yu Junjian Vocal Notes".
2. Don't ignore "Chinese standard" in order to achieve "sound standard"
In 2014, when the famous musician Zhou Weizhi passed away, Yu Junjian went to express his condolences. Zhou Weizhi's wife, Wang Kun, who was also a famous singer, said to him: "You must tell young people how to sing 'national singing'. The real 'ethnic singing' came alive."
What kind of language has what kind of singing method, and what kind of singing method can produce what kind of song, Yu Junjian firmly believes that this is the necessity of a national cultural bloodline.
The Chinese language has "Thirteen Ways", which has a rhyme and four tones.
"Language determines the singing method. Compared with bel canto, which emphasizes 'in place', our national singing method emphasizes 'flavor'. According to our language structure and voice state, we must sing out our own characteristics."
In a public welfare lecture, the children present were fifteen or sixteen years old, and Yu Junjian asked them if they knew what "original singing" was, but no one knew.
He also asked if many children born after 2000 like folk songs?
Do you like folk singing?
More than half of the answers were "what is a folk song" and "what is a national singing method".
However, Yu Junjian knows that there are many authentic and excellent practitioners in our national singing method.
"The so-called original taste should be Wang Kun, Guo Lanying, Caidan Zhuoma, Deng Yuhua, Wang Yinxuan, Guo Song, Hu Songhua, He Jiguang, Kerimu, etc. In addition to these older generation singers, there should also be Li Guyi, Wu Yanze, Zhu Fengbo, Li Shuangjiang, Jiang Dawei", singers of authentic Chinese folk songs, always put the "taste" of folk songs in the first place in their singing concept and singing awareness, "No matter how they sing, in their singing, they always put A strong Chinese 'flavor' as the main manifestation".
"Water" can be sung to express the sense of flow, "scent" can be sung to taste, and "white" can be sung to color.
In the song "Who Doesn't Say My Hometown Is Good", there is a sentence "layers of green", and the layers of green can also be sung.
"If you don't sing the 'preface' of 'layer', the song will have no taste, and you won't be able to sing the meaning of 'layer'. Don't ignore the 'Chinese standard' in order to achieve the 'sound standard' '".
The "standard of sound" is precisely the criterion followed by bel canto. Yu Junjian believes that we must emphasize that between national singing and bel canto, there must be a relationship of learning from each other's strengths and learning from each other, and it should never be led by the nose. relationship, let alone who should "dissolve" who's relationship.
3. Artists must have sincere feelings
On Yu Junjian's own public account, on May 31, he posted a post and recommended two songs. The post was titled "Music of Joy and Sadness in Very Days". It is a cheerful Mongolian style song.
He briefly introduced these two pieces in the post, and wrote in his recommendation: This sad and joyful piece of music, a piece of song, is intertwined with human feelings in the current anti-epidemic days.
At the opening ceremony of each session of the National Vocal Music Advanced Seminar taught by Yu Junjian, he will put forward to the students "three essentials" as an artist: to pursue artistic spirit, to improve humanistic quality, and to cultivate compassion.
"An artist must have a poetic state, and a poetic state at all times. This is the spirit of art. At the same time, it is necessary to treat others with compassion, which is the perception in art. Art is the carrier of human emotion and human understanding. One’s own way should be full of humanistic feelings, without such feelings, art can’t be done well.”
He fondly recalled those predecessors who carefully pronounced their names in his mouth: "In their singing, they pursue the precision, precision, essence, and even spirit of national language, Chinese emotion, and regional style." He reminded the future The singers must not be lacking in these aspects.
When the Golden Bell Awards just ended, four of the five gold award winners came from the "Yu Junjian Public Welfare Classroom". Yu Junjian was both surprised and surprised, but he was not so "surprised" when he thought about it. He was not proud of his music classroom, but he was I am glad that my insistence on teaching the original ethnic singing method is effective.
He wrote in the preface to his new book: I hope to be able to clarify and find the difference between national singing and bel canto.
Just as we need to find the formal and aesthetic differences between ballet and folk classical dance, oil painting and ink painting, Gothic architecture and Baroque architecture and large roof and stilted building, tuxedo and cardigan, etc.
"Sincereness is the soul of all arts", he answered in the question and answer in the book how to make the singing "unforgettable".
"Tomorrow will be beautiful. If the motherland is strong, the nation will be confident in its singing. If the motherland is prosperous, the future of national vocal music will be prosperous." He wrote in the postscript of the book.
(Reporter Li Jinrong)