Nearly 40 ethnic groups, about 680 folk musicians, more than 230 kinds of folk musical instruments, 1300,100 folk music, 2019,<> pictures, <> million words of Chinese and English text materials, this is the "Chinese music map" system built by Ye Yunchuan, a national music producer. Since <>, he has led the production team to travel through more than ten provinces (autonomous regions and municipalities) across the country, recording the original singing and performance of folk artists of all ethnic groups, using music to retrieve the memory of the nation, and finding the origin of life from the mother tongue. Recently, a reporter from China Youth Daily interviewed Ye Yunchuan in the warm square live broadcast room to listen to him tell the story behind the "China Music Map".
"I am a Sichuan Hakka and have been backpacking since I was 14 years old. Whenever I hear folk music, I get goosebumps and tears in my eyes. I really want to bring Chinese music to the world and tell Chinese music stories in the world's musical language. In 2003, Ye Yunchuan founded the "Ruiming Music" brand, which used 20 years to promote the exchange, collision and integration of Chinese national music and world music. He said: "Our nation has very rich musical elements, but lacks international interpretation and high-quality presentation. Therefore, he set out again and again, constantly trying to cross borders or cross-cultural integration of Chinese music and jazz, blues, Latin, classical, New Age music and other musical forms. He traveled to Boston to use the traditional Chinese instrument Suona and Pipe Dialogue, the first performance-grade organ in the United States, born in 1863; He also went to Japan to interpret classic Chinese and Japanese folk songs with Japanese bang music such as shakuhachi, pipa, shamisen, taiko and other Japanese bang music and Chinese folk music improvisational ensembles that were transmitted to Japan thousands of years ago, and revive Tang and Song culture.
Ye Yunchuan said: "Foreign musicians often ask me: What is Chinese music? Where do Chinese feel their folk music? This question is difficult to answer. In his view, traditional Chinese music is distributed in 960.<> million square kilometers, with thousands of years of culture and history, as well as hundreds of musical instruments passed down for thousands of years, and all ethnic groups and regions have rich musical cultural treasures, "It is difficult to tell others what Chinese music is in a simple way."
In 2019, Ye Yunchuan launched the "China Music Map" project, which was funded by the National Arts Fund. He tried to establish a musical system, deconstructing Chinese music from the perspectives of ethnicity, geography, style, and instrument form, and using the concept of music map to answer the world's "This is traditional Chinese music". "If you don't explore 'who you are,' you won't know where you're going," he said. ”
"Culture is disappearing much faster than we think." Ye Yunchuan believes that when the way of life has undergone tremendous changes, traditional culture is also constantly being lost. For example, with the development of industrialization and urbanization, the labor trumpet created in primitive labor is no longer needed, and its disappearance is almost inevitable. "Originally, each ethnic group used its own language and culture to express their emotions, but when the descendants could only speak Mandarin, their respective emotional expressions became more and more similar, and the descendants were even more unable to understand the culture of their predecessors, and the multiculturalism began to flatten." He hopes that through the collection, arrangement and recording of these music, with international production requirements and standards, the most original and precious sounds are widely collected and picked up in the local national culture, so as to evoke cordial national memories and reconnect with nature and the umbilical cord of life through music.
In the past four years, Ye Yunchuan led the team, under the guidance of recording master Li Dakang, to nearly 4 provinces (autonomous regions and municipalities) across the country, looking for concert halls, theaters and other venues in various places, using world-class recording equipment and extremely high sampling frequency to record the subtle emotions, breathing, heartbeat and every moment of emotion of each folk musician when playing and singing.
Among them, Xi'an drum music is the longest recorded in the project, with a history of nearly 1300,1000 years, and it is said that it was handed down by musicians who escaped from the court during the Anshi Rebellion, and it has been preserved almost as it is. "When the music of more than <>,<> years ago sounded, as soon as that dignified and graceful temperament came out, you listened, wow! This should be the voice of that era! Do you know who those players are? They are just villagers in the suburbs of Xi'an, but as soon as their Sheng, pipe, flute, and drum come out, they listen to court music, and they are the gorgeous Yale and Yanle of the Tang Dynasty. Ye Yunchuan believes that music can most faithfully record and reflect the traditional culture and style of a nation, "like a living bloodline, it continuously transports the nutrients of the strata and region where a nation is rooted, and the indescribable imprint." ”
Among the singers and performers who participated in the recording of the project, there were inheritors of intangible cultural heritage at all levels, such as Gu Yulin, Tian Xiaoli, Luo Fengxue, Zhang Shunying, Bian Ba Tashi, etc., as well as folk music artists Zhao Jiazhen and Guo Yazhi, who toured the world all year round. Covering nearly 40 ethnic groups such as Han, Mongolian, Tibetan, Uygur, Kazakh, Zhuang, Bai, Yi, Korean, etc., 1300,218 pieces of music have been carefully recorded, and selected ethnic music tracks involving more than 30 genres such as Xi'an drum music, Jiangnan silk bamboo, and Zhihua Sijing music, including traditional music masterpieces such as "Zhaojun Out of the Block", "Out of Water Lotus", "High Mountains and Flowing Water", as well as ethnic minority music epics such as "The Legend of King Gesar", "Manas" and "Ashima". The genre involves mountain songs, pastoral songs, fishing songs, labor trumpets, opera, rap, ethnic minority court music, instrumental solo ensembles and other forms; It uses as many as <> kinds of traditional musical instruments and collects nearly <>,<> words of written materials.
Ye Yunchuan said: "Folk music is even harder than we thought. I met an 18th-generation Huayin old dialect, and her children didn't want to learn the Huayin old dialect. Each nation has its own cultural heritage, and when I feel sad about the loss of culture, I am happy because of our record, which will be preserved forever. Eternal. Whether our children and grandchildren will be hundreds of years or a thousand years from now, they can also understand the traditional Chinese culture through images, sound and words. ”
Traditions need to be inherited, culture needs to be carried forward, and dissemination is the best way to protect national music. Ye Yunchuan revealed that in the future, he will lead the team to continue to record in more regions, record more disappearing national voices, and continuously improve with high-quality digital production, multimedia preservation and international promotion, and establish a systematic and three-dimensional "Chinese music map" with both macro and subtlety, leaving a precious national music record full of memories and stories for future generations.
China Youth Daily / China Youth Net reporter Zhang Shitong Source: China Youth Daily