“A person who could tune a piano may not be able to tune a yangqin,” says Xu, “because yangqins have so many strings and they often get loose.” Those strings that produce mid and high range tones are normally made of steel. Now some yangqin can span five and a half octaves.Īmong all existing Chinese musical instruments, owing to its broadest spectrum and highest number of strings, the yangqin also has the most complicated modulation mechanism. But in the early 1970s, the modulating yangqins with four sets of frets was invented, increasing its music range to four and half octaves. Ancient yangqins only had a range of two and a half octaves. More Octaves and Strings, a Test for Tunersĭuring the 400 years since the yangqin was brought to China, few modifications had been made to the modulation mechanism of the musical instrument, until in the 1960s after the founding of the People’s Republic of China. Xu Xuedong, a yangqin virtuoso and composer. Different choices of striking material mark a key difference between Chinese yangqin and Western hammered dulcimers. There is much truth to this statement as in Chinese culture, bamboo is the personification of a number of admirable traits, for example an unyielding spirit. “Bamboo is bouncy,” explained Xu, “and the bamboo hammers bounce back easier once they strike the board.” He also believes that the reason why Chinese people in the past chose bamboo hammers rather than wood hammers was that bamboo represented the spirit of Chinese literati. Chinese people opt for bamboo hammers because bamboo exhibits better natural elasticity. The original yangqin was played with wooden hammers. Throughout the development history of yangqin in China, it has undergone several major changes. In Beijing Qinshu, sanxian (a Chinese stringed instrument) and yangqin are the only instruments used in the orchestra. For example, the yangqin has been the main accompaniment instrument in the orchestra of the folk opera form Qinshu, which has different local versions like Sichuan Qinshu and Shandong Qinshu. By late Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), the yangqin had become an essential part of nearly all Chinese folk operas for various ethnic groups across China. When it came to the late Ming Dynasty, the rise of Chinese folk opera art along with the increasing popularity of Chinese novels bolstered a rapid integration of the yangqin with local folk instruments, giving birth to a new form of orchestra and adding a new charm to Chinese folk art. It arrived in Guangdong Province and then spread to other inland regions including provinces of Guangxi, Sichuan, and Hunan. On March 27, 2016, a group of primary school students perform classic Chinese music on yangqin in a peach orchard in Wuma Town, Qiaocheng District of Bozhou City in Anhui Province.Īccording to historical records, during the reign of Emperor Wanli (1573-1620) in the late Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), the yangqin first came into China via the Maritime Silk Road. The yangqin is not only popular in China, but also widely played by people in Korea, Japan, and Southeast Asian countries. With reforms to adapt to Chinese culture, the yangqin has gradually evolved into an independent Chinese instrument, markedly distinct from those hammered dulcimers outside China. For instance, in terms of appearance, the yangqin is much larger than the santur in India while much smaller than the hammered dulcimer in Romania. Though they all trace their early roots back to the region of Iran, the shape, structure, and playing methods of each member of the hammered dulcimer family significantly differ from country to country. Xu adds, “The yangqin is the only musical instrument that has similar versions of it being played in more than 60 countries.” Today, the yangqin and its foreign “counterparts” are called by different names in various countries, but it is generally known by its English name hammered dulcimer. “Consequently, the yangqin is also known as the ‘Chinese piano.’” “It is widely recognized that the piano is a variant instrument of China’s yangqin, one major difference being that the hammers and strings of the piano are placed inside the instrument body instead of outside like the yangqin,” said the Minzu University professor Xu Xuedong, a yangqin virtuoso and composer.
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