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China Music
Chinese music appears to date back to the dawn of Chinese
civilization, and documents and artifacts provide evidence of a
well-developed musical culture as early as the Zhou dynasty (1027-
221 B.C.). The Imperial Music Bureau, first established in the Qin
dynasty (221-207 B.C.), was greatly expanded under the Han emperor
Wu Di (140-87 B.C.) and charged with supervising court music and
military music and determining what folk music would be officially
recognized. In subsequent dynasties, the development of Chinese
music was strongly influenced by foreign music, especially that of
Central Asia.
Chinese vocal music has traditionally been sung in a thin,
nonresonant voice or in falsetto and is usually solo rather than
choral. All traditional Chinese music is melodic rather than
harmonic. Instrumental music is played on solo instruments or in
small ensembles of plucked and bowed stringed instruments, flutes,
and various cymbals, gongs, and drums. The scale has five notes.
The New Culture Movement of the 1910s and 1920s evoked a great
deal of lasting interest in Western music as a number of Chinese
musicians who had studied abroad returned to perform Western
classical music and to compose works of their own based on the
Western musical notation system. Symphony orchestras were formed in
most major cities and performed to a wide audience in the concert
halls and on radio. Popular music--greatly influenced by Western
music, especially that of the United States--also gained a wide
audience in the 1940s. After the 1942 Yan'an Forum on Literature
and Art, a large-scale campaign was launched in the Communistcontrolled areas to adapt folk music to create revolutionary songs
to educate the largely illiterate rural population on party goals.
After the establishment of the People's Republic, revolutionary
songs continued to be performed, and much of the remainder of
popular music consisted of popular songs from the Soviet Union with
the lyrics translated into Chinese. Symphony orchestras flourished
throughout the country, performing Western classical music and
compositions by Chinese composers. Conservatories and other
institutions of musical instruction were developed and expanded in
the major cities. A number of orchestras from Eastern Europe
performed in China, and Chinese musicians and musical groups
participated in a wide variety of international festivals.
During the height of the Cultural Revolution, musical
composition and performance were greatly restricted. After the
Cultural Revolution, musical institutions were reinstated and
musical composition and performance revived. In 1980 the Chinese
Musicians' Association was formally elected to the International
Musicological Society. Chinese musical groups toured foreign
countries, and foreign musical organizations performed in China. In
the mid-1980s popular ballads and Western folk and classical music
still drew the greatest audiences, but other kinds of music,
including previously banned Western jazz and rock and roll, were
being performed and were receiving increasing acceptance,
especially among young people.
Data as of July 1987
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