MUSIC

• Peking Opera


  Considered the highest form of art in China, featuring speech, singing, mime and acrobatics performed to instrumental accompaniment
• Divisions of Peking Opera instruments

  • Wenchang (to accompany singing, featuring stringed instruments)
  • Wuchang (to accompany acting, dancing, and fighting, featuring percussion instruments)
• Elements of Peking Opera

  • Melody
  • Tempo
  • Harmony
• Pengling


  • Two small bells made of high-tin bronze, without internal clappers, and hemispheric or bottomless gourd-like in shape
• Dizi


  • Bamboo flute in Chinese, played horizontally and commonly carved out of a single piece of bamboo with a cork-lined blow hole
• Yunlou


  • Tuned with seven pitches to the octave, may be carried by a handle or set on a table
• Guzheng


  • A Chinese zither, a kind of plucked instrument with a pentatonic scale using the notes do, re, so and la
• Types of Jingxi melodies

  • Xipi
  • Erhuang
• Xipi and Erhuang


  Both use Yuanbans
• Erhuang


  Serious and lyrical text, fiddle may be played and tuned lower, emphasize using a pentatonic scale in G and C with C equivalent between the Western B and B
• Erhuang

  Accompanies stories or moods of loss and sorrow in Peking Opera
• Xipi


  Can be heard during the happy and bright moments, emphasize using a pentatonic scale in E and A in the context of a scale starting on C
• Musical elements of Peking Opera

  • Melody
  • Tempo
  • Harmony
• Pengling


  • Two small bells made of high-tin bronze, without internal clappers, and hemispheric or bottomless gourd-like in shape
• Moods in Xipi

  • Happiness
  • Agitation
  • Anger
• Dizi


  • Bamboo flute in Chinese, played horizontally, commonly carved out of a single piece of bamboo with a cork-lined blow hole
• Jingxi texts

  Series of couplets of 7 or 10 syllables each
• Arias


  Categorized into different types but in a recognizable way
• Musical tension

  Using an incomplete melodic cadence (point of resolution) aids the tune to create a sense of forward motion and tension
• Yunlou


  • Tuned with seven pitches to the octave, may be carried by a handle or set on a table
• Guzheng


  • A Chinese zither, a kind of plucked instrument with a pentatonic scale using the notes do, re, so and la
• Jing's melodies

  • Xipi
  • Erhuang
• Xipi and Erhuang both use Yuanbans
• Erhuang


  Serious and lyrical text
• Erhuang tunes

  Accompany stories or moods of loss and sorrow in Peking Opera
• Moods in Peking Opera

  • Happiness
  • Agitation
  • Anger
• Jingju arias

  Series of couplets of 7 or 10 syllables each
• What are these called?

  Pengling

  
• What is this called?

  Dizi

  
• What is this called?

  Yunlou

  
• What is this called?

  Guzheng

  
• What does the wenchang accompanies?

  Singing and stringed instruments
• What does the Wuchang accompanies?

  acting, dancing, and percussion instrument