Analysis of aesthetic connotation of cucurbit silk What is the meaning of aesthetic connotation?

China's national musical instruments have a long history and a wide variety. According to the different pronunciation principles and playing methods, it can be divided into four categories: wind instruments, stringed instruments, plucked instruments and percussion instruments. Hulusi is a reed instrument in wind instruments, which was first popular in Dai areas of Yunnan. Its timbre is thick, soft, simple, full of personality, unique and beautiful, small and exquisite, easy to carry, and it is more and more loved by music lovers and listeners. With the exchange of music culture between East and West, Hulusi music has a great influence in the world. In August 2000, the author went to Britain to attend the 36th International Folk Art Festival, and the cucurbit flute solo was interviewed and recorded by BBC Radio. This performance made me feel the joy of success and inspired my interest and hobby in learning this instrument.

First, the craft is exquisite and beautiful.

Hulusi is a characteristic musical instrument with unique shape and structure, and its production embodies exquisite craftsmanship. Hulusi consists of a complete gourd, three bamboo tubes and three metal reeds, with a total length of about 30 cm. A bamboo tube is inserted into the handle end of the gourd as a vent hole, and the whole gourd is used as a bellows. Three bamboo tubes with different thicknesses are inserted at the bottom of the gourd, and each bamboo tube inserted in the gourd is inlaid with a copper or silver reed. The middle main pipe is the thickest, with 7 sound holes (plus 6 backs 1), which can play the melody sound of g-g 1. The auxiliary pipes on both sides only have reeds without sound holes, and can only produce harmony with the main pipe. Usually, the thinner bamboo pipes produce A sound, and the thinnest ones produce e 1 sound.

1, elegant appearance

Hulusi has bamboo leaf yellow, walnut brown, or natural patterns formed by two colors, with purple bamboo tubes, which have various charming shapes and different natural colors. Its shell is smooth, its cortex is hard, it is easy to carve, and it can be used for painting and poetry. Its structure is decorative, reflecting the simple and elegant natural atmosphere.

Gourd melons are round and full in appearance, symbolizing harmony and happiness, and are loved and cherished by people. It is the representative symbol of auspicious culture in China, with a special style of vigorous, simple, concise and lively. Gourd and melon are specially used to make gourd silk gas boxes. Choose ripe gourds and melons with yellow color, thick and firm skin, beautiful, dense and not easy to break. The shape of cucurbit silk is related to tonality, and its pitch is smaller than that of cucurbit silk. The cucurbit silk with a deep voice is bigger than the cucurbit melon. Take the commonly used five keys as an example, gourd and melon are arranged in order from small to large: small D key, C key, bB key, G key and F key.

In the traditional culture of China, bamboo symbolizes the elasticity, longevity and happiness of life. Its shape is tall and slender, and it is green all year round. Known as one of the four gentlemen of Mei Lan, Zhu Ju and Mei Songzhu, one of the three friends. The bamboo tube used to make cucurbit silk directly affects the timbre, and purple bamboo is the best, followed by bitter bamboo and phoenix bamboo. Generally, bamboo is solid, old, dry and round without cracks, and the thickness of both ends is not much different. It's better to have a certain weight. The inner diameter of the bamboo tube should basically match the corresponding tonality, and the difference should not be too big (generally not more than two millimeters).

2, superb technical beauty

Hulusi requires accurate pronunciation, soft tone, smooth interval and easy playing, which is closely related to the production process. Although the cost of its production materials is not high, it has extremely high technical requirements and is a fine manual stunt. Pronunciation is the core part of cucurbit silk, which determines its timbre, volume and durability. In history, the selection of cucurbit silk pronunciation has gone through a process from leaves to bamboo and then to copper. Teacher Yang Sheng, the producer of cucurbit silk, made many changes and changed the pronunciation of cucurbit silk to copper. This kind of copper reed tongue expands the range and volume, and the timbre is also beautiful. The change of pronunciation has made a big leap in the production of cucurbit silk. The actual thickness of copper skin is generally 0. 1 mm, but it is best to choose 0.2 mm copper skin, and it is best to make it reach 0. 1 mm after forging. There are also two kinds of copper reeds, brass and copper, among which copper reeds are better. In recent years, Yang Zhiyu, a teacher from Yu Quan Studio, Yunnan Province, processed bullet shells into reeds, which improved the fatigue resistance of the reeds. The volume is also higher than that of ordinary reeds, and the timbre is brighter. This is the highest quality and durability of cucurbit silk made in Yunnan at present.

Second, the rich beauty of national culture.

National culture is the spiritual resource formed in the long-term life of all ethnic groups, and it is a scientific summary of their social, political, economic, historical, cultural and military aspects. National culture is a spiritual heritage accumulated in a long history and an innovative consciousness to promote national progress. Hulusi music shows the true beauty of national life, the profound beauty of national style and the rich beauty of national culture.

1, showing the true beauty of national life.

Music can express people's thoughts and feelings and stimulate people's pursuit of beauty; Music can reflect social reality and show all kinds of worlds. Music can depict nature, present a vibrant artistic conception, and show colorful social life and customs. Hulusi has a special saying among Dai people that "bamboo symbolizes men and gourd symbolizes women". Hulusi is a combination of "gourd" and "bamboo", which means "husband and wife love each other, family is harmonious and life is disaster-free". There is also a touching story among the Dai people: A long time ago, when a flash flood broke out, A Dai's little one held a big gourd and braved the stormy waves to save his sweetheart. His faithful love moved the Buddha. The Buddha inserted a bamboo tube in the golden gourd and gave it to the brave little one. One-inch picked up the golden gourd and blew out wonderful music. Suddenly, it was calm, flowers were in full bloom, and pride was like a peacock. Although we can't verify its concrete authenticity, from these beautiful legends and stories, we can realize that the music culture of Hulusi is closely related to people's lives. For example, Bambusa in the Moonlight: The moonlight is like water, and the breeze is blowing gently. Beautiful A-mei stares out of the window affectionately, listening to the sound of cucurbits admired by spoony brother outside the bamboo building, and they are telling each other their love. The timbre of Hulusi is sometimes mellow and affectionate, sometimes lingering and sometimes bright, creating a soft, quiet and pure picture of Dai life, so that people can truly appreciate the beauty of national life in Hulusi music.

2. It embodies the profound national beauty.

National style is a national characteristic of a nation, which reflects people's living habits, thoughts and feelings, language characteristics, history and culture. People often call the Dai people "the nation of water". They live by the water and celebrate the Water-splashing Festival. "Water" is a vivid portrayal of the national temperament and cultural character of the Dai people ―― tenderness, tranquility, delicacy and beauty. Hulusi has a series of special skills in playing techniques, such as virtual finger vibrato, abdominal vibrato, playing, overlapping, sliding, circulating ventilation, etc., which can show the national style embodied by different themes, genres, artistic conception and emotions, such as playing the first two paragraphs of Hulusi's famous song Deep in the Bamboo Forest:

The "3" sound in the second paragraph should be played with virtual finger vibrato and used according to the requirements of folk customs. The fingers that play the sound can't play too fast and too firmly, so as to produce a vibrato effect similar to that when rubbing strings, showing a strong Dai rhyme. The national temperament and cultural character of the Dai people, such as "water", are deeply infiltrated and embodied in the music culture of Hulusi. Through the forms and techniques with national characteristics, they show their unique national style everywhere in the fields of material culture and spiritual culture, which is natural with the beautiful local natural environment and gives people a very harmonious and quiet feeling.

Third, the unique artistic beauty of music.

Music content is an artistic display of the beauty of human thought, emotion and social practice. The beauty of music art is the lingering melody, the coordination of harmony and the ups and downs of rhythm. The beauty of music art is inseparable from the creation of musicians and the appreciation of appreciators. The delicate and gentle music of cucurbit silk originated from life just shows this artistic beauty.

1, beautiful sound form

Music is an art with sound expression, and sound is the material basis for carrying music, and it is also a means for composers to think artistically, shape music images and express emotions. It is the basis for performers to transform musical works into sound forms and convey them to the audience; It is an audio intermediary for listeners to perceive the artistic beauty of music through hearing. Hulusi is often used to play folk tunes such as folk songs, and it is most suitable for playing music or dance music with smooth melody. Generally, the tunes are long, and the music is soft and harmonious, which can better express the thoughts and feelings of the players. Hulusi is deeply loved by people for its smooth breath, soft and delicate timbre and mellow and simple performance. At present, the cucurbit silk used is divided into single tube and double tube. In addition to the main pipe, the right attached pipe of the single-tube cucurbit silk is also designed with a "3" sound, which is usually plugged with a soft plug, and the soft plug can be pulled when pronunciation is needed. In addition to the main tube and the "3" sound attachment tube, the double-tube gourd silk also has a "6" sound attachment tube on the left attachment tube, which can open two soft plugs at the same time when necessary. Although the range of Hulusi is very narrow, it has a certain harmony effect and can show a perfect musical image in a limited range. Compared with other traditional Chinese musical instruments, its unique timbre is very fresh and has a strong and mellow local flavor. With the development of the times, some Hulusi musical instruments and modern electronic musical instruments can also reflect the perfect combination of tradition and modernity, giving people a brand-new feeling.

2. The theme is beautiful.

The visual image in painting and sculpture can directly show the characteristics of a certain shape and color of objective things. Music uses the corresponding relationship between sound changes and emotional ups and downs to indirectly reflect the complex relationship between social life and people's ideological and emotional changes, arouse aesthetic feelings and arouse certain emotional images. Hulusi is the most popular among Dai, Achang and other ethnic groups. Young men and women express their feelings or people walk on the road and work in the fields. They often play cucurbit silk, which adds a lot of joy to people's lives, such as "Wedding Vow": Brother and sister are in love, as if the running water rings day and night, sometimes the running water will run out, and my brother will always be by my side ...; Butterfly spring: Dali has beautiful scenery in March, and butterfly spring is easy to dress. Butterflies come to collect flowers and honey. What is the reason why A-mei combs her hair? Butterflies come to collect flowers and honey, what kind of piles is A-mei combing her hair … and so on. , are well-known Hulusi famous songs. Hulusi music has a wide range of performances and rich themes, such as the sincere love of young men and women, beautiful bamboo forest scenery, charming moonlight night scene, national customs of festivals, etc ... The theme expressed by Hulusi music is soft and beautiful, which makes people relaxed and happy, and reflects the people's pursuit of truth, goodness and beauty.

3. Inner emotional beauty

Music is not a simple imitation of natural sounds. Music works must be combined with special subjective feelings to be meaningful, and should reflect the beauty of external skills and thoughts and feelings. Music should have not only "musicality" but also "emotion", which is the inherent beauty of music. Due to the limitation of the structure itself, the performance of cucurbit flute is somewhat simple compared with national wind instruments such as bamboo flute and suona, and there are not so many complicated techniques, but it is an emotional instrument with sweet timbre and strong expressive force. For example, Love Song of Bamboo House is a musical work with strong national charm, which shows the sweetness of love between young men and women of ethnic minorities. Introduction: young men are waiting for their sweetheart under the bamboo building, and beautiful girls are dressing up; The first part: echo up and down, two people snuggle up to each other and tell each other their hearts; Intermittent and the second part: faster, lively and cheerful, singing and dancing; Conclusion: The changes in the first part are repeated, the music is weakened, and they are reluctant to part. The beauty of music not only has the rhythm of notes, but also contains emotions. Hulusi's music is not only the interweaving of rhythm, melody, harmony and parts, but also makes people understand the emotions contained in it through the effects of melody, rhythm and harmony, and deepens their feelings about the connotation of music.

In a word, Hulusi is a traditional national musical instrument in China. Its origin can be traced back to the pre-Qin period. It not only permeates the connotation of national culture for hundreds of years, but also has distinctive local characteristics and strong national artistic style. Both timbre and external structure have high artistic aesthetic value, which is an important part of China traditional culture. After the founding of New China, China national musicians constantly reformed Hulusi, and a large number of famous folk music creators and performers emerged. China has a profound history and culture for thousands of years. Hulusi still occupies an important position in modern culture because of its unique historical origin, profound cultural connotation and broad mass base. With the progress of the times, we should continue to carry forward the national music culture, and let Hulusi go from folk to society, from domestic to international, and become a bright pearl in Chinese national culture.

Zhang Jianzhuang: Hunan Women's Vocational College

Zhang Kuikui: Hunan Women's Vocational College

Editor in Charge: Zhao Zhuo