yellow river analysis

Music Teacher June 2012 1

KS5KS5 Xian Xinghai Yellow River Piano Concerto

by Alan Charlton

IntRoduCtIon

Xian Xinghai’s Yellow River Piano Concerto is one of the two prescribed set works for IB HL and SL for exami-

nation in 2013–14, the other being Prokofiev’s Classical Symphony. As the Yellow River Piano Concerto is a

new set work – and quite unusual in style and structure – this resource builds on Music Teacher’s April 2012

resource, offering more detailed analysis of the work.

Knowledge and understanding of the set works is tested in Section A of paper 1 (the listening paper). In this

section, three questions are set, from which students have to answer question 3, comparing the two set works,

and then choose from either question 1 or 2, which are on the respective individual works. Students have clean

scores of the set works with them in the examination. Each question carries 20 marks, so the set works account

for 40 out of 140 total marks for the paper at higher level and 40 out of 120 marks for standard level.

IB set works tend to be selected to highlight links between different musical traditions and Xian’s Yellow River

Piano Concerto, with its strong Chinese and European influences and inseparable relationship to Chinese

political and social concerns, is no exception. This resource will therefore approach the work from this angle,

with the musical elements being explained in this context.

BaCKgRound

China in the Twentieth Century

As with its neighbour Russia, China experienced great political and social upheaval in the twentieth century

that encompassed war, revolution, famine and political repression. Since the 17th century, China had been

ruled by the Qing dynasty, whose vast empire included Tibet, Mongolia and Turkestan. Its power had gradu-

ally waned, with Western powers gaining considerable influence over trade in the nineteenth century. Further

weakened by the Boxer Rebellion of 1899-1901, China became a republic in 1911-12 with the abdication of

the last emperor.

This gave rise to a period of instability during which rival groups sought to wrestle power from Sun Yat-sen’s

leadership, with the Communist Party in particular becoming a growing threat.

In 1925, Chiang Kai-shek’s nationalist party, the Kuomintang, gained control, initiating a civil war with the com-

munists. Then in 1931, Japan invaded, starting a gradual occupation that lasted until the end of the Second

World War. During this period, Mao Zedong became the Communist leader (1934), establishing a base in

Shaanxi Province, before temporarily uniting with the Kuomintang against the Japanese in 1937.

After Japan’s defeat at the end of the Second World War, (1945), the civil war between the Nationalists and

Communists resumed, with Mao declaring victory in 1949, founding the People’s Republic of China. As Stalin

had in Russia, he established an authoritarian regime and set about forcibly redistributing land from landlords

to people’s communes, and developing huge infrastructure projects. The first such economic drive (the “Great

Leap Forward”) in 1958 had to be abandoned after it resulted in famine and millions of deaths. Political isola-

tion, followed with growing threats from both Russia and the West. Concerned that China was increasingly

becoming ruled by an intellectual elite, Mao launched the Cultural Revolution of 1966, in which intellectuals

were moved out of the cities into the countryside to be ‘re-educated’ by the peasants, or in other words forced

to carry out hard manual labour. This period saw the closure of schools amid a climate of fear presided over

by the violent groups of young men known as Red Guards. The worst period of violence ended in 1969, but

Alan Charlton is a freelance composer and has written numerous lesson resources for Music Teacher, including material on the IB set work El Salón México.

Music Teacher June 2012 2

the Cultural Revolution lasted until Mao’s death in 1976. After this, Deng Xiaoping assumed control, bringing

with it a less repressive climate and opening the country up to the outside world. Although human rights con-

tinued to be a considerable issue, the Tiannamen Square massacre of 1989 caused worldwide outrage. Since

then, China has continued to become more open, prosperous and Westernised and is now one of the leading

economies and superpowers in the world.

Why is the above history lesson important? Because the Yellow River Piano Concerto is inseparably linked to

political events in China, in an even more extreme way than Shostakovich’s works were affected by Stalinist

Russia.

Unlike most western classical works, it was composed by no fewer than five people over a period of over 32

years. The original version (Yellow River Cantata) was completed by Xian Xinghai in 1939, when China was at

war with Japan and still divided by civil war between the Communists and Nationalists. This music was then

reworked into the Yellow River Piano Concerto (the IB set work) by four musicians in 1971 during the Cultural

Revolution, when Western culture was considered dangerous and subservience to Chairman Mao and his

entourage was paramount. The influences of these two different periods can be seen very clearly in the music,

so a knowledge of them is essential to it.

MuSIC and PolItICS In 20th CentuRY ChIna

The political upheaval affected the performance and creation of music in a profound way. Two main strands of

music were involved, which went in and out of favour according to the politics of the time.

� Populist music: mass songs, e.g. political songs, workers’ songs

� Cosmopolitan music: Western classical music, e.g. Beethoven, Chopin

Chinese musicians were torn between the last two of these, not least because the Communist Party frequently

changed its stance on the type of music it wanted to promote. At the time of the composition of the Yellow

River Cantata (1939), the Communists tolerated cosmopolitan musicians; musicians who were influenced by

Western music and who sought to emulate Western compositional techniques into their own music. However,

they also wanted to use music as a means of educating the masses in Communist ideals and ultimately to at-

tract their support. In order for this to happen, it had to be popular. Xian Xinghai, composer of the Yellow River

Cantata was widely regarded as the Chinese composer who most successfully combined these two strands.

When the Communists came to power in 1949, the role of music changed from being a revolutionary force to

a means of maintaining order and establishing loyalty towards the regime. The party wanted to create a new

type of music to mark the beginning of a new era and help to define China as a great nation; traditional music

had two many associations with China’s past to be used.

Initially, it was thought that the answer lay in combining political music (Communist songs, marches and so on)

with a Western classical music-influence technique (i.e. western-style harmonisation, instrumentation, forms,

etc.). Cosmopolitan musicians, who had perhaps been musically educated in Europe, were best placed to

write this sort of music as they were the most skilled. Additionally in the 1950s, cosmopolitan Chinese musi-

cians such as the pianist Fou T’song received great acclaim outside of China for their performances, and were

thus valued by the regime, since they enhanced its influence and prestige. At the time, China had close ties

with its communist neighbour Russia, so its artistic influence extended to Eastern Block countries such as

Poland, where Fou T’song won third prize in the Chopin Competition.

However, China fell out with Russia, and this, coupled with Mao Zedong’s movements of Great Leap Forward

and the Cultural Revolution, led to an anti-cosmopolitan climate and the repression of intellectuals, who includ-

ed musicians. During the Cultural Revolution, the heads of China’s musical conservatoires were persecuted by

the Red Guards, with for instance the Shanghai Conservatoire president He Luting, known for his championing

3 Music Teacher June 2012

of European music and criticism of mass song, having his home ransacked and being publicly beaten by Red

Guards. Traditional Chinese music was also attacked.

This led to a musical problem: as European music was effectively banned, many Chinese musicians were out

of work, having nothing to play. There was thus a need to create new works that could be performed but which

also conformed to the ideals of the regime: for a while the only works that had official approval were ‘model

operas’ combining Beijing opera singing and western instruments, such as Yin Chengzong’s ‘The Red Lan-

tern’. It was to provide additional party-approved music that the Yellow River Piano Concerto came into being.

the geneSIS of YelloW RIveR PIano ConCeRto

Xian Xinghai (1905 –1945)

Xian Xinghai composed the original incarnation of the work, called Yellow River Cantata. This was a choral

work in eight movements composed from 1938 –9 during the war with Japan while Xinghai was based at the

Communist headquarters in Yan’an.

Xian had humble origins, being born into a family of boat people. After being introduced to western music

and taking up the clarinet and violin during his time at a school attached to Lignan University, he went on to

study at various Chinese music conservatoires, including Canton, Beijing and Shanghai. In 1930 he travelled

to Paris, where he studied with the French composers Paul Dukas (Composer of ‘The Sorcerer’s Apprentice’)

and Vincent D’Indy. Living in extreme poverty, he nevertheless encountered the impressionistic musical style of

Debussy and others, which must have influenced his approach to orchestration and harmonisation. Returning

to China in 1935, where he became involved in the Communist-backed ‘National Salvation Song Movement’,

whose purpose was to create mass songs with political messages, designed to politicise the workers and thus

gather support and influence for the Communists. Having composed over 400 of these songs, with titles such

as “Battle Song of Resistance against Japan”, in 1938 Xian was appointed head of the Lu Xun Arts Academy at

Yan’an, the Communist party headquarters. While here, he composed four cantatas, two operas and a further

600 mass songs. In 1940, Xian left for Russia to work on music for documentaries, but was unable to return to

his homeland and died of pneumonia in 1945.

Yellow River Cantata

Xian’s best known work (Chinese title ‘Huanghe’) was written to aid the war effort during the Sino-Japanese

War. The Yellow River of the title is known as ‘Huang He’ and is used by Xian in the work to symbolise the spirit

of the Chinese people, whose first civilisations were established on its banks. The eight movements, based

on texts by Guang Weiran, are each introduced by a narrator and explore different aspects of the river. (The

following summaries are based on the translations in Shan Bai, The Historical Development and a structural

analysis of the Yellow River Piano Concerto, University of Pretoria, 2006).

1. Song of the Yellow River Boatmen

Describes the perils of crossing of the Yellow River, incorporating a work-chant and with rapid scales and

flourishes depicting the turbulence of the water

2. Ode to the Yellow River (baritone solo)

Pays homage to the greatness of the Yellow River, nurturing and moulding the Chinese people into a

large and powerful civilisation

3. Ballad of the Yellow River

Describes how the river has been harnessed to make the land more fertile and how an enemy invasion

has disrupted this and created devastation

4. Dialogue Song by the Riverside

Personal accounts of exiles who have been displaced by the war (based on a Shanxi folksong)

5. Lament of the Yellow River

Expresses the suffering of Chinese woman at the hands of the Japanese during the war

6. Defend the Yellow River

A call to the Chinese to rise up against the Japanese

4Music Teacher June 2012

7. Shout Aloud, Yellow River

A further call to arms, exhorting the river to draw on its own natural power

Xian’s original version of the work was composed for the scant forces he had available to him in Yan’an. In

addition to the narrator, choir and solo singers, his instrumentalists included a guitar, the Chinese instruments

of the erhu (2 stringed violin), a dizi (bamboo flute), drums, bugles, a bass string instrument made out of an

oil drum and a new percussion instrument filled with spoons. When in Russia, Xian reorchestrated the work for

large orchestra, also renotating it in western 5-line staves (the original used a different form of notation used

by local musicians). The work is considered to be one of the most successful fusions of Chinese music with

Western harmonic, structural and instrumental practices.

An important point to note was that Mao Zedong and his wife Jiang Qing attended the first performance in

Yan’an, on April 13, 1939, before Xian left for Russia. Mao was so impressed that he gave the composer a

present of a pen and ink and Xian was subsequently admitted to the Communist Party.

Students need not study the Yellow River Cantata in detail. However, an awareness of the nature of the work

and the circumstances of its composition are important, particularly the following points:

� it has a strong programmatic element (an ability to summarise the story is desirable here)

� it uses populist material based on folksongs and mass songs, which was important if it were to serve its

purpose

� the propaganda element in the work is very prominent, especially the call to arms to resist the Japanese

� much of the melodic material is vocal and intended to be sung by untrained singers, so is both lyrical and

simple

� the orchestration of the version scored for western orchestra is significantly different to the piano concerto

version. there is much use of percussion instruments, the textures are fuller and more complex, with a

greater use of colour, showing the influence of french impressionist music. this complexity is passed to the

solo piano in the piano concerto version

Background to the composition of Yellow River Piano Concerto

Xian became something of a cult figure in China after his death, although his major works were little performed.

The populist and the cosmopolitan sides to his music were both used as musical role models by both the left

and the intelligentsia as the balance shifted between these two forces at different times. He was seen as repre-

senting the authentic modern Chinese musical voice, with a populist appeal rooted in Chinese folk music and

work songs married to European sophistication and technique. With the banning of foreign culture during the

Cultural Revolution (1966–1976), the revolutionary associations of Xian’s music presented a way for performers

to bypass the censorship of Mao’s regime.

Jiang Qing (Mao’s wife) had been influential in defining new guidelines for the type of music supported under

the ideals of the Cultural Revolution. She wanted peasants and workers to be at the forefront of operatic and

concert performances, rather than stories about dead emperors and performances of foreign works. She was

central in the creation of the ‘Shajiabang Symphony’ for the Central Philharmonic (a Beijing-based orchestra

and collective of musicians founded in 1956), a 1965 work based on a recent populist opera celebrating the

Communist heroism during the war with Japan. Although pianos were frequently destroyed by the Red Guards

during the early years of the Cultural Revolution and virtuoso pianists were imprisoned, forbidden to play or, in

Yin Chengzong’s case, sent to the countryside for re-education, Jiang Qing liked the instrument, having had

lessons in her youth.

Yin Chengzong (born 1941) had enjoyed considerable success as a piano virtuoso prior to the Cultural Revo-

lution, studying in Russia and winning second prize in the 1962 Tchaikovsky Piano Competition and, having

been sent to the countryside, attempted to rehabilitate the piano in China. In 1967, he and other members

of the Central Philharmonic performed piano music from the back of a truck in Tianenmen Square and made

piano arrangements of a ‘model opera’, ‘The Red Lantern’ (‘The Red Lantern with Piano Accompaniment’)

which he sent to Jiang Qing. He was successful in persuading the leaders of the Cultural Revolution that the

piano was an acceptable instrument for communicating their ideals and by 1969 had become something of

a celebrity.


Jiang Qing suggested that the Yellow River Cantata be reworked into a piano concerto and in 1969, oversaw

the formation of a team of musicians to compose this new version of the work. In addition to Yin Chengzong,

this team included three to five other members of the Central Philharmonic:

� liu Zhuang (b.1932), a pianist and composer who studied in Russia and taught at the Shanghai Conserva-

tory

� Chu Wanghua (b.1941), a pianist and composer and lecturer at the Central Conservatory of Music, Beijing

� Sheng lihong (nothing known)

� (perhaps also Shi Shucheng? (pianist and conductor)and Xu fei-Sheng)?

In preparation for the work, the musicians went on retreat to the caves of a former revolutionary base next to the

banks of the Yellow River. Here, voluntarily emulating the Cultural Revolution’s preoccupation with reeducating

intellectuals, they interviewed peasants who had survived the war with Japan, listened to bamboo flute music

from the Shaanxi region, studied communist literature and helped boatmen with their work.

Completed in 1970, the finished work condenses the Yellow River Cantata’s eight movements into four, includ-

ing a piano part greatly influenced by composers in Yin Chengzong’s repertoire, notably Rachmaninoff, Cho-

pin and Liszt. In deference to Mao’s regime, the fourth movement culminates in a climactic statement of ‘The

East is Red’, the anthem of the Cultural Revolution.

The concerto was immediately successful and, because so few pieces were allowed to be performed, it, to-

gether with The Red Lantern with Piano Accompaniment and the Shajiabang Symphony, was a more or less

permanent feature of the Central Philharmonic’s programmes over the next two-three years, being played

about eight times a month. After Mao’s death and the end of the Cultural Revolution in 1976, Yin Chengzong

quickly fell out of favour, eventually emigrating to the USA in 1983. The concerto also disappeared for a while

from the Chinese repertoire, although it has since been resurrected. It has become well known in the west, the

first performance there dating from 1973, and its populist appeal, together with its promotion by soloists such

as Lang Lang and Daniel Epstein as well as the championship of Yin Chengzong himself, have ensured that it

has been widely performed and recorded.

The East is Red was composed in 1942 by Li Youyuan (1903–55) and was performed frequent-ly at Yan’an. Based on a North Shaanxi folk melody, it fell into disuse after the Revolution, but was resurrected for the Cultural Revolution, its text glorify-ing Mao Zedong, being ideal for this purpose.


MuSICal featuReS of YelloW RIveR PIano ConCeRto

Form

In order to have the work cleared for performance, the composers of Yellow River Piano Concerto were careful

not to use forms that resembled too closely those of Western classical music. Therefore, although there are

similarities to classical forms, the structures are looser than might be found in classical concertos. The Yellow

River Piano Concerto also has four rather than the traditional three movements.

1sT MoveMenT

bar nos. section material used tempo key

1–16 a a (flourish) (1–5); b (mordents) (6–11); a (12–15); pno cadenza (16)

fast ( = 168) d maj

17–24 B c (call and response) slow ( = 66) d maj

25–38 a1 a (24–28); b (29–38) fast ( = 152) d maj

39–50 B1 c; b (47–50) moderate ( = 84) d maj

51–74 C d (8 bar phrase), repeated 59–66; b (67–74) fast ( = 144) B min – C maj

75–83 a2 a (75–80); pno cadenza (81–83) fast ( = 152) modulates

84–92 B2 e (lyrical melody derived from c) slow ( = 52) d maj

93–103 d material similar to c fast ( = 144) d maj

104 a3 b (104–109); a (110–113) fast ( = 144) d maj

Notes:

� loose rondo form structure, section a being the rondo theme

� very little modulation – almost all in d major apart from bars 51–83

� economical use of melodic material

� sectional juxtaposition of cells of material, esp.

� call and response: based on a Chinese folk singing style known as duikou chang

� sectional, block-like form: note the use of different tempi to accentuate the section starts

� piano scales represent waves: struggle of boatmen crossing the river?

� based on first movement of Yellow River Cantata


2nd MoveMenT


1–35 a a (melody) (1–16); a repeated in piano in a varied form (17–35)

adagio ( = 52) Bb maj

36–49 B b (new melody, derived from a), with faster l.h. acc.

piu mosso Bb maj

50–54 C c (4/4 melody), with thick piano octaves/chords

(allargando) Bb maj

55–59 d d (4/4 melody), piano triplets piu mosso g min

60–66 e e (melody accompanied by piano block chords); quote from March of the volunteers (61–64, hn 1)

= 69 Bb maj

67–73 Coda f (pentatonic descending figure) = 88 Bb maj

Notes

� the opening of March of the volunteers is used twice by horn 1/trumpet 1 in bars 61–4.

� mostly in B major

� rhapsodic style: a freely developing melody, with new material being introduced as the movement progresses

� apart from the restatement of the opening 16 bar melody, only tiny snatches of material are subsequently

repeated

� the phrase structure is unusual, with changes between 3/4 and 4/4 and, apart from bars 1–9 and 17–25, little

use of conventional question-answer phrases

� the orchestra mostly accompanies the piano, which plays figuration based on the underlying harmony

� there are textures for orchestra alone: bars 1–15 and 67–73; and for piano solo: bars 17–23 and 27–30

March of the Volun-teers was composed in Yan’an by Nie Er, a revolutionary. It was originally an anti-Japanese song but became China’s national anthem after the revolution. During the Cultural Revolution, it was replaced by The East is Red.


3rd MoveMenT


(1) Intro a (bamboo flute solo - pentatonic); piano solo (based on 4 notes);

free eb maj

2–53 a b (pentatonic folk melody: pno solo, 2–31); repeat of 2nd half of b with pno figuration (orch, 32–47); codetta (orch, 48–53)

moderate ( = 80) eb maj

54–72 B c (4/4 9-bar melody (54–63)), repeated by pno in style of pipa (64–72)

slow ( = 44) C min –- eb maj

73–81 bridge d (2 bar melody developed sequentially) moderate ( = 96) eb maj – modulates

82–88 C e (new 3/4 melody on piano) agitato B maj

89–105 d f (new melody on orch, then developed in solo piano passage in 92–105)

agitato db maj

106–134 e g (new 3/4 melody on piano, with l.h. triplet then sq (119) figuration, then quaver triplet chords (128–134))

agitato Bb min – db maj –Bb min

135–156 a b on orch, with piano figuration; coda from 149-end

= 76 eb maj

Notes

� basically in ternary form (aBa): the B section has many themes

� the reason it contains many themes is because it was constructed from three separate movements from the

Yellow River Cantata


4Th MoveMenT


1–8 Intro 1 the east is Red (4–7); pno cadenza (8) allegro ( = 138) C maj

9–18 Intro 2 x (15–18) Presto ( = 176) a maj

19–39 a a (theme) animoso a maj

40–49 bridge1 b1 a maj

50–71 a1 a: variation 1 (repeated quavers in orch, crotchet bass line in pno l.h.)

a maj

72–93 a2 a: variation 2 (running bass in octaves in pno)

a maj

94–115 a3 a: variation 3 (imitation at one bar’s distance) a maj

116–132 bridge 2 x (125–132) a maj

133–153 a4 a: variation 4 (imitation, accented chords on crotchet beats)

d maj

154–163 bridge 1 b1 d maj

164–180 bridge 2 b2; x (171–180) d maj

181–196 a5 a: variation 5 (augmentation, chromatic scales from mvt 1 flourish)

Bb maj

197–216 a6 a: variation 6 (sq figuration in piano, dactyllic rhythm in strings)

C maj

217–237 a7 a: variation 7 (theme in dotted notes, semiquavers in violins)

f maj

238–270 bridge 3 b3 (based on material used in bridge 1); piano solo (263–270)

f maj then modulates

271–302 a8 a: variation 8 (piano triplets): a is developed to provide a link to the next section

Bb maj then modulates

303–326 coda part 1 the east is Red (303–326); piano repeated chords and scales in quaver triplets (303–319) and leaping chords (320–326)

molto meno mosso

( = 56)

d maj

327–366 coda part 2: a9

a in imitation; a combined with the east is Red (345–360); final statement of the east is Red (361–366), combined with quote from the Internationale (hn 1, b.361)

presto d maj

367–381 coda part 3 section to close the work, with piano triplet figuration.

presto ( = 84) d maj


Notes

� theme and variation form

� the introduction anticipates the climactic appearance of the east is Red

� there are nine variations on the theme

� two bridge passages link the variations in certain places: these contain antiphonal ideas, recalling Chinese

call and response choral singing

� the quotations from the east is Red and of the final phrase of the Internationale, the international anthem

of socialism, were included at the request of Jiang Qing: these were essential for the work to be approved

for performance by the censors

� the climactic appearance of the east is Red in the final movement has the effect of transforming the

concerto into a glorification of Mao Zedong; its lyrics compare Mao to the sun. the quotations have been

retained after the end of the Cultural Revolution despite proposals by some musicians to remove them.

Programmatic aspects of Yellow River Piano Concerto

The Yellow River Piano Concerto can be placed into a tradition of programmatic works stretching back to the

early 19th century. Specifically, there are many examples of programmatic music about war, revolution and

rivers such as those in the list below:

As well as in communist China, programmatic works, particularly cantatas, were encouraged in the 1920s and

30s in another communist regime, Russia, where they were seen as an effective medium for communicating

political propaganda to the masses. As Yellow River Piano Concerto was itself reworked from a programmatic

cantata, it has inherited the programmatic features of that music. Its movement titles describe what the music

is intended to evoke. Additionally, in the original score, there are Chinese inscriptions above certain passages

of music (such as “War horses are galloping, valiant fighters engage the enemy” above bar 181 of movement

4), omitted in the Eulenberg score, which describe what images the music is meant to be evoking.

Examples of programmatic elements in Yellow River Piano Concerto include:

� I, scales of opening section: used to represent waves

� I, call and response ideas: represent workers by imitating a form of mass song

� II, Quote from March of the volunteers: perhaps used to recall the resistance against Japan, or to recall

pre-Cultural Revolution glory

� II, water boatman’s song: represents those who make their living from the river

� III, use of bamboo flute and musical representations of the Chinese lute and Chinese zither: recall the folk in-

struments of China and therefore the ancient, traditional culture of the peasants living near the Yellow River

� Iv, main theme (b.19): military-sounding theme might represent the mobilisation of the Chinese forces to

defeat with Japan or a similar militaristic idea

� Iv, bar 181: galloping rhythm of quaver-two semiquavers to imitate galloping horses

� Iv, quotations of the east is Red and the Internationale: used to represent the triumph of Mao’s Communists

(see also under Communist influences below)

Beethoven’s Battle Symphony (1813): an early programmatic work, with musical depictions of the English defeat of Napoleon’s army at the Battle of Victoria in 1812. It includes the Rule Britannia, ‘God Save the King and Malbrouck’s s’en va-t-en guerre

Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture (1880): an account of the Russian victory over the French: includes quotations of the French and Russian national anthems, and cannon effects

Shostakovich Symphony no.7 in C major (‘Leningrad’ )(1941): musical depiction of the siege of the Russian city of Leningrad by the Germans during the Second World War. Composed at the height of the siege, it has strong parallels with the circumstances surrounding the composition of the Yellow River Cantata in 1939

Smetana Ma Vlast (1874–9): meaning “my homeland”. This is a set of six tone poems based on landmarks from Smetana’s Bohemia. The second of these, Vltava, is the musical depiction of the River Moldau, using similar depictions of flowing water to those in Xian’s work.


Influences of Traditional Chinese Music

While Chinese folk music was suppressed during the Cultural Revolution, as it might have generated nostalgia

for the old empire, there are nonetheless many Chinese features, many of which have survived from the Yel-

low River Cantata, originally scored for Chinese instruments. Traditional Chinese features of the work include:

� pentatonicism (most of the melodic material)

� call and response musical ideas (from duikou chang, an antiphonal folk singing style) (e.g. I, bars 17–24)

� metrical changes (e.g. 2/4 v 3/4) that probably come from the rhythm of the original words

� use of Chinese bamboo flute in III (bar 1)

� imitation of strumming of the guzheng (a Chinese zither) in III (piano cadenza in bar 1 and figuration in bars

2–39)

� imitation of repeated notes of the yangqin (Chinese hammered dulcimer) in III, bars 64–72

� use of traditional north Shaanxi folksong – the province in which Yan’an and the Yellow River are located

(the east is Red is based on a folksong from this region, ‘Riding a White horse’)

� use of other melodies that are new but similar to folksong

� free, narrative form and free approach to melodic development

� phrase structure is unusual in places (e.g. 3 bar phrases in III, bars 64–72)

� as the cantata was originally written for choir and traditional Chinese instruments, the melodic and accom-

paniment material is generally simple and tends to avoid chromaticsm

Communist/Socialist Realist musical influences

The desire to placate the communist leadership is central to almost every aspect of the concerto: unlike in

Western music, there was almost no room for concerns such as personal expression. Some of the more obvi-

ous effects of the tough censorship of the leadership of the Cultural Revolution include:

� quote from the east is Red – Iv, bars 303–326: Mao’s anthem

� quote from the Internationale (last phrase) – Iv, bars 361–366, trumpet 1/trombone 1: worldwide socialist

anthem

� quote of March of the volunteers (opening phrase) – II, b.61–64, hn 1/tpt 1: this was the Chinese national

anthem prior to the Cultural Revolution, composed by nie er at Yan’an

� inclusion of piano – favoured by Mao’s wife

� theme of work – defeat of Japanese, text of original work presumably promoted Communism/socialism

� idea of a programmatic nationalistic/political work follows models from Soviet Russia and China, for instance

Shostakovich’s Symphony no.7 in C major (leningrad)

� movement titles – help spread propaganda by stressing Chinese greatness and glorifying the war against

Japan

� joint authorship: a collective of composers rather than a single composer was more in tune with communist

ideology, which placed the many over the individual

� avoidance of Western traditional forms such as sonata form: the forms which are used (variation, ternary,

etc.) are obscured so as not to draw attention to their Western origins

Western influences

Although Western culture was banned during the Cultural Revolution, the model for Chinese music was a

combination of party-approved Chinese elements (i.e. mass song) with techniques and instruments from the

western classical tradition: in 1964 Jiang Qing had written of the superiority of western instruments over native

Chinese ones “National instruments still need many years of reform, why can the already developed Western

instruments not be used? We should use foreign things to serve China.” Furthermore, Xian had received a pe-

riod of western musical training at the Paris Conservatoire, and Yin Chengzong’s writing for piano was heavily

influenced by Western works in his repertoire, by Rachmaninov, Liszt and Chopin.

Therefore, with the exception of melody, most of the musical features of the Yellow River Piano Concerto are

Western-influenced by nature, especially the harmonic writing, instrumentation and musical forms.

General features of the work are listed below: all those not previously mentioned as Chinese influences are in

all likelihood Western influences.


hArMony

� chromatic passing notes:

� I, 75–81 – bass line desc.

� II, b.43 – bass line

� III, b.62

� Iv, b.209–212, 259–263 – bass line desc.

� chromatic inflections:

� II, b.37: g sharp – a in d minor chord

� III, 56 – B natural against f min chord

� augmented chords:

� II, b.40, beat 3

� added sixth chords

� II, b.64; III, b.17

� III, b.128 – added note chords

� dominant seventh chords

� III, b.22 – eb 4th inversion

� ninth chords

� I, b.16, pno – amaj 7 and b9

� III, b.129

� III, b.146, beat 2

� major seventh: II, b.41

� enharmonic moves

� III 76–77: passes chromatically from chord of f minor 2nd inv to to B major

� diminished seventh

� III, b.100–101

� 4 note chords (quartal harmony) of Bb, C, eb, f

� III, opening up to fig 1

� pentatonic modal harmony:

� III, fig 1 – bar 10 use only notes Bb, C, eb, f, g (pentatonic scale on eb) � parallel fifths

� III, b.13 beat 2 – 14 beat 1; III, b.40

Melody And MelodiC developMenT

� pentatonic scales

� most melodies are pentatonic, e.g. the opening melody of II.

� hexatonic scales

� Iv, opening of piano cadenza – uses a hexatonic scale of Cdefga

� diatonic scales

� Iv, scale just before fig 1 is e major

� chromatic scales

� III, b.60, beat 3

� III, b. 115, beat 3 and in following 3 bars

� Iv, b. 187 (reference to 1st mvt?)

� imitation

� at the unison, III, b.50–52

� melodic sequence

� I, bars 51–58 are repeated at a different pitch in bars 59–66

� Iv, bars 213–216

� rhythmic augmentation

� (Iv – b.185–193, hn)

� repetition of short cells

� I, e.g. 71–74

� truncation of cells

� I, b.23 is reduced by a beat and used in 25

(these last two features are associ-ated with Chinese music, but can also be found in Western composers such as Ravel, Debussy and Vaughan Williams)


rhyThM, MeTre And TeMpo

� dotted rhythms

� Iv, bars 217–247

� 3/4 alternating with 2/4

� Iv, bars 164–171

� dactyllic rhythms (quaver, 2 semiquavers) (influence of Shostakovich?)

� Iv, bar 181

� syncopated rhythms

� Iv, b.205

� groupings of 3+3+2 quavers

� Iv, bars 9–10, 13–14

� triplets

� Iv, bars 254–258, 271–295

� use of many different tempi in each movement (e.g. 1st movement)

� use of dramatic accelerandi (I, bars 41 and 71)

TexTure

� almost entirely melody-dominated homophony

� monophony

� III, bar 54, beat 2

� octaves

� III, bar 82 beats 1–3; Iv, most of the cadenza in bar 8

� imitation

� III, 48–53; Iv, bar 94

� antiphony

� I, 17–24 and 39–46 (this texture is from a call-and-response Chinese singing style known as duikou

chang); Iv, bars 238–242

insTruMenTATion

Generally the orchestral writing is functional and conventional, with the orchestra mostly playing an accompa-

nying role when the piano is playing. There is some use of dialogue between different instrumental groups at

times (e.g. brass alternating with wind/strings in IV, 238–242). Apart from the bamboo flute, the orchestra used

is a standard symphony orchestra. The following techniques are used:

� harp glissando (I, bar 1)

� timpani roll (I, bar 1)

� cymbal roll (I, bar 75)

� con sord trumpets and trombones (with mutes) (III, b.55)

� hand-stopped horns (III, bar 58)

� pizzicato (cellos and basses, III, bar 64)

� sul g on violins (III, bar 119)

� divisi violins (III, bar 128)

� trills (Iv, flutes, b.259)

� tremolo (Iv, b.259, strings)

� double strokes (Iv, b.15–18)

The solo piano writing is almost entirely in a Western-influenced virtuoso style, the piano being a Western in-

strument. Strong influences are Rachmaninov, Liszt and Chopin. The only passages that could be thought to

display a Chinese style of piano writing are those imitating Chinese folk instruments in the third movement. The

concerto displays a wide range of virtuoso piano textures and techniques: one theory was that Yin Chengzong

was trying to keep virtuoso pianists in practice until the Cultural Revolution had ended. Techniques include:

� rapid arpeggios in 6ths, I bar 16

� different numbers of notes in each hand during rapid figuration (I bar 75)

� rapid alternating octaves (I bar 81) and chords between the hands (I bar 83) see Rachmaninov Piano Con-

certo no.2, III, 10 bars before the end

� florid inner parts (I bar 88) and exploitation of the high register

� glissandi (I bar 92)

� thick harmonies created by streams of chords (II bar 50)

� frequent duplets v triplets (II bar 50)


� excessive ornamentation (III bars 2–15, etc.)

� crossing of hands in rapid arpeggios, with l.h. playing top note (III bar 36)

� martellato (“hammered”) (III bar 54)

� rapid repetition of single notes (written as trem, III bars 64–72)

� rapid figuration in 10ths (III bars 89–91)

� trills and tremolos (III bar 95)

� rapid contrary motion scales of chords (III bars 133–134)

� line doubled in four octaves (Iv bar 8) (see liszt Piano Sonata in B minor bar 9)

� ostinato bass line in octaves (Iv bar19) (see Chopin, Polonaise in ab major op.53, e major section

� octaves in staccato quavers (Iv bars 72–92) (similar to a passage in Shostakovich Piano Concerto no.2,

1st mvt

� rapid repeated chords (Iv bar 263)

� repeated chords for added resonance (Iv bar 303) (see liszt Piano Sonata in B minor, first “grandioso”

section)

PRaCtICe eSSaY QueStIonS

The critic Harold Schonberg, writing in the New York Times described the Yellow River Piano Concerto as

“movie music. It is a rehash of Rachmaninov, Khachaturian, late romanticism, bastardised Chinese music and

Warner Brothers climaxes.” Drawing from examples from the score, evaluate to what extent his criticisms are

valid.

To what extent did Chinese 20th century history influence the composition of the Yellow River Piano Concerto?

Use examples drawn from the score to support your answer.

The Yellow River Piano Concerto can be thought of as a fusion of Chinese and European musical styles. Iden-

tify two musical elements derived from Chinese music (traditional or otherwise) and two features of European

music. Demonstrate and discuss how these elements contribute to create the work’s overall style.

yellow river analysis

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