scale: some people think that China's music has only five scales, which is a misunderstanding. Actually, five tones and seven different tones coexist for a long time.
if the pentatonic scale is expressed as follows:
1 2 3 5 6
Gong Shang Jiao Zheng Yu
"Gong Shang Jiao Zheng Yu" is a phonetic name. Note that this is the first key, not the absolute pitch (the issue of absolute pitch will be discussed later).
there are three kinds of seven tones:
ancient scale:
123 # 4567
palace quotient angle change sign feather change palace
new scale:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7
palace quotient angle change sign feather change palace
Qing quotient scale:
123456b7.
Others think that there are six tones, that is, only one tone is added on the basis of five tones. But in general, six tones can be regarded as incomplete seven tones; By the same token, the so-called four tones, or even three tones, can be regarded as incomplete five tones.
Mode:
China traditional music has five modes: Gong, Shang, Jiao, Zheng and Yu, which are formed by taking five tones of pentatonic scale as the main tones respectively.
Gongdiao: Gongyin (notation is usually represented by 1) is used as the tonic;
quotient mode: taking quotient tone (notation is usually represented by 2) as the mode tonic;
angular mode: the angular tone (notation is usually represented by 3) is used as the mode tonic;
modal tone: the modal tonic is the modal tone (the notation is usually represented by 5);
Feather mode: Feather tone (notation is usually represented by 6) is the mode tonic.
So "Gong, Shang, Jiao, Zheng, Yu" is sometimes a phonetic name and sometimes a modal name, depending on the context. Theoretically, each mode can use the above five tones and different seven tones, but in practice, some modes and scales are more common, while others are relatively few.
On the absolute pitch (tonality) of music:
China used a set of legal names for absolute pitch in ancient times, such as Huang Zhong and Da Lv. . . And different dynasties in history have different absolute pitch standards, which are not involved here for the time being. In modern times, in order to explain the absolute pitch of music, the western pitch system is often used. Let's take Gong Yin = C as an example: it is called "C Palace System" or "C Palace". The five modes of the same palace system use the same key signature, which is similar to the western relative major and minor tones. For example, the staff of the C palace system is the same as that of key signature in C major (there is no sharp sign), and the notation is "1 = C". It is not difficult to deduce that the absolute pitch of the tonic in the five modes of the C palace system is: < P > the mode of the C palace system, and the tonic is on C;
quotient mode of C palace system, with tonic on D;
C palace system angle mode, the tonic is on e;
C palace system tone-calling, the tonic is on g;
C palace system feather mode, the tonic is on a;
By analogy, other 11 sounds except C can also form such a system, such as #C palace system and D palace system. . . Each system also has these five modes.
to judge what mode a song or a piece of music is (here, it means that there is no modulation in the middle, and a simple tune is used from beginning to end), it depends on its tonic. Which is the tonic? A single melody song or music usually depends on its ending sound (note that it is not the first sound, nor the most common sound). In other words, the ending sound is the tonic, with few exceptions. With few exceptions, the root sound of the ending chord is the tonic in a multi-part chorus or ensemble. With the tonic, the mode will be known. What is the tonic is the mode.
Here are some examples of China folk songs, looking for relatively simple tunes (without tone sandhi) to illustrate their tonality and mode:
Gongdiao: Jiangsu folk songs <; Wuxi Jing > According to this score, Gong Yin is on C and the tonic is Gong, so it is the Gong mode of the C Gong system.