Zheng Qiufeng’s instrumental works, just like his vocal works, reflect the composer’s distinct personality: regarding the use of folk tunes, even if the composer is purely composing tunes, they still reveal folk meanings. The tone of rhyme; the melody style that is good at lyrical, long notes and broad breath rhythm; as a military composer, long-term military life and the practice of creating for the military, the works have a strong military atmosphere, especially in the distinctive rhythm and strong rhythm. The sense of bass dynamics. The creation of any work reflects that era. The author's subjective wishes generated in the creative atmosphere of the general environment, and the wishes of the creative group spawned by the general environmental background of that era, are all reflected in Zheng Qiufeng's instrumental works. Reflected consciously or unconsciously.
The creation of the dance drama "Five Red Clouds" best reflects this point. When people passed the "baptism" of the Great Leap Forward era in 1958, a newborn calf's spirit of not being afraid of tigers was unique to young people at that time. Zheng Qiufeng did not systematically study composition at that time. His studies at that time were at best the accumulation of composition knowledge in performance and conducting practice. The reason why he dared to write such a large-scale work was not only the enthusiasm of young people, but also the enthusiasm of the whole country at that time. The scope of the creative spirit of daring to think and do is related to desire.
Among the batch of small and medium-sized orchestral works in the early days of the founding of the People's Republic of my country, such as Liu Tieshan and Mao Yuan's "Yao Dance" (1953), Wang Yiwu's "Pixiu Dance" (1954), Ge Yan's "Carriage" (1954) , Li Weicai's "Chinese Folk Song Series" (1955), Shi Yongkang's "The Story of the Yellow Crane" (1955), Li Huanzhi's "Spring Festival Overture" (1956), Lu Huabai's "Kang Zang Suite" (1956), Xin Huguang's "Gada Meilin" (1956) ), Liu Shouyi and Yang Jiwu's "Celebrating Victory" (1956), these were quite influential works at the time. Except for a few of their composers who were students of the conservatory of music at that time, most of the other composers were not all majoring in the strict sense. They are professional composers by background, but their works that now seem a little childish reveal a sense of creative vitality. Their common creative characteristic is that they pay attention to the beauty of the melody and its national style or local characteristics. They have typical European classicism characteristics in the structure, harmony, texture, orchestration and other aspects of the music, which are balanced, symmetrical, simple and simple. Strict, clear and harmonious, without embellishment. This characteristic reflected in the orchestral field was synchronized with the development of folk song choruses nationwide at that time, that is, choruses with folk song styles or adapted from folk song melodies.
The creation of the dance drama "Five Red Clouds", which was produced in this nationwide creative background, also bears a distinct mark of the times on its technical features. This music *** written by Zheng Qiufeng is divided into two parts. The first part is warm and cheerful, with strong ethnic dance rhythms and festival festive features. The theme adopts the pentatonic scale, which is actually a four-note series: 1 2 3 5. The strong rhythmic power brings together the scene of the bonfire gathering of ethnic minorities on festival nights. As shown, this feature was also one of the most advocated and widely influential features in the creation of domestic orchestral works at that time. The second part is a completely lyrical style, which contrasts with the first part. This contrast is also in line with the aesthetic orientation of ordinary people. The balanced and symmetrical posture achieved in the contrast was also commonly used in creation at that time. There is an extremely lyrical passage in this part, which uses a duet of flute and cello to express the intimacy between male and female lovers and brothers and sisters. This lyrical duet makes people easily think of the duet between the violin and the violin in the violin concerto "Butterfly Lovers", which was composed in the same year as "Five Red Clouds". This coincidence illustrates a kind of passion in domestic creation at that time. *Sexual techniques.
This distinctive national style, that is, the style of the times advocated in domestic creation at that time, has been continued in Zheng Qiufeng's works, from the composer's "Play", "Spring on Ludao", You can see it in works such as "Ode to Yaoshan Mountain", "Stone Drum and Ding Dong", and "Zhuhai Fisher Girl" from the 1980s. The national style personality formed by the composer in the early stages of orchestral creation is what most composers in my country who have experienced that era have always maintained, and it is also a prominent point in Zheng Qiufeng's instrumental creation.
The outstanding feature of most of Zheng Qiufeng's works, including vocal and instrumental music, is the broad and long melody. This melody feature can be said to have been throughout Zheng Qiufeng's creative life. People can see the composer's extreme use of long sounds from the long single note in his masterpiece "Ode to Chairman Mao", which reminds people of Liu Chi's 1943 adaptation of the music of "Northern Shaanxi Dao Qing" The song "Fan Shen Dao Qing", the broad display of the single long sound in the song adds to the touching charm and local characteristics of the work. This technique has become the mainstay of Zheng Qiufeng's melody style in his works.
The music of "Spring on Ludao" not only uses Xiang opera music materials from Fujian and Taiwan to add local characteristics, but its long and lyrical melody is what left the deepest impression on people. This melody is broad and stretched, full of the boldness of the northern people, and there is no artificiality. However, this melody is so harmonious and perfectly integrated with the southern atmosphere of the entire work. Although we can hear in the middle part of the work that the composer used some specific portamento techniques to express the delicacy of the southern nation, the tension of the entire work is still determined by the alternation of the long tone melody line and the bass tonic and dominant tones. It is formed by the contrast of the excitement brought about by it.
In "Play", the cheerful tunes in the first and last parts do not drown out the 3/4 beat rhythm with long notes as the characteristic sound in the middle part of the music: 561︱353-︱, each music The long note at the end of the stanza, especially the rhythmic gap between the eighth note and the half note, not only forms the driving force of the music, but also demonstrates the composer's individual melody style. Although the composer claimed that this was just a study, the perfection of the work has transcended the specific meaning of the study. Another violin piece, "Missing", also has a similar approach.
Among the composer's dance music works, "Zhuhai Fisher Girl" is a work with a relatively complete conception and is close to pure music. The work was written in the 1980s and retains the general melody personality of Zheng Qiufeng's works. . From the bold use of dissonance in the work and the emergence of melody fragments with European modal music style, people have strongly felt the changes of the times. At the same time, against the background of the dissonant harmonic language of the orchestra, the appearance of the Gaohu lead player adds a bit of a blend of Chinese and Western features. It is no exaggeration to say that this work may be one of the earlier explorations of the combination of Gaohu and Western orchestra (although it is only a short section in this piece). People can see from Gaohu's leisurely leading performance that , appreciate the characteristics of the South. However, what is eye-catching in the whole song is still the composer's consistent melody characteristics, whether it is from the hazy introduction, the Gaohu melody in the first and third parts, or the four-beat lyrical melody in the middle of the second part. The long breath of lyrical temperament forms the main body of the melody. In sharp contrast to these is the active melody of the scherzo nature in the second part of the work. The melody has been given some instrumental treatment, which further reflects the composer's expressive melody characteristics.
Throughout Zheng Qiufeng’s personalized melodies are those extremely colorful and charming melody frameworks mainly composed of pentatonic scales. Even according to what the composer calls ‘purely creative melodies’, It does not break away from the characteristics of the scales and modes of the Chinese nation, not to mention the melodies that were originally taken from folk song materials. The Yao folk song used in "Yan of Yaoshan" must have a long-note melody core behind the short notes, which may be an important point that attracts the composer. Sure enough, when Zheng Qiufeng chose the theme of the folk song, the composer made special efforts to change it. Pay attention to the change of one short and one long in three beats. When many composers in the world choose folk music, they often consciously or unconsciously choose music materials that match their own melodic personality, that is, music materials that conform to their own aesthetic orientation and are consistent with their own aesthetic orientation. For example, the American composer Copland noticed that when he selected folk music, his selection and adaptation of folk music were based on innovative ideas and motivations that helped form his own style. Obviously, Zheng Qiufeng also had this consideration. Sometimes the composer unconsciously revealed it when creating, and the subconscious expression may be their truest reflection.
"Reunion" is the latest work written. The whole song clearly expresses the opposition of modes within the three-section structural framework. Section A, reproduces Section A, adopts a major key and pentatonic scale; Section B adopts a minor key, and the melody is based on the heptatonic scale. However, Zheng Qiufeng still pays attention to highlighting the characteristics of the Chinese pentatonic scale. Partial tones other than the pentatonic have a certain specific color cues. Most of Zheng Qiufeng's orchestral works are music for dance, and most of these dances describe military life. This reminds people of the Soviet Red Flag Song and Dance Troupe and the Romanian "Doina" Army Song and Dance Troupe, which reflect the heroic life of the army. Vigorous dance. Zheng Qiufeng's dance music also depicts many dance scenes. Therefore, when people break away from the stage vision and listen to the music quietly, they feel that the structure of the works is too strong, including "Five Red Clouds" and "Zhuhai Fisher Girl". Works with their own complete musical structures are no exception. No wonder many composers in the world always have a certain consideration when writing music for dance. The American composer Copland once expressed his feelings about writing the dance drama "Appalachian Spring": "How reckless and expensive." Time to write 35 minutes of accompaniment for a modern dance, knowing how short-lived most ballets and their music are'.
It is against this creative background that due to the constraints of dance, the structure of Zheng Qiufeng's works is slightly monotonous. The composer has obviously noticed this shortcoming and tried his best to improve it. be adjusted within the range. In "Female Soldier", in the three-part structure, some treatments to weaken the structure are added to break through the formulaic structure, such as weakening the strong rhythmic contrast in the structure, so that the lyrical middle part still has a strong sense of rhythm. , the whole song is unified in passionate emotions, etc.
In this type of dance music works, a strong sense of rhythm has become inevitable. "Bonfire and Nose Flute", "Female Soldier", "Zhuhai Fisher Girl", "Rondo - Line" (even including "Spring on Ludao"), the strong rhythm gives the work a military-like fighting momentum and military-like fiery Life scenes, and using the dominant and dominant sounds in the bass area to alternate, is a common method to create this climax. At the same time, increase the frequency of percussion, especially the snare drum. "Rondo - Line" seems to have used this technique to the extreme. Regardless of the theme or the insert, it is all supplemented by military-like percussion rhythms, until the sound of the Young Pioneers' military drums and horns appears, and the military characteristics are clearly visible. Of course, This is directly related to the fact that the work is made for a queue.
"Stone Drum and Ding Dong" is the only film music excerpt among all 10 works. Restricted by the content of the film, the whole work is full of primitive wildness and has an ethereal sense of mystery, making it People can easily relate to what the music expresses. In the work, the composer perfectly expresses the theme through the use of dissonance and percussion. The use of percussion here no longer has the meaning of strengthening the rhythm, but as an integral part of the music melody, with rich sculptures. The connotation of character. Although the work is short, it already has a certain flavor of modern music. This is reminiscent of the mysterious music written by Shi Wanchun for the movie "The Fog" during the same period.
Zheng Qiufeng
Most of Zheng Qiufeng's instrumental works mainly adopt traditional musical structures in terms of musical structure, and most of them have contrasting structures. In terms of harmony, traditional classical functional harmony must be followed. Dissonant chords must be resolved, and the tonality cannot go too far, generally within the first-order relative key. But in "Zhuhai Fisher Girl" we also hear the dissonant ascending progression of chromatic chords. This dissonance has a lot to do with the theme melody of Guangdong folk songs. A similar situation can be seen in Xian Xinghai's chorus "Fishermen's Song" adapted from Guangdong folk songs: a blend of background accompaniment with descending parallel third semitones and male lead vocals with pentatonic melody. A strong sense of rhythm is a major feature of Zheng Qiufeng's instrumental works, and his outstanding melody personality: long tones are the mainstay, short tones are the supplement, wide rhythms are the leading role, and tight rhythms are the adjustments. This is the composer's most representative sexual characteristics.