舞台巨人——彭修文和他的民族管弦乐艺术

Maestro Peng Xiuwen and His Art of Chinese Orchestral Music

中国的民族器乐流传数千年，不断地发展变化，去粗取精，大浪淘沙，留存到今天的乐器当具有相当的生命力。中国的民族管弦乐队吸取了其中的一部分优秀的乐器，并借鉴了西方交响乐的一些方式，出现在世人的面前不过七八十年的历史。从上世纪20年代最早的上海民间音乐社团“大同乐会”，到30年代中期成立的中国第一个新型职业民族乐队——“中央广播电台音乐组”，

In the 1940's,Peng Xiuwen started his artistic career for traditional Chinese music.For several dozens of years since he joined the Chinese Orchestra of China Radio International,and since the Chinese Orchestra of the China National Radio was founded in the 1950's, great changes have taken place in the Chinese society.Chinese artists have been working hard in the exploration and development of Chinese music art under the guidance of such policies and guidelines as'Make the past serve the present and foreign things serve China'and'Let a hundred flowers blossom and a hundred schools of thought contend'. For these few dozen years,Peng Xiuwen had displayed his extraordinary creativity in defending and fortifying the cause of Chinese orchestral music.His records of its development history and his thoughts over the changes of life and society contributed much to his creation of so many pieces of beautiful music.He performed with his baton to interpret the music of different times,which presents a world of so much diversity and so beautiful melodies that would touch and influence a great number of people.By learning extensively from the ancient and from all other art forms,he managed to use all these useful elements in Chinese orchestras.He paid much attention to images and implication in his musical interpretation with profound concepts and refined expressions.He was experienced in using the techniques of'impressing with emotion'and'fusing the emotion with the environment'.His artistic style is grand and vigorous,always inspiring and impressive with its distinctive character that represents the force,style and charms of Chinese music.The several dozen years' unremitting efforts by Peng Xiuwen and many of his disciples have finally led to the creation of a brand new road for the art of Chinese orchestral music. My impression of Mr.Peng Xiuwen after having met him is that, first,he had profound education of traditional culture,and second,he had rich knowledge of both Chinese and Western music,and had a spirit of unceasing innovation for Chinese orchestral music.This seemingly antinomy becomes nevertheless the right characteristic of his unique art.As a conductor of Chinese music,Peng had been working for his entire life on research and restoration of traditional music,and had adopted it in a creative way in orchestras of Chinese instruments. With a history of several thousand years,traditional Chinese music, with many different means of expression,embodies a distinctive spiritual culture and aesthetic features.Such instruments in a Chinese orchestra as Pipa,Erhu,Dizi,Sheng and Suona have all a history of long standing,and rich performing techniques which form a lively world of music with both yin and yang,both fortitude and flexibility,and even both music and noise.An orchestra of Chinese instruments highlights the melodic charm,which is the most important concept of traditional Chinese music aesthetics.It is also an important factor to evaluate the artistic level of a musician by looking at whether his or her performance of the music has the melodic charm and whether the taste is appropriate or not. Besides his pursuit of traditions,Peng Xiuwen had also displayed his outstanding creativity with his ceaseless innovations.We know that the past century sees a severe conflict between the Chinese and Western culture.When encountering the Western musical culture,our people used to hesitated,contemplated and contended.Some of them proposed'nationalism',some suggested'overall Westernization',and many more adopted the way of'combining the Chinese with the Western'. Peng,together with all those who had been keen on developing Chinese musical culture,learned and adsorbed the essence of Western music in continued efforts,and applied it to our Chinese orchestras with an aim to enrich the means of expression.In Peng's opinion,Chinese orchestras are not only good at performing musical works of single lines,but also capable of performing symphonic works of polyphony and complexity.In the present days when there are different opinions in favour of either symphonic orchestration,internationalization or modernization, Peng Xiuwen advocated for symphonic orchestration of Chinese instrument orchestra.In his view,although a Chinese orchestra learns many elements from Western orchestras,it is by no means a replica of the latter.When many different Chinese instruments gather together,they provide a great potential for wider expressions,which also requires us to discover unique cultural values of Chinese music and to represent them in our own way.