MUZI MUZIChinese Matrix

Pipa

Pearls large and small falling on a jade plate

Introduction

The pear-shaped, bent-neck lute, once played flat with a plectrum and now upright with the fingers

The pipa is a four-string plucked lute with a pear-shaped body and a bent-back pegbox. The name appears in Eastern Han texts, and from the Qin and Han to the Sui and Tang it covered several plucked lutes; the bent-neck pipa arrived from the Western Regions in the Northern and Southern dynasties, was mostly held flat and played with a plectrum in the Tang, and was later held upright and played with the fingers. Large suites multiplied in the Ming and Qing, and Qing schools formed at Wuxi, Pinghu, Pudong and Chongming, with Hua Qiuping's collection (1819) as a key source. In the Republican era Liu Tianhua refretted it with six frets on the neck and thirteen on the face, and its signature pieces include Ambush from Ten Sides and Flute and Drum at Sunset.

Representative works

  1. The Moon on HighA classic civil-style pipa suite whose earliest known version survives in a Ming manuscript dated 1528.
  2. Ambush from Ten SidesIt tells the Battle of Gaixia from the Han side, and Hua Qiuping's 1818 collection calls it simply Ten Sides
  3. The Overlord Takes Off His ArmourIt tells the Battle of Gaixia from Xiang Yu's side and includes a farewell to Consort Yu
  4. Flute and Drum at SunsetAlready notated in Ju Shilin's pipa manuscript of 1860 and expanded into ten titled sections by Li Fangyuan in 1895.
  5. White Snow in Spring SunlightEach section opens on the first eight bars of Lao Liuban, and Wang Yuting's seven-section version is the Little Yangchun
  6. Song of the FrontierA pipa suite on Wang Zhaojun's longing for home, first joined into one large piece in Li Fangyuan's score of 1895.
  7. Autumn Moon over the Han PalaceA Chongming-school pipa classic that Liu Tianhua transcribed for erhu from a gaohu record in 1929.
  8. Great Waves Sifting the SandA pipa solo by Hua Yanjun, recorded by Yang Yinliu and Cao Anhe in 1950.
  9. Spring River in the Flower-Moon NightLiu Yaozhang's 1925 ensemble arrangement of an old pipa piece, titled by Zheng Jinwen of the Datong Music Society.

Timeline

Eastern Han to present
100 · OriginEastern Han texts such as Xu Shen's Shuowen jiezi already use the name pipa, taken from two plucking strokes, pi and pa; it then covered several kinds of plucked lute.551 · EvolutionThe Annals of Emperor Jianwen in the Book of Liang record that in 551 Hou Jing's men brought wine and a 'bent-neck pipa' to the emperor, showing the bent-neck pipa was in use in the south by then.1819 · EvolutionThe pipa collection edited by Hua Qiuping of Wuxi and others was printed in 1819, including the large suites Ambush from Ten Sides and The Warlord Takes Off His Armour, a key source for the Qing schools.2008 · ImpactIn 2008 Pipa art (the Yingzhou gudiao, Pudong and Pinghu schools) entered the second national list (II-119).
  1. 100OriginEastern Han texts such as Xu Shen's Shuowen jiezi already use the name pipa, taken from two plucking strokes, pi and pa; it then covered several kinds of plucked lute.
  2. 551EvolutionThe Annals of Emperor Jianwen in the Book of Liang record that in 551 Hou Jing's men brought wine and a 'bent-neck pipa' to the emperor, showing the bent-neck pipa was in use in the south by then.Literature › Book of Liang: Annals of Emperor Jianwen
  3. 1819EvolutionThe pipa collection edited by Hua Qiuping of Wuxi and others was printed in 1819, including the large suites Ambush from Ten Sides and The Warlord Takes Off His Armour, a key source for the Qing schools.
  4. 2008ImpactIn 2008 Pipa art (the Yingzhou gudiao, Pudong and Pinghu schools) entered the second national list (II-119).

Heritage Listings

  1. 2008National List of Representative Items of Intangible Cultural Heritage2nd batch · II-119 Pipa art [Yingzhou gudiao · Pudong and Pinghu schools] · no. 618 · nominated by Chongming and Nanhui · Shanghai · and Pinghu · Zhejiang