A bamboo flute that’s said to have been one origin of Chinese music
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Chinese civilization is one of the oldest in the world, and music has always been an important cultural component.
There are different versions about the birth of music in China, many rooted in myths and legends. One version tells of a man named Ling Lun, who lived during the reign of the Yellow Emperor (2697-2596 BC).
He is said to have made a flute that could reproduce the sound of the mystical phoenix.
Ling was said to have captured a phoenix by playing the flute.
The instrument in the story is a dizi, which is still used today in folk music and was always popular with the masses because it was light and easy to carry. The flute was originally played while held vertically until foreigners introduced horizontal playing.
Another prominent Chinese folk instrument is the guzheng, or Chinese zither. It dates back to the Warring States Period (5th century-221 BC). It is a long wood instrument with anywhere from 15 to 21 strings. Movable bridges called qinma support the strings, which were originally made from twisted silk or sheep gut. By the 20th century, steel strings were used.
The guqin is a similar instrument, with seven strings and no bridges. It is often considered the premier solo instrument of Chinese music, with a history dating back more than 3,000 years
Playing the guqin was one of the four arts that ancient scholars were expected to master, along with painting, calligraphy and an ancient form of chess. The great sage Confucius was a master of the instrument.
Some traditional instruments, like the pipa, which resembles a lute, actually originated outside China. The erhu, often called the Chinese fiddle, came from Central Asia. Its sound is produced by a bow drawn across the two strings and by the vibration off a sheet of python skin stretched across wooden frame of the sound box.
Other prominent traditional folk instruments are the huqin, a family of string instruments with hexagonal or octagonal sound boxes, and the hulusi, a wind instrument made from a bottle gourd and bamboo sticks.
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