The members of the "Sawmill" orchestra rehearsed under the leadership of the troupe leader Huang Jun.
(From left to right) Huang Qicong, Zhao Xiaoliang and Su Zhaofu in rehearsal.
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Editor's note: Years are like songs, life is like a tide. The undulating music contains the flavor of life. The crane-haired old man found his youthful vitality on the strings, the urban white-collar workers got the spiritual healing in the keys, the rural youth got creative inspiration in the notes, and the Students found the dream of struggle in the songs... Countless people who love music are using their own ways to turn their hearts into music, playing an urban symphony full of warmth and passion.
This issue of Culture Weekly looks for the moving music in the streets and alleys, focuses on the grassroots musicians with feelings, listens to the melody of Guangdong's vigorous times in their dream stories, and feels the vigorous artistic ecology.
Many people believe that the "golden age" of learning violin is in childhood. For example, the Chinese violinist Lu Siqing learned to play the violin at the age of 4, the Soviet violinist Oiststrakh learned to play the piano at the age of 5, and the Polish violinist Wieniawski began to contact the violin at the age of 6...
However, Su Zhaofu began to learn the piano at the age of 75. This year, he had his first violin.
Before retiring, Su Zhaofu was a professor at the Department of Chinese at Guangzhou University, and taught students literature for half a lifetime. He said that he began to learn the piano after retirement to make up for the regrets of his youth. And until he retires, he won't be able to read staves.
Older people like him, who started from scratch, are common in the "Sawmill" senior chamber orchestra. The band, whose average age is more than 70 years old, unexpectedly won the gold medal at the recent 4th Guangdong Provincial Band Invitational Competition.
They come from all walks of life, and before they retired, they were postal workers, the first generation of "code farmers", foreign executives... In the second half of their lives, they chose to cross the border, riding on the wings of music, and being a "teenager" who chased their dreams.
Retirement occupied by music
This is the first collective rehearsal of the "Sawmill" orchestra after the Spring Festival this year.
The rehearsal hall is located on Bichang East Road, which was originally an art classroom, and the space of about 30 square meters was filled with 16 students. Su Zhaofu used to sit in the middle of the last row. He wore a dark mountain suit, spotless and wrinkle-free, and sat up straight the whole time. The sheet music on the frame has been turned yellowed and curled due to repeated practice.
Su Zhaofu is 87 years old this year, the oldest student in the regiment. When he was 75 years old, Guangzhou University of Elderly Cadres opened the first violin class in the country, trying to break the traditional concept that "the elderly can learn piano, but they can't learn violin". At that time, he had been in piano classes for several years, and as soon as he heard that there was an elderly violin class, he immediately signed up.
"Literature and music are very closely related." Su Zhaofu remembers that when he was young, he taught students the "Book of Poetry", "three hundred and five pieces, Confucius is a string song"; decades later, when he played the folk song "Shule Chuan", he still saw the scene of "wind blowing grass and low to see cattle and sheep"...
Learning to play the piano from scratch is not an easy task. Su Zhaofu needs to resist a series of problems brought about by the growth of age: the function of the fingers is degraded, the joints are stiff, the hands will tremble when playing the piano, and the fingers often press the wrong strings. But he still enjoyed it, signing up for every term, and his classmates were getting younger and younger, and he still refused to "graduate" from the class.
"At first I thought I was stupid, it was very hard to pull, like 'sawing wood', and my daughter laughed at me for being interested and not talented." Su Zhaofu said with a smile that he not only practiced the piano for 2 hours at home every day, but also often listened to public welfare classes online, and often shared learning experience with teachers and piano friends. Once, when he went to the piano shop to practice, he happened to meet a master's degree student who graduated from the Juilliard School of Music in the United States, and since then, he has often listened to each other's concerts.
"When I was young, I couldn't imagine that I could have the life I have now." Su Zhaofu told reporters that he has had a special affection for music since he was a child. He also remembers that after the outbreak of the War of Resistance Against Japan, when he was a child, he was wrapped up in swaddling by his parents and fled from Guangzhou to northern Guangdong. In turbulent days, music is the greatest soothing. When they were in elementary school, the teacher led them to sing salvation songs, and he played an orphan who fled. "I remember very clearly that the accompanying song at that time was 'Ballad of Yellow Water'. As soon as the music sounded, we all cried, and the sadness of wandering will never be forgotten. It was also at that time that I found myself falling in love with music. ”
Decades later, he went to the Luhu Xinghai Garden to admire the statue of Xian Xinghai, and it seemed that he once again heard the high-spirited and tragic salvation song in his ears.
After most of his life, Su Zhaofu, who has not had the conditions to touch the instrument, finally learned the violin as he wished. When he first retired, he was also responsible for transporting his granddaughter to and from school, and he could only practice in the morning. After his granddaughter went to junior high school, he was finally able to unload the escort responsibility, and since then, his life has been occupied by music.
"I study music almost every day, Monday to Friday, there are piano lessons, choral lessons, orchestra rehearsals, violin classes, and I have to practice when I go home." Speaking of today's life, the old man has a happy expression.
The old man's dedication and love for music has made Huang Jun, the founder of the orchestra and a young violinist of the Guangzhou Symphony Orchestra, also deeply admired. He laughed and said: "In fact, these old people are also very 'rolled', you can see it during rehearsals, many people have secretly practiced at home more than 50 times." ”
In Huang Jun's view, although the old people are relatively difficult in technology, they also have their own advantages in learning the piano. "They have experienced more things, traveled more roads than we have, and witnessed great changes in society, and the depth of their understanding and expression of music is incomparable to that of teenagers." Huang Jun said.
Versatile "old boy"
"Our original intention was to get a group of like-minded elderly people to get together and play music." Huang Jun's wife, Han Yue, who is also the founder of the orchestra, told reporters.
In 2020, Han Yue, who teaches violin at the Guangzhou University of Elderly Cadres, found that the elderly are not satisfied with the school curriculum, and often spontaneously team up to practice "duets" and "trios" in the square. She discussed with her husband Huang Jun to set up the "Sawmill" elderly orchestra.
"Nominally we are teachers, but in fact we get more from them." Mr. and Mrs. Huang Jun said that the elderly people in the orchestra are both students and elders, and often bring them many surprises.
At the rehearsal scene on this day, Huang Jun was surprised to learn that Su Zhaofu also had a set of "native methods" for repairing violin sound pillars by himself; another member, 70-year-old Zhao Xiaoliang, could not wait to show him his newly learned piano song "Teenager". After Huang Jun listened, he praised: "Xiao Liang is worthy of being the 'technical director' in the orchestra. ”
Wearing square-rimmed glasses and a plaid shirt, Zhao Xiaoliang, who looks like a programmer, calls himself an "old naughty boy". Unlike Su Zhaofu, Zhao Xiaoliang has been playing violin and piano since childhood. In 2017, he won the national piano competition for the elderly with a song "Shandan Dan Flowers Bloom Red". In 2020, he regained his bow and is now the orchestra's first violinist.
Before retiring, he worked at Guangzhou First Bus Company, was a member of the earliest preparatory group of "YangchengTong", and was also a real "code farmer", who wrote a line of code for the establishment of the revenue center.
He loves to delve into all kinds of new things. During the epidemic, he used mobile phone software to edit the "Turkish March" video played by 7 elderly people on the piano into a version of the "Cloud Ensemble", and the timeline and subtitles were handled just right.
"Did you cut it yourself?" The reporter confirmed to him in surprise. "Yes!" Old Zhao then took out his mobile phone and showed the reporter the editing software page like a number of families, "You see, the seven pictures are put together, the seven tracks are good, just made up, very simple." ”
Zhao Xiaoliang, who has full enthusiasm for everything, also told reporters about such a past: In the late 1960s, he joined the team in Shaoguan, there was no piano in the countryside, and his hands were itchy. By chance, he met a friend of the literary troupe. After that, he would ride his bicycle to the literary troupe every one or two weeks, a round trip of 30 kilometers, just to "rub" the piano for an hour. After returning to Guangzhou in 1975, because of his work and other relations, he hardly touched the piano again until he was close to retirement.
Not long ago, Zhao Xiaoliang opened a video number to share videos of exercises and competitions, which became a "living advertisement" for the orchestra.
After the day's rehearsals, 68-year-old Huang Qicong rushed to the next event, the dance class.
At the request of a reporter, he shared a photo of himself dancing. In the middle of the hallway in front of the classroom, he stood upright on one leg, his hands spread, and his posture seemed to be flying.
Before retiring, Huang Qicong worked in a foreign company, was a veritable "trapeze artist", often traveling all over the world on business; he could not spare time after retiring, he had to learn violin, dance, and often went out to perform, "not enough time every day".
Making classical music "accessible"
"Their desire to learn the piano is really beyond my imagination." Huang Jun remembers that the purpose of the original formation of this elderly orchestra was more to popularize classical music. Unexpectedly, the old people practiced more and more professionally, and won the gold medal of the Guangdong Provincial Band Invitational Competition in one fell swoop.
In the award-winning performance video, 12 elderly people perform their duties, men wear suits and shoes, and women wear blue dresses, neatly performing a jazzy Shostakovich". After the video was posted on the Internet, some netizens commented: "It's amazing, the same song, the feeling of pulling out at different ages is completely different!" ”
For this song, the old people rehearsed for nearly a year. The rhythm of each rehearsal is very tense, and under the leadership of Huang Jun, the old people practice it over and over again. "This bar is again, and when the ensemble is played, everyone's voice must be taped again!" He walked from the stage to the old man, listened carefully to the music pulled out by each person, and constantly gave guidance or encouragement.
After class, the elderly people go home and record the clips of their own performances on their mobile phones, and then share the videos to the group, nervously waiting for everyone's comments.
Unlike the serious and sophisticated classical music players who people remember, Huang Jun seems to be a bit "different", he wears casual clothes with sneakers, likes to laugh, like a big boy next door. He often joked with people: "The movement of the piano is so similar to sawing wood!" And that's where the name Sawmill comes from.
A native of Guangzhou, Huang Jun chose to work at the "doorstep" after graduating from the Shanghai Conservatory of Music in 2007, joining the Guangzhou Symphony Orchestra and developing the idea of promoting classical music in his spare time.
He walked out of concert halls with a group of like-minded friends, held violin music salons in cafes, and brought "accessible" classical music appreciation activities to the public in different corners of the city.
"Playing on stage is not difficult for professional musicians, but in popular activities, you can't copy the stage." Huang Jun and his friends have seriously explored ways to promote different groups. For example, in the classroom, they will lead children into the world of classical music through games and interactions, and when facing the 80-year-old grandmother, they will play a well-known song "Liang Zhu ZhiHua Butterfly", or a group of "Birthday Song" variations...
Nowadays, the old people of the "Sawwood" Orchestra also followEd Huang Jun, into ancestral halls, parks, nursing homes, special schools, and used public welfare performances to prove that classical music is not only Yangchun white snow, but also "very close to the people and very fun." ”
"Like the name of our orchestra, no matter how good our practice is, don't forget that we started with 'sawing wood'. That's my original intention. Huang Jun hopes that in Guangzhou, which is known as the "City of Music", more people can enjoy the "play" time freely in the future, let classical music flow through the streets and alleys, and let more people get happiness, encouragement and strength from the sound of music.
Southern Daily reporter Huang Kunyuan Xu Ziming
Planning coordinator Bi Jiaqi
Photography by Nanfang Daily reporter Qiu Minye