At present, under the academic guidance of the Institute of Music of the Chinese Academy of Arts, Tencent Games has released the latest achievement of the "Digital Protection of Traditional Chinese Instrumental Music" project, "Guqin Digitization".
Under the guidance of Lin Chen, the representative inheritor of guqin art, a national intangible cultural heritage project, the game audio team of Tencent Games NExT Studios sampled the timbre of the 459-year-old Ming Dynasty guqin "Qiu Lai", and through the post-processing and algorithm synthesis of game audio technology, 10,892 guqin timbre samples were finally produced, corresponding to 56 commonly used playing fingerings, and the timbre and techniques of the guqin were "reproduced" in the digital world.
This is the first time in the industry to carry out high-standard, high-quality, high-restoration technique monophonic sampling of the Ming Dynasty guqin, and it is also the first attempt to complete the simulation of the guqin hand sound in the digital world, and help related academic research to make innovative progress. At the same time, the project cooperated with QQ Music, a strategic partner of online music, and Tencent News, a media partner, to produce digital creative content of the Ming Dynasty guqin. This is also the second time that the project has used digital technologies such as game technology to preserve and activate national musical instruments and precious musical sounds, attracting Chinese people to listen to the melodies of history and the voice of the nation.
10,892 guqin timbre samples were produced, and the digital world restored the "unity of human and piano"
The "Guqin Digitization" project lasted nearly two years. On the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the successful inscription of the Chinese Guqin World Heritage Site, the project uses game sound design thinking and game engine to analyze the acoustic principles of the guqin, innovatively reproducing the playing techniques of the guqin while preserving the timbre of the guqin, and realizing the "unity of human and piano" in the digital world. In the end, the project corresponded to 56 commonly used fingering techniques, and a total of 10,892 guqin timbre samples were produced, and a set of standardized string instrument recording processes that can be reused were summarized in the process.
The results of "revitalization" are applied in multiple fields, and games have become a "new container" for cultural bearing.
When sharing the project history and achievements of the "Guqin Digitalization", Luo Lin, head of Tencent Interactive Entertainment's brand and digital ecological marketing and promotion planning, said that games continue to play an innovative role as a new container for culture in terms of the digital expression of traditional culture, the deep integration of culture and tourism, and the promotion of cultural innovation and development by science and technology.
"Through the in-depth linkage with cultural industry partners, the use of game technology to professionally protect traditional culture, while precipitating standardized digital assets and processes to help breakthroughs in the field of cultural research, we can better explore cultural inheritance and innovation. Rollin said.
The results of the "Guqin Digitization" will be applied to many fields. First of all, based on the recorded guqin timbre, the project co-created the theme song "Ancient and Modern Youqin" with QQ Music, an online music strategic cooperation platform, and sung by QQ Music's AI music partner Xiaotian to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the successful application of Guqin for World Heritage Status. At the same time, through the AI technology of "QQ Music Galaxy Sound Effect", AI creation of related tracks was carried out according to different emotions and artistic conceptions, 12 pieces of guqin healing music were completed, and QQ Music was launched in the form of a special feature. In the future, QQ Music plans to use the Tencent Music Daystar platform to use the Ming Dynasty guqin timbre collected by the "Traditional Instrumental Music Digitization Project" to allow the public who love to create a "digital guqin" and rejuvenate traditional Chinese instruments with music and technology.
In the field of games, the digital sound source of the guqin will be used in the research and development of game products such as "The Moon Knife at the End of the World", so that players can get in touch with the guqin culture through gamification. The first phase of the game cooperation will be launched on December 22 in the new school "Immortal Sword" mobile game "Immortal Sword", and the new character of the sect, Tang Dynasty Lesheng Li Guinian, will perform a song "Jade Emblem Zhu Xian" based on the guqin timbre collected by the project. At that time, players will not only be able to listen to the music played by the guqin in the rivers and lakes of the heavenly sword, but also feel the musical character of the guqin.
In the field of culture and museums, Tencent Games has cooperated with the Nanjing Folk Museum, a subsidiary of the Nanjing Museum, to set up a guqin digital sound source experience space, so that museum visitors can play the guqin music source independently and experience the rhyme and culture of the guqin more vividly.
In addition, in order to showcase more stories about the innovative collection of the Ming Dynasty guqin, Tencent News and Tencent Games jointly produced the documentary "Ancient and Modern Voices - Guqin Chapter", where the audience can learn about the cultural story of the Ming Dynasty guqin that spans a century and is vividly integrated with modern technology.
Inheriting the beauty of traditional Chinese instrumental music, the "super digital scene" helps build cultural influence
The "Digital Preservation of Traditional Chinese Instrumental Music" project was launched by Tencent Games in 2022. Under the academic guidance of the Institute of Music of the Chinese Academy of Arts, the project aims to solve the problem that many precious music sounds and ancient music scores have disappeared due to the lack of systematic recording, and uses game audio design and algorithm capabilities to digitally store the music sounds and scores of China's precious traditional instrumental music, and carry out protection and science popularization work in the aspects of timbre collection and preservation, ancient music score research, etc.
In the 1.0 phase of the project, with the support of the Hubei Provincial Museum and the Hubei Provincial Bo Chime Orchestra, the audio team of Tencent Games NExT Studios conducted a systematic, high-standard, high-restoration, and high-quality digital sampling and restoration of the "Zeng Hou Yi Chime 1:1 Replica" (the first in the industry), including 64 bell forward and side strikes, with a total of 613 effective monophonic sound sources, using game technology to sound the ritual music instrument that has been inherited for 2,000 years in digital time and space.
The digitization of the guqin in the 2.0 stage has achieved a further extension and breakthrough in the dissemination and inheritance of ancient music, so that the precious traditional instrumental music such as the guqin can be rejuvenated in the digital world, becoming visible, audible and playable, bursting with new vigor and vitality.
On the one hand, game technology can accurately output the sound and charm of traditional instrumental music, and on the other hand, with the help of the interactive form and application of games, the "revitalized" ancient music can widely gather the attention of users. As a result, as a "super digital scene", the game can more intuitively experience the beauty of Chinese instrumental music, and also allows the voice of the nation to be continued and inherited, helping Chinese traditional culture to build greater influence.
Nanjing Folk Museum
Nanjing Folk Museum is located in the national key cultural relics protection unit - Ganxi Mansion. Ganxi Mansion is located at No. 15, 17, 19 and No. 42 and No. 46 Daban Lane, Qinhuai District, Nanjing, and is a Qing Dynasty residential complex composed of five groups of multi-entry through-hall style Qing Dynasty residential buildings, covering an area of nearly 10,000 square meters. Ganxi Mansion is the former residence of Ganxi, a famous literati and historian in the Qing Dynasty, and is a relatively complete Qing Dynasty residential complex with a large existing area and a relatively complete preservation in Nanjing. Ganxi Mansion and Ming Xiaoling Mausoleum and Ming City Wall are known as the three major landscapes of Ming and Qing Dynasty architecture in Nanjing, and have extremely high historical, scientific and tourist value. Ganxi Mansion is commonly known as "Ninety-Nine and a Half Rooms" and "Gan Family Compound".
Through three chapters, the exhibition tells the humanistic stories that occurred in the Ganxi Mansion and the inheritance of Nanjing's characteristic intangible cultural heritage folk culture through three chapters: "Jinling Famous Mansion Calligraphy Heirloom - Ganxi Mansion History and Culture Exhibition Area", "Jinling Treasures and Prosperity - Nanjing Intangible Cultural Heritage Exhibition Area" and "Jinling Prosperous Meeting and Chengnan Heritage - Old Nanjing Folk Customs Exhibition Area".
Yangtze Evening News/Purple Cow News reporter Jiang Tiansheng
Proofreading Tao Shangong