Intern Ma Xiaoqing, Reporter of China Youth Daily and China Youth Network Wang Xinxin
Dazzling stage lighting, cheerful electronic dance music, accompanied by melodious erhu tunes... On the evening of October 29, at the youth song meeting of the 31st Summer Universiade (hereinafter referred to as the "Chengdu Universiade") in Chengdu, the "Jincheng Youth Walk" sung by the Berkeley Conservatory of Music and Chengdu university students ignited the atmosphere of the scene.
The composition of this work was Chen Yimiao, a Chinese student from The Berkeley School of Music. In the public collection of songs for the Chengdu Universiade, this song attracted the attention of judges and voting netizens with its unique style of combining Western and Chinese.
Wu Tengteng, a young erhu player, plays "Jincheng Youth Walk". Li Yulong / Photo
At the youth song meeting that night, the host introduced "Jincheng Youth Walk": The song played the happiness movement of Jincheng with a very oriental flavor of erhu, and told the Chinese story with a beautiful tune full of national charm.
"A good song has never belonged only to the creator, but to the public, and its lyrics and composition record the heartbeat of this generation of teenagers." Chen Yimiao said, "I hope that this song created for the Chengdu Universiade can become such a song – no matter where you come from and what language you speak, you can feel the warm hope and dream from it." ”
In November 2020, the Executive Committee of the Chengdu Universiade launched a song collection activity, collecting more than 2,700 musical works from all over the world. After several rounds of public voting and expert committee review, the song "Jincheng Youth Line" became one of the 20 theme promotion songs of the Chengdu Universiade.
Chen Yimiao said that the song was her "one-shot creation". "When I got this theme, I thought about how to combine music with the University Games, so I chose to use the rhythm of the rhythm to express the youthful feeling of college students, so I had a very cheerful rhythm of this song."
Berkeley Conservatory of Music and Chengdu college students sang "Jincheng Youth Walk" together. Li Yulong / Photo
After the rhythm is determined, the melody follows. In just one or two days, Chen Yimiao completed the tunes of "Jincheng Youth Line". The song combines traditional erhu performance, opera singing and popular electronic music, allowing traditional Chinese music to collide with popular elements to create a new spark.
It is worth mentioning that the songwriters and singers of this song are all college students. Chen Yimiao believes that the creator's college student status is in line with the theme of the Universiade, and everyone has integrated their expectations for this global youth event into the song.
Chen Yimiao was born into an Erhu family. Her great-grandfather was a folk artist who played Jiangnan silk bamboo, and her grandfather Chen Yaoxing and father Chen Jun were both famous erhu players in China. Since I can remember, Chen Yimiao's daily life has often accompanied erhu, and at a young age, he was the gold medal winner of China's three major professional erhu competitions.
Chen Yimiao. Courtesy of respondents
Immersed in traditional Chinese culture, Chen Yimiao gradually grew up and began to be exposed to different types of music from all over the world. She tried to integrate erhu and Western music, hoping to innovate the erhu performance repertoire like her grandfather and father, and create a national style music belonging to the "Z generation".
In her many attempts, she found that traditional Chinese music has many similarities with Modern Western music. "For example, erhu is a 'five-tone style', jazz music is the same, and the two have many similarities in terms of scales. At the same time, the sound and tone of the erhu are also very suitable for playing jazz, so I can try to play some jazz tunes with the erhu. ”
In Chen Yimiao's view, traditional Chinese music, which has been passed down for thousands of years, exudes different charms in different eras. Inheritors of different eras will follow the changes of the times and adapt and innovate traditional music.
"In our family, for example, my grandfather used erhu to compose and play military music during the war years. Dad combined some Western music and played a lot of violin works with erhu. And I should create voices that fit our time. At the same time, she stressed that this kind of creation is not to add the erhu to other music, but to discover the new rhythm of the erhu.
"The genes of national music are buried in our blood, and all we have to do is to unearth its shining points little by little." Chen Yimiao said.
In addition to playing erhu songs on stages at home and abroad, Chen Yimiao also publishes popular songs or anime theme songs that he plays with erhu online. In a video called "Attack on the Erhu", Chen Yimiao used the erhu to play the tracks from the Japanese anime "Attack on Titan", and the video barrage constantly floated "good like", "love love" and "wonderful".
"The appeal of traditional Chinese music to young people has always been there." Chen Yimiao said that on the campus of the Berkeley College of Music, she hopes to introduce erhu to classmates around the world.
Chen Yimiao said that as more inheritors of traditional music move to the world stage, more and more people gradually understand and learn traditional Chinese music. She hopes to create more musical works that everyone likes, spread traditional Chinese music and traditional culture more widely, and make Chinese music a popular musical language around the world.
"During the Chengdu Universiade, university students from all over the world will come to China and Chengdu, so I want to create a song that meets the listening habits of young people around the world." Talking about the creation process of "Jincheng Youth Trip", Chen Yimiao said that the Chengdu Universiade is not only a sports competition, but also a cultural exchange event for young people around the world.
On this international stage, she hopes to combine the performance of erhu with avant-garde and popular melodies to show the charm of traditional Chinese culture to young people around the world.
Source: China Youth Daily client