Beixinzhuang village, with a population o f about one thousand, is located in the
suburbs of Beijing, about twenty-five kilometres to the southeast of the city centre.
In 1951, some youths of the village organized a music association and started to learn
Bei]ing yinyue (jingyinyue "Beijing music") from a monk living in the
village. Over the past half century, the main goal of the Association has been to
maintain this music tradition, its most important activity being the performance of
music for funeral ceremonies.
There has been great change over this period, and the Association has been
struggling to keep its tradition. In order to survive, it has had to enlarge its
repertoire to fit the changing society. Today, although their repertoire has been
greatly expanded, with many different styles o f music added, the most important
pieces are of two types: Beijing yinyue pieces learned from the monk, and popular
songs adopted mainly from the media.
The present work is a study of the Beixinzhuang Music Association and its
repertoire as influenced by Confucianism, the predominant traditional ideology o f
China, and in terms of the fundamentals of traditional Chinese music theory.
Chapter I introduces the cultural background and existing research of Beijing
yinyue. Chapter II reviews Confucian belief in theory and practice. Chapter III
addresses the organization o f the Association and its activities, and Chapter IV
introduces its material culture. Chapter V analyzes the local repertoire and Chapter
VI examines the integration of this music into the funeral rituals. A postscript
attempts to explain the reasons for change in the repertoire.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:BVAU.2429/13471 |
| Date | 11 1900 |
| Creators | Du, Yaxiong |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Relation | UBC Retrospective Theses Digitization Project [http://www.library.ubc.ca/archives/retro_theses/] |
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