A Research Into Music Stability Of Yangzhou Qingqu

This dissertation belongs to Chinese traditional musical morphology research area. It aims at the questions of "WHAT/HOW" and "WHY" for the characteristics of stability of Chinese traditional music. with the case research of "Yangzhou Qingqu". So; first of all, from the view of morphological analysis, it reveals the intension of the character of stability of Yangzhou Qingqu, i.e., the immovable (stable) elements of musical morphology. Then, it investigates the subjective and objective causes for these stable elements.Chapter 1 and 2 of this dissertation have examined in details for the Major Tune Labels Manjianghong and Nandiao. on the inner structural character, and applications on different occasions, by the quantitative and qualitative methods such as music-score-comparison, normal-form depiction, sample-calculation, etc., and found:1. The interior structures of these two Tune Labels are made up of many different "stock phrases": the repeated materials. For instance, the constructional material of Manjianghong: motive-degree. phrase-degree, sentence-degree and paragraph-degree, all of which act as "stock phrases"(the repeated materials), and become the principal structural material. It is the same with the case of Nandiao. The author distinguishes these as "material stability".2. In different contexts, these two Tune Labels do not adjust their melodies to fit these contexts. Instead, they remain their shapes into the structural stability. For instance, Mnajianghong keeps its length in three paragraphs,131 bars, and each sentence. Its mode, tonality, line word phrases, instrumental music, and tail-melodies are kept immovable with the same position. Nandiao, except keeping these characters such as structural length, mode, and tonality etc., its melody proceeds in the same way in different kinds of contexts as well. The author calls "structural stability" for the situations of structural stable, whereas "melodic stability" for the approximate melodies.3. Because of the characters of these stabilities, especially of the character of "structural stability" and "melodic stability", we can extrapolate the historical stability of these two Tune Labels. Thus, this dissertation researches into the "close relatives" and "distant relatives" of these two Tune Labels separately, and finds some communicative elements of musical morphology in them. As a result, the author believes that these communicative elements may be the historical music-morphology of those homonymous Vulgar Tunes of Ming Dynasty and Qing Dynasty.Chapter 3 of this dissertation seeks the causes of these stabilities of Yangzhou Qingqu, by research into the transmission mode of oral culture of Yangzhou Qingqu itself, and other kinds of Chinese traditional music. The author considers that the character "material stability" determined by the common character of oral culture. However, the features "structural stability" and "melodic stability" depend on the conventional mechanism of the transmission mode of Yangzhou Qingqu. That is to say, they depend on the strict and scheduled transmission mode of the Party of Yangzhou Qingqu. and on the emphasis on those art elements such as "&awya?"(equivalent to heavy/weak beats, rhythm)."6airz"(equivalent to incorporation of words and melodies)in transmission process. Furthermore, the dissertation thinks they may be one of the "high cultural specificities" of Chinese traditional music. Therefore, the subject of "melody archaeology" becomes possible.