A Research On CHEN Qigang's Compositions

CHEN Qigang1(1951~),a Chinese composer,has been influenced by Chinese traditional culture since childhood,graduated from the central conservatory of music in China and went to Paris to study in 1984.He has won high honors and achievements in the world,and gradually formend music languages,composition concepts and style with personal characteristics.In order to explore the compositional process from “Reference-integration” to “Sefl-reflection”,this doctoral dissertation selected 18 musical compositions involving chamber music,orchestral music and other genres by CHEN Qigang from 1980 to 2017 as the research objects,and probed into his musical composition based on perspectives of techniques,concepts and style.The research on tecniques focuses on four aspects.The first is “Melody,Rhythm and Beat”,which attempts to summarize the contrast and alternation of the Chinese pentatonic colors of“surround type”,“winding type” and “scale type” melody based on the superposition of Chinese pentatonic tones(scale);to summarize the characeristics of dense acoustics based on verticalarithmetic sequence and the gradual rhythmic changes of horizontal arithmetic sequence;to summarize the application of Chinese folk songs,Guqin music and Chinese opera musical elements in the compositions.The second is “Multi-sound Techniques”,with harmony and polyphony as the breakthrough point,aiming to reveal the characteristics of single and compound tonality,as well as the alternation of Chinese pentatonic tonality colors,to reveal the embodiment of horizontal linear thinking such as imitation polyphony,contrast polyphony and branch polyphony in the compositions.The third is “Timbre,Acoustics and Texture”,which summarizes the conversion and embellishment of single or composite timbre under strengthcontrol,which summarize the polyphonic texture form under horizontal linear thinking,and the “massive type”,“mesh type” and “tile type” characteristics of “static” and “dynamic” continuous texture.The fourth is “Composition Analysis”,which takes five compositions in different periodes,genres and themes as the analysis object,andanalyzes the application of specific compositional techniques in his compositions from the aspects of musical materials and structural characteristics,supplemented by the observation of composition with similar genres or themes in different periods,so as to explore the evolution,continuation and extension of his musical composition in genres,themes,techniques,emotions and aesthetic conceptions.The research on concepts and style focuses on three aspects.The first is “Self-finding”,which observes the exploration of concepts and style from the aspects of the expression form and aesthetic experience of compositions such as LE SOUVENIR,VOYAGE D'UN RêVE etc.The second is “Self-establishment”,which finds the formation of his concepts and style from the expression forms and aesthetic purport of POèME LYRIQUE II,EXTASE II,REFLET D'UN TEMPS DISPARU,WU XING,IRIS DéVOILéE etc.The third is “self-reflection”,which observes the extension of concepts and style from the expression methods and aesthetic orientation of recent compositions such as LUAN TAN,LA JOIE DE LA SOUFFRANCE etc.Based on the perspectives of techniques,concepts and style,combined with CHEN Qigang's life and emotional experience,this doctoral dissertation aims to probe into the process of“exploration–reflection–formation–establishment–continuation-extension” of his musical compositions.