A Textual Research Into Types Of Banquet Music Performances Of The Tang Dynasty

In the social life of the Tang Dynasty, banquet music performances occupied a mainstream position in all music performances. In this thesis, the author collects, sorts and analyzes the historical literature about banquet music performances, in a relatively detailed, full-scale way. Then, with an all-around, panoramic understanding about the banquet music culture, the author puts forward the various performance types below by means of generalization, and further describes all the types detailedly.In terms of their function and style, this thesis classifies banquet music performances into three types: ritual, educational, and recreational. Ritual banquet music performance took place mainly in the court. Educational one was suitable not only for the court but also for prefecture and county governments. Recreational one was permeated into the musical life of all social strata and groups of people, including the highest stratum of emperors, royal families and relatives, the intermediate group of officials, scholars and merchants, and the lowest grassroots. Accordingly, as the biggest type of banquet music performances, it is further divided into seven major sub-types, namely, performance for court entertainment and celebration, for emperors' private dinners, for awarding and for local governments, for households, for traveling, for whorehouses and restaurants, and for armies, civilians and merchants.On the basis of the available historical materials, this paper states and dissects diachronically and typologically the musical forms, styles and functions of banquet music performances. It is made clear that ritual banquet music performance took the form of yue-xuan (乐悬), a term for serial hanging bells and musical stones in ancient China, as the medium of musical presentation. In the performance, the music functioned primarily to clarify identity for the sake of salutation. This performance itself was a very important part in the political life of the dynasty. Similarly, educational banquet music performance also used the form of yue-xuan as the medium of musical presentationwhen it was in tai-xue (太学), the highest educational institution of the Tang Dynasty. However, when it came to xiang-yin-jiu (乡饮酒, a ritual for showing respect for the old, it proceeded with a small band playing sheng(笙), a reed pipe wind instrument, and singing songs alternatively. This performance, as an educational activity, carried out and put into practice in the court and by local governments, played mainly the role of intensifying traditions and rectifying human ethics. It is also made clear that recreational banquet music performance was presented in the form of song and dance, bai-xi (百戏) a collective term for the art of folk performances in ancient China, or both. It covered large-scale and small-scale recreational performances. The former was for people to watch and appreciate with a purely artistic eye, so they would not take part in the music performance. The latter was under way in the form of singing, dancing and feasting, and attendees would participate in the music performance. Apart from attaining the aim of entertainment, recreational performance was also likely to adjust human relations. In addition, the banquet music performance between an emperor and his officials reflected bilateral political purposes, and the performance in the army boosted the morale of soldiers, and the performance in literates' home as well as in their get-together reflected their peculiar cultural connotations.Through the description and analysis of the various types of banquet music performances, this thesis comes to the conclusion that these performances', perched and rooted in the cultural land of the Tang Dynasty, represented a unique human spirit and cultural fashion of people at that time. In other words, banquet music performances themselves were a cultural focus of the dynasty. All the aspects of the Tang Dynasty culture, including economy and politics, were shown commonly and deeply by virtue of banquet music performances...