A Study On The Innovation Of Zheng Art In New Era And Its Cultural And Aesthetic Attributes

Zheng (Guzheng) is one of China's national instruments with a long history. Accompanied by the history and culture changes, the Guzheng art is still a popular musical form. After the turning point of reform and opening up, the Zheng art comes into a new era like other musical forms, which is embodied in Zheng music composing and the innovation in Zheng performance.In the process of documents collection the author finds that the theories and monographs on Zheng art is rare and what's more, little attention has been given to the systematic researches to the Zheng art performance. Therefore, the author believes that this topic may functions as a steppingstone to arouse people's attention to the theoretical research of Zheng art. Meanwhile, the research on the innovation of Zheng art in the new era and the culture and aesthetic attributes embodied in it may make modest contribution to the development of Zheng art.This thesis is divided into five parts. The first chapter is devoted to the brief introduction of the origin and schools of Zheng art to the readers. In chapter two, three aspects of the Zheng art including the theme, playing techniques and the traditional tonal form and scale are presented. In chapter three, the author chooses some representative works of modern Zheng pieces to analyze their innovation points in six aspects, namely, the theme, playing techniques, strings sequence, timbre, performance form and rhythm form. Chapter four presents the analysis on the culture attribute of modern Zheng art.First, as a national instrument, Zheng must have its nationality in art style. Second, influenced by the reform and opening up, there is a cultural and art crash between the East and the West, which causes a change on the culture ideology of both the artists and the audience. Third, along with the increasment of East and West exchange, more and more western musical forms are introduced into China, formulating some new musical forms. In the field of Zheng art, the atonality strings sequence is the most representative new form. At last, as an art form, the Zheng art performs a new social function. In the fifth chapter, the author exposes the aesthetic attributes of the Zheng art in new era from the perspective of musical composition and the appreciator.Through the exploration on the innovation of Zheng art in the new era and the analysis on its cultural and aesthetic attributes, this thesis finds that although the innovation presents a challenge and revolt to the traditional Zheng art, it does not impact on its distinctive national character. The reason is that this art takes its root deeply into the Chinese tradition and has its completed social and cultural function. Meanwhile, the innovation reflected by the art is not just a breakthrough by the composers, but also a satisfaction to the audience's aesthetic demand. These two factors supplement to each other. From the perspective of the music itself of Zheng art, it brings the musical aesthetic experience to the audience, which is reflected by the appreciation steps and the cognitive background of audiences from different walks of life.