Research On The Cultural Connotation Of Chinese Sad Music And Aesthetics Of It

In this paper, the so-called sad music is which can bring to the audience the emotional experiences of sadness, grief..., its scope includes vocal and instrumental music. Vocal music also includes modern opera, folk songs, pop songs, as well as poems,lyrics...which can be sung out with music in ancient China.In China, especially in ancient China, there is a common phenomenon that people prefer sad music. In some dynasties, people admired sad music almost to the extent of crazy. The root cause of Chinese people’s preferring sad music is traditional Chinese culture. In the history of China, if culture of Buddhism and Taoism became the mainstream of social consciousness, the phenomenon that people prefered sad music would be particularly prominent; if culture of Confucian became the mainstream of social consciousness, the phenomenon of people preferring sad music would be not obvious.Admiring feminine beauty is the Taoist basis of aesthetics of Chinese sad music. Chinese sad music is permeated with the moral connotation such as introversion, weakness and inferiority, it is not only able to evoke people’s compassion, but also an important carrier of ancient saints’ preaching. Taoist thought of admiring feminine traits of personality lead to Chinese people tending to admiring feminine beauty in the aspects of thinking, patterns of behavior, traits of personality and aesthetics.In the meanwhile,it also affect Chinese people’s, especially ancient Chinese people’s aesthetic perception of preferring sad music.The sentiment of lives’ tragic beauty is the cultural foundations of Chinese sad music and aesthetics of it. Taoism believe that too great pleasure will bring about sadness and too great sadness will bring about pleasure, yin and yang alternate, Taoism follows nature. Being in line with nature is the most harmonious beauty. Final appearance of development and changes of things in the world all end in the disappearance of body, so the beauty of tragedy in the process of life which is in line with nature is the essence of beauty in the world.The pursuit of tragic beauty in the process of cultivating and tempering oneself is moral sublimation of Chinese sad music and the aesthetics of it.In the Taosits’ entire monastic process before reaching the ideal state of the "inaction",there has been full of expectations of the sweet after sweat and aesthetic perception of suffering.Taoism of pursuing misfortune and suffering and being unafraid of death is the cultural root of the thought of regarding sadness as beauty and the cultural genes of the aesthetics of sad music.The concept of "Shi God" in Taoism is equivalent to the ego in Freud’s theory; "primordial spirit" is equivalent to the superego;"Yu God" is equivalent to the id. The "primordial spirit" (superego) believe that the true meaning of life is returning to the nature, although the efforts of "Shi God" (ego) to overcome the temptation of "Yu God" (id) is full of misery, the "primordial spirit" (superego) is pleased with this and passes this kind of consolation to the "Shi God" (ego), thereby forming aesthetic perception in the Shi God’s consciousness. This is the most important Taoist cultural psychological causes of aesthetics of Chinese tragic, and of course, the aesthetics of sad music.Buddhists believe that life is a " reincarnation karma", tribulations serve as the ladder of being Buddha, so when Mr. Lu Xun made the evaluation of " Dream of Red Mansions ",he said only monks are happy to accept sufferings in this world. Buddhist thinking of being happy to accept sufferings is the cultural basis of aesthetics of Chinese sad music.In the Buddhist cultural horizons, Chinese pursuit of sad is either the performance of Buddha-dhatu’s enlightenment of tragic dynasty, heart with compassion, broad compassionate bosom which lies in sentient beings’ consciousness or the reflection of devil in mind which lies in sentient beings’ consciousness, that is irrationalism, amorality, hysterical world-weary delusion. This is the Buddhist cultural psychological causes of aesthetics of Chinese sad music.Confucianism also has ultimate concern for life,but the culture of Confucian attaches great importance to secular world, not the so-called past lives, pays attention to the surface of the self, not the superego and ego. So affected by the culture of Confucian, people’s psychological catharsis and sublimation of personality only happen at the level of secular world.Chinese culture of Buddhism and Taoism advocates that the evil ingredients of human nature are definitely not the true ones. The true human nature is pure and clean. Both Taosim and it are same in nature.The culture of Buddhism and Taoism observed the Id, ego and superego very thoroughly while Freud’s psychoanalytic theory only recognize and emphasize the subconsciousness of human(id), which is the moral defects of Freud’s theory of the unconsciousness.The cultural function of Chinese sad musical has changed from preaching to enlightenment then to entertainment. From ancient times to the present, this degenerative process also reflects subjects of people’s aesthetic perception changed from superego to id. In more ancient times when the function of music is preaching, Chinese people’s consciousness of preferring sad music was affected by the superego;in ancient times when the function of music is enlightenment,it was affected by the compromise of contradictory struggle between the superego and id; in modern times when the function of music is entertainment,it was more affected by the id. Modern Chinese sad music has lost the function of preaching in more ancient times, and its function of enlightenment has also been greatly weakened, instead, its function of entertainment has been strengthened.The modern people generally have no preference for sad music; instead, people prefer upbeat music. This phenomenon may be related to the happiness index, but from a cultural point of view, it can also reflects that modern people have gradually forgotten and discarded the traditional culture.