Research On Music For Funeral Ceremony In Hushan County, Guangshan Town, South Henan

This paper mainly considers the music played at the funeral ceremony of Hushan County, Guangshan Town, South Henan. The author of this paper obtains first-hand data by means of field investigations at the real sites in order to reveal the authentic situation of the music played at local funeral ceremonies. With the musical matters for the funeral ceremonies of Huoju Daoism in Hushan County and corresponding musical compositions as the mainline, detailed and profound researches have been carried out from such five aspects as the history of Huoju Daoism, procedures for the funeral ceremony in Hushan County, functions of the ceremonial music, artistic features of the ceremonial music and inheritance as well as protection of funeral ceremony. Based on the manners for inheriting music by means of Daoism, corresponding suggestions and presuppositions will be put forward for future development of the music for the funeral ceremonies of Huoju Daoism in Hushan County.This paper is sub-divided into five major parts:In Chapter One, based on the briefing of the history of Huoju Daoism in Guangshan Town by means of reviewing the historic records for Guangshan Town and site investigations, the reasons for why the music played for Huoju Daoism ceremonies in Guangshan Town has been long popular in local area. The origin of folk Taoist Forum in Guangshan Town has also been introduced.In Chapter Two, the procedures for holding the funeral ceremonies and carrying out funeral traditions in Hushan County have been concluded by means of site investigations. The ceremony spot belongs to one kind of diet business that lasts one whole day, thus the author only abstracts partial information from 10 parts of the entire ceremonial procedures and represent partial of such information in the form of words.In Chapter Three, these three major functions of the music for the funeral ceremonies in Hushan County are introduced: gathering function, instructive function and emotional transmission function. Based on such introduction, the musical style for the funeral ceremony in Hushan County is further studied.In Chapter Four, deeper analyses are made towards the musical styles for the funeral ceremonies in Hushan County based on the folk music and flower drum opera in Guangshan Town, such analyses are mainly carried out from four aspects: vocal music, types of musical instruments and instrumental music, mixed bands at the ceremonies and musical compositions for the ceremonies. In Chapter Five, based on site investigations towards the folk Taoist forum in Hushan County, some methods for inheriting the folk Taoism forum of Guangshan Town have been withdrawn: family inheriting, learning from teachers and learning from stealing; some suggestions have also been given in terms of inheritance and protection of the music for the funeral ceremony in Hushan County.