CCTV, Don't Mistake Shamelessness for Entertainment!
2006/4/10 18:05:28
Happened to watch TV today, and it was CCTV3, apparently a new program, something like "A Century of Chinese Music." It included a line: "In the last 20 years of the last century, Chinese music reached its pinnacle." If this so-called pinnacle reached its pinnacle within the comprehensively popularized linguistic context, then go ahead and pinnacle all you want. But if standing within the serious context they claim to represent, then CCTV, having just been shameless using General Shi, has once again world-historically lied with ever-increasing shamelessness!
For the Germans, their greatest music was written by Bach, Beethoven, and others. Even a garbage place like America wouldn't be shameless enough to forget that their father of music is Gershwin! I ask you: in the last 20 years of the last century, what Chinese musical work surpassed the "Yellow River Cantata"? Though "The Butterfly Lovers" is rather annoying, did any Chinese concerto from the last 20 years of the century surpass it?
Don't think that just because cinema had the garbage Fifth Generation directors, the so-called avant-garde composers in music like Tan, Wang, Guo, and their ilk became a pinnacle. The first 80 years of the last century weren't great for Chinese symphonic music, and the last 20 years didn't produce anything good either -- apart from the boasting, of course. As for art songs, like those by Zhao, Huang, Qing Zhu, and others -- works like "How Can I Not Think of Him," "The Great River Flows East," "I Live at the Head of the Yangtze" -- and works like "On the Jialing River," did the last 20 years of the century produce anything to surpass them?
In popular songs, is there anything that surpasses "My Motherland"? In military songs, anything better than "I Love Wuzhi Mountain, I Love Wanquan River"? In the hymn category, anything exceeding "Song of Praise" or "Ode to Beijing"? In folk-style opera, anything surpassing "The White-Haired Girl" or "Little Erhei's Wedding"? Even in the domain of folk instrumental music, did the last 20 years produce any works approaching the classics of Cantonese music, Jiangnan silk-and-bamboo, and the like? Anything surpassing Liu Tianhua? Don't think that just because those who messed around with Chinese music in the last 20 years now have the power of discourse, they can shamelessly spout nonsense. Destroy all their garbage works, and pieces like "Moon Reflected in the Erquan Spring" will still be considered classics.
Musical works are written with life, not blown out through the mouth -- listen to the music of Bach, Beethoven, and Schubert and you'll understand. Chinese music, aside from ancient pieces and folk songs, has a significant gap compared to the world's top level. But China's best modern works are absolutely not from the last 20 years, and the last 20 years were absolutely not the pinnacle of Chinese music. This is beyond doubt.
Listen to this art song from the 1930s. Nothing from the last 20 years of the century, including symphonies, can surpass it! CCTV, don't mistake shamelessness for entertainment!