Chronicle of "Flowing Water River"

Author: Yin Yigong / Country:
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-06-01
Features: In the June 1998 issue of "Yunling Ge Sheng," Zhou Liangpei's article "On Xiao He Tang Shui" stated that "Xiao He Tang Shui" "completely borrows" the melody from "Da Tian Zai Yang." At the end of last year, Zhou Liangpei called me to talk about "Da Tian Zai Yang." I said I hadn't heard it before and asked him to send me a copy. He sent me a set of "Songs in Yunnan," which is how I first encountered "Da Tian Zai Yang," so it's impossible to say that it was used to arrange and adapt "Xiao He Tang Shui" in 1947. When I was at Yunnan University in 1947, the song Huamingbang sang wasn't the "Da Tian Zai Yang" I saw later. I asked him then, and in the early 1980s, I asked Chen Shaochun to ask him again, and he both said he was just "humming casually." At that time, he used the "a" tone to sing some phrases, and what caught my attention was how he repeatedly sang: 61233216, getting faster and faster, later turning into: 32163216…3212632216… This reminded me of two folk songs I heard in the Midebu mountainous area near my hometown, one being "Sheep Herding Tune": 161632163221600556156546532665320. Once, I heard an old man singing on a hillside, stretching the syncopated rhythm of 3216 into 3216, making it very melodious and profound, leaving a deep impression on me. When arranging "Xiao He Tang Shui," I made this phrase repeat frequently, and the structure of "Sheep Herding Tune," which has two sections for each of the 12 months, with two lines per section, also became the structure of "Xiao He Tang Shui," with two lines per section and two sections per song. This year, after the CCTV team interviewed me, they went to the Midebu mountainous area to record "Sheep Herding Tune" and broadcast "Where Xiao He Tang Shui Originated" on CCTV's "Documentary Window" on July 16, 1998. The other song is "The Moon Shines Bright": 6123321632216-6165325665326-. Some elderly people said this was a melody that someone created based on "Sheep Herding Tune," depicting the lives of stone carvers, vendors, etc., and it evolved from "Sheep Herding Tune" with some changes. "Xiao He Tang Shui" was created by combining these two folk songs. There is an important point: the Copyright Law of the People's Republic of China explicitly states in Article 12, "Works produced by adaptation, translation, annotation, or arrangement of existing works shall be owned by the adapter, translator, annotator, or arranger." Therefore, no matter what song I adapted to create "Xiao He Tang Shui," the copyright of both the melody and lyrics of "Xiao He Tang Shui" belongs to me. I have already registered this with the provincial copyright bureau on May 30, 1994. Regarding the pen name "Zhao Hua," I have been using it since 1943 when I edited the "New Great Wall" bulletin in Midebu. In 1946, the call for submissions in the "Teaching Singing" magazine published by the "South Wind Chorus" had "submit manuscripts to Zhao Hua at Yunnan University." The same issue also published my article "From the Son of a Thousand Gold" under the pen name "Zhao Hua." The second issue of "Teaching Singing" also published several Midebu folk songs I arranged, such as "Embroidering a Satchel," "Dali Sea," and "Calling Across the Mountains," all under the pen name "Zhao Hua." The rumors and false statements in "On Xiao He Tang Shui" are not in line with the facts. (Originally published in "Yunling Ge Sheng," Issue 2, 1999, P12-13)