I started to work on this music in the middle of June, inspired by Akira Ifukube: Chant de la Sérinde (1997) for koto.
Yves asked me if I can play like a conversation with the koto. I tried, but the result was not satisfactory for me. I also feel that qin should just play solo to bring out the natural character of the qin. Therefore, this 西域之歌 (Song of West Region) gradually came out.
Two months later, now I think I can say that it is finished with my interpretation on the qin. I just have this funny feeling about how my brain is absorbing repeated playing and practicing and suddenly a phrase of creativity jumps out within my fingers, that is how I wrote down the ending section after a few tries in different directions.
I basically took the first half of Ifukube's Chant de la Serinde for koto, and rearranged it on the qin. Koto has a different nature which can play a bunch of sequential notes in a rapid tempo, and both hands can create complicated chords. Qin has only 7 strings, therefore, I use sliding and crossing a few strings to create a sequential sound of notes. There are some cords but only in 2 notes at a time. Even so, I play some of the chords in a slightly separate timing to create two notes sequentially, which is a technique that I learned from the earliest surviving qin melody, Yolan from the 6th century. This piece on the qin becomes simplified and I like to let each note linger. To me, fewer notes but more subtle sounds are more mysterious and attractive.
The process of translating this piece of music onto the guqin was very pleasant. The decision of each tone must be considered for a while. It is like tasting and brewing. Where should the note be placed? Should it be light or heavy? How can my fingerings be unobtrusive, and not too difficult and not too strange to complete the appropriate sound? Should it faithfully present the original creator’s voice, or add my own imagination and creation? Every single decision was an experience of going through the moment. I also sincerely admire Ifukube’s beautiful creations .
Yves’ curiosity also awakened my curiosity. What kind of fantasy did Akira Ifukube have regarding Sérinde? What kind of fantasy do I have about Sérinde? To be honest, I have not had any special feelings until recently when the news of the Taliban's occupation of Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, swept overwhelmingly, and I suddenly felt something in the music.
For me, this song is full of exotic sadness. In that place where there were many battles in ancient times. Different religions and cultures have created a certain influence on mankind. Is it salvation or prejudice and cruelty?
The frontier fortress poems of China in the Han and Tang Dynasties have already implicitly expressed sadness and desolation.
Guqin melodies [Hujia Shiba Pai], [Long Shuo Cao] (formerly known as Zhaojun Yuan), (In particular, they are all "Wuye tuning", which is the tuning I used in my "Song of the Western Regions" ), are the stories of Chinese women marrying the Xiongnu...
The Western Regions are a place parted in life and separated by death...
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From Yves' Facebook:
For the New York Guqin Society August 22nd, 2021 yaji ('elegant gathering'), I suggested to guqin interpret/teacher Peiyou Chang to transcribe Akira Ifukube's Chant de la Sérinde originally written for 25-string koto.
Intrigued by the name Sérinde and why a Japanese composer would use a French title for his 'musings' about Central Asia, I presented the results of my research in a Google Docs presentation (3).
1) Chant de la Sérinde, solo for 25-string koto, by composer Akira Ifukube; interpret Keiko Nosaka who commissioned the piece to Ifukube.
