In 1977, a recording of "Liu Shui" (Flowing Water, as performed by Guan Pinghu, one of the best qin players of the 20th century) was chosen to be included in the Voyager Golden Record, a gold-plated LP recording containing music from around the world, which was sent into outer space by NASA on the Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 spacecrafts. He said that "the Chinese understanding of the nature of sound as vibration was much increased by studying the production of timbre on the strings of the ch'in." This understanding of timbre, overtones and higher harmonics eventually led the Chinese to discover equal temperament in music. It is kept in the Forbidden City Museum in Beijing.Īccording to Robert Temple, the qin played an important part in the gaining the first understanding of music timbre for the Chinese. Many are still playable, the most famous perhaps being the one named "Jiuxiao Huanpei" 《九霄環佩》, said to have been made by the famous late Tang dynasty qin maker Lei Wei (雷威). The earliest surviving qin in this modern form, preserved in both Japan and China, have been dated to the Tang Dynasty (618-907). Chinese tradition says the qin originally had five strings, but then two were added about 1,000 BCE, making seven.īased on the detailed description in the poetic essay "Qin Fu" 【琴賦】 by Xi Kang / Ji Kang (223–262), the form of the qin that is recognizable today was most likely set around the late Han Dynasty (206 BC - 220 AD). It is mentioned in Chinese writings dating back nearly 3,000 years, and related instruments have been found in tombs from about 2,500 years ago. Legend has it that the qin, has a history of about 5,000 years that the legendary people of China's pre-history Fuxi, Shennong and Huang Di (the Yellow Emperor), was involved in its creation. The modern form has been standardized from about two thousand years. By tradition the qin originally had five strings, but ancient qin-like instruments with 10 or more strings have been found. Extended sections in music scores consisting entirely of harmonics are common, this made possible because the 91 indicated harmonic positions allow great flexibility early tablature shows that even more harmonic positions were used in the past. Stopped sounds are special for the variety of slides and ornaments used, and the use of glissando (sliding tones) gives it a sound similar to a pizzicato cello or fretless bass guitar. Sounds are produced by plucking open strings, stopped strings, and harmonics. The qin is a very quiet instrument, with a range of about four octaves, and its open strings are tuned in the bass register (its lowest pitch is about two octaves below middle C, or the lowest note on the cello). Other Western nicknames for the guqin include " Chinese guitar" and "Chinaman's harp". Other incorrect classifications (mainly from music CDs) include " harp" or "table-harp". Because Robert Hans van Gulik's famous book about the qin is called The Lore of the Chinese Lute, the qin is sometimes inaccurately called a lute. The guqin is not to be confused with the guzheng, another Chinese long zither also without frets, but with moveable bridges under each string. It can also be called qixianqin 「七絃琴」 ("seven-stringed instrument"). Traditionally the instrument was called simply qin 「琴」, but by the 20th century the term had come to be used on many other musical instruments as well (for example, the yangqin 「揚琴」 hammered dulcimer, the huqin 「胡琴」 family of bowed string instruments, and the Western piano ( Chinese: 鋼琴 pinyin: gāng qín literally "steel stringed-instrument")), so the prefix "gu-" 「古」 (meaning "ancient") was added for clarification. It is uncommonly spelt as Gu Qin (and sometimes GuQin or Gu-qin) in English. It has been played since ancient times, and has traditionally been favored by educated people as an instrument of great beauty and refinement. info) ( Chinese: 古琴 pinyin: gǔqín Wade–Giles: ku-ch'in literally "ancient stringed-instrument") is the modern name for a plucked seven-string Chinese musical instrument of the zither family.You can help Wikipedia by reading Wikipedia:How to write Simple English pages, then simplifying the article. The English used in this article or section may not be easy for everybody to understand.
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