Nanguan music

Nanguan music
Chinese南管
Transcriptions
Southern Min
Hokkien POJLâm-kóan
Alternative Chinese name
Chinese南音
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu PinyinNányīn
Southern Min
Hokkien POJLâm-im
Second alternative Chinese name
Chinese南樂
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu Pinyinnanyue
Southern Min
Hokkien POJLâm-ga̍k
Third alternative Chinese name
Chinese南曲
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu PinyinNánqǔ
Southern Min
Hokkien POJLâm-khiok
Wang Xin-xin playing Nanguan pipa. The Nanguan pipa is held in the ancient manner like a guitar which is different from the near-vertical way pipa is now usually held.
The mouthpiece of the Xiao flute.

Nanguan (Chinese: 南管; pinyin: Nánguǎn; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Lâm-kóan; lit. 'southern pipes'; also nanyin, nanyue, xianguan, or nanqu) is a style of Chinese classical music from the southern Chinese province of Fujian.[1] It is also popular in Taiwan, particularly Lukang on west coast, as well as among Overseas Chinese in Southeast Asia.[2]

Fujian is a mountainous coastal province of China. Its provincial capital is Fuzhou, while Quanzhou was a major port in the 7th century CE, the period between the Sui and Tang eras. Situated upon an important maritime trade route, it was a conduit for elements of distant cultures. The result was what is now known as nanguan music, which today preserves many archaic features.

It is a genre strongly associated with male-only community amateur musical associations (quguan or "song-clubs"), each formerly generally linked to a particular temple, and is viewed as a polite accomplishment and a worthy social service, distinct from the world of professional entertainers.[2] It is typically slow, gentle, delicate and melodic, heterophonic and employing four basic scales.[3]

Nanguan was inscribed in 2009 on the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO.[4]

  1. ^ Thrasher, Alan Robert (2008). Sizhu Instrumental Music of South China: Ethos, Theory and Practice. Brill. pp. 12–14. ISBN 978-9004165007.
  2. ^ a b Wang, Ying-Fen (September 2003). "Amateur Music Clubs and State Intervention: The Case of Nanguan Music in Postwar Taiwan" (PDF). Journal of Chinese Ritual, Theatre and Folklore (141). Retrieved January 2, 2014.
  3. ^ Wang, Xinxin. "Nanguan Music: Appreciation and Practice (course description)". Graduate Institute of Musicology, National Taiwan University. Archived from the original on January 19, 2010.
  4. ^ "Nanyin". UNESCO.