Shen Xingong

Shen Xingong

Shen Xingong (1870 ~ 1947), one of the representatives of school music, is a Chinese music educator from Shanghai, Jiangsu Province. The original name is Shen Qinghong, the character is Shukui, and the pen name is Xingong. In 1895, he taught at St. John's College in Shanghai. In 1896, he was admitted to the normal class of Nanyang public school. In April 1902, he went to Japan to study at Hongwen college in Tokyo. He returned to China in 1903 and worked in Nanyang public school. Inspired by the music education in Japanese schools, he devoted his whole life to music education. He once organized a "Music Workshop" among Japanese students to study the creation of music songs. His songs have a wide range of themes and easy to understand contents. He became the first music educator to write lyrics in vernacular. His representative works include "Gymnastics - military exercises" (also known as "men's first ambition is high") and "Yellow River", etc., and he published the collection of songs "school singing collection"; in addition, Shen Xingong also created singing classes, and taught and promoted them in many places. Shen Xingong was the earliest music teacher in the initial stage of music education in ordinary schools in modern China. He wrote more than 180 songs in his life. Most of them used the tunes of foreign songs, and a few used Chinese traditional folk songs to fill in lyrics or compose music. He made outstanding contributions to the school music movement.

Life of the characters

Shen Xingong was born in Shanghai on February 14, 1870. Xingong is the pseudonym he used in composing songs and music. In 1890, he was a scholar. In 1895, he applied to teach Chinese at John's College (later changed to St. John's University). Two years later, inspired by the idea of "saving the nation through education", he resolutely gave up the teaching position with favorable treatment and was admitted to the first normal class of Nanyang public school. After the failure of the reform movement of 1898, a group of people with lofty ideals went to Japan one after another to find a way to save the country. Shen Xingong also went to Japan in April 1902 and joined the Hongwen college in Tokyo at the same time as Lu Xun. In Japan, what touched Shen Xingong most was the music activities that played a great role in school education, political propaganda and people's life after the Meiji Restoration. This kind of vigorous and enthusiastic school singing is a good remedy for the poor and weak Chinese. So Shen Xingong organized Chinese students to set up a "music seminar", which specially hired Japanese musicians as teachers to study the creation of Chinese songs. This was the first time that Chinese held modern music seminar. One of the earliest music songs in the history of modern Chinese music, men's first ambition, was Shen Xingong's first composition at that time. This song was later widely sung in China (originally known as "Gymnastics - military exercises").

In February 1903, Shen Xingong returned to China and taught in Nanyang primary school for 24 years. He first set up "singing" class in his school to promote the wave of music. According to the first Chinese education yearbook of the Ministry of education of the national government, this is the beginning of the "singing" class in Chinese primary schools. This initiative soon received a warm response from the whole society. Shen Xingong practiced it and wrote more than 180 songs in his life. Since 1904, he has published three school songs, six new school songs and four songs of the Republic of China. In 1937, it was revised and 82 songs were selected, and a collection of Xingong songs was published. In addition, he also translated and published the book teaching method of singing in primary schools. In 1922, he also served as the director of university discipline, and was employed to teach music in Wuben women's school, Nanyang middle school, Longmen normal school and Shanghai society.

The road to study

Shen Xingong's ancestors were a famous family and made their fortune by sailing. After the Opium War in 1840, due to the invasion of imperialist colonial forces, sailing ships could not compete with the foreign ships, and Shen Jiajia road gradually declined. When Shen Xingong was born, his family was on the verge of collapse. Shen Yuegang, Shen Xingong's father, was ordered by his grandfather to take charge of domestic affairs. He not only suffered from the pressure of bankruptcy, but also relied on pawn and some errands to make a living, which left a deep impression and painful memory on Shen Xingong. Shen Xingong received enlightenment education from his mother when he was a child, and then he went to school with his elder brother, a scholar. At the age of 8, the whole family lived in Changsha. At the age of 12, they moved to Qingpu grandmother's home. In 1890, Shen Xingong was a scholar in the examination and ranked second with excellent results. Unfortunately, his elder brother died that year, so he became a teacher in a private school run by an official family in Shanghai. From then on, he began to live on his own. In 1891, Shen Xingong went to Jiangning to take part in the local examination, which completely disillusioned him of going to the official career through the imperial examination. However, preparing to take part in the local examination laid a good foundation for him. Then the family affairs and state affairs made his thoughts strongly shocked.

In 1890, Shen Xingong came from the countryside to Shanghai, an important source of reform ideas. Everything was very new. For example, "learning from foreigners and improving skills to control foreigners", "middle school as the body and Western learning as the use", abolishing stereotyped writing, setting up new schools, setting up factories to manufacture new weapons, and so on, were the topics that progressive intellectuals often talked about at that time. In order to make a living for his family, his father went to Hunan, far away from his hometown. In 1892, because of poverty and illness, he died in a small inn in Changsha. The disastrous defeat of 1894 Sino Japanese war made Shen Xingong despair of the decadent Qing Dynasty. At this time, due to the death of the owner of the private school that employed Professor Shen Xingong, he also ended his career as an old-fashioned teacher. When he was a tutor, Shen went to Gezhi academy founded by the British to listen to the Dean teach mathematics. Influenced by this, he began to sprout the thought of studying western learning.

In 1895, Shen Xingong was recommended to teach Chinese at John's College in Shanghai. Besides teaching, he also learned English from foreign priests and learned Kunqu Opera from famous Kunqu Opera masters. Driven by the reformist thoughts of "saving the country by science", "saving the country by industry" and "saving the country by education", Shanghai Nanyang public school (the predecessor of today's Shanghai Jiaotong University) was founded in 1897. The school first set up a normal school to train new teachers. When Shen Xingong learned about this, he decided to give up the preferential treatment of John's college teacher, and was admitted to Nanyang Normal School, majoring in mathematics, English, physics, Chinese and other courses. Soon, he got the post of part-time teacher. In 1900, Shen Xingong and his classmates in the normal class organized the primary school affiliated to Nanyang public school. After he graduated in 1901, he applied to be a teacher of the primary school. In April 1902, Shen Xingong went to Japan and studied in Tokyo Hongwen college at his own expense. Later, because of the incident that the Japanese government and the Qing imperial envoy persecuted Chinese students, he and some of his classmates dropped out of school to protest and transferred to the Tsinghua School run by the Chinese.

Main contributions

Shen Xingong was the earliest music teacher in the initial period of music education in ordinary schools in modern China. He wrote more than 180 songs in his life. Most of them use the tunes of foreign songs, and a few use Chinese traditional folk songs to fill in words or compose music. Since 1904, he has published three school songs, six revised school songs and four songs of the Republic of China. In 1937, it was revised, 82 songs were selected, and the collection of Xingong songs was published. In addition, he also translated and published the book teaching method of singing in primary schools. The themes of Shen Xingong's music and songs are relatively wide: the Yellow River, the song of the army and the patriotism, which show the patriotic spirit; the revolutionary army and beautiful China, which directly advocate the national revolution and praise the new deal of the Republic; the women's song, the telegraph and the textile, which advocate equal rights between men and women and attach importance to science. Most of his songs are children's songs. Since he has been a teacher for a long time, he has a deep observation and understanding of children's psychological characteristics and singing requirements, so he is good at describing some things that children come into contact with in life, making children feel kind. He is also the first writer to use vernacular to write lyrics. His lyrics are simple and easy to understand. He pays more attention to the vividness of musical language and children's characteristics in choosing tunes. For example, his music, such as gymnastics - military exercises, boat racing, bamboo horse and blacksmith, is widely spread among students. He composed six songs, including "the Yellow River", "revolution must first check people's heart", "soldier's bullet", "Lotus picking song", "today's Yuqin club song" and "mourning song". Among them, "the Yellow River" has the greatest influence. This song shows the author's sincere feelings for the motherland. Huang Zizi highly praised this song in the preface of "heart work singing collection", believing that it is "very grand and generous" It's just the spirit of the lyrics. The school songs made by Chinese people have this spirit, but they don't have many views.

Shen Xingong's contribution is not only reflected in modern new education, especially in modern new music education and popularization, but also involves many other fields. For example, as early as 1907, Shen Xingong directed the drama "children's play" (also known as "disputes between the old and the new") in order to rescue the flood in Huaihe and Xuzhou. This play draws lessons from the "new drama" style popular after the Meiji Restoration in Japan, and is called "new drama" in the history of Chinese drama. It was written in the same year as Li Shutong's play "black slave calling on heaven", which was adapted from the novel of the same name by the Stowe people in the United States. It is one of the earliest plays in China. During the three years from 1919 to 1922, Shen Xingong also created and directed drama snow rose, loyal boy, fairy cloth and Tangdi flower, and added music to some dramas, which was rare at that time. Shen Xingong also adapted and directed the Kun Opera shuangzhong Tomb Based on the story of Zhao's orphan, and performed it at the 20th anniversary meeting of Nanyang public school. He used thirty or forty different pieces of Kunqu Opera in the play

Chinese PinYin : Shen Xin Gong