Lu Chunling

Lu Chunling

Lu Chunling (September 14, 1921 - May 22, 2018), male, Han nationality, Shanghai. The first batch of national intangible cultural heritage project Jiangnan Silk and bamboo representative inheritors. Flute player, composer, one of the representatives of Southern flute school, known as "Chinese Magic Flute", President of Shanghai Jiangnan Silk and bamboo society.

Character experience

Lu Chunling was born in 1921 to a family of car drivers in Shanghai. When he was 7 years old, he learned flute from a cobbler and had a strong interest in flute art. When he was young, because of his poor family, he made a living by riding tricycles and working as a car driver. Even so, he never gave up learning flute and all kinds of music activities.

As a teenager, he joined Ziyun national music club, a folk silk and bamboo group.

In 1940, he organized "Chinese Orchestra" with friends.

In his youth, Lu Chunling was forced by life. He once drove a car and rode a tricycle. The hard work of life did not overwhelm him. In addition to using the flute to relieve his depression, he also used the convenience of driving and cycling to find teachers and friends to temper himself.

After the founding of new China, he became a professional musician.

In 1953, Lu Chunling participated in the preparatory work of the Shanghai National Orchestra, and since then has become a soloist of the Shanghai National Orchestra.

He was transferred to Shanghai Conservatory of music in 1976.

Lu Chunling is a flute player and music educator. He has taught students all over the world. Many young and middle-aged flute players have received his guidance. Some of them enjoy a certain reputation in the music and teaching circles at home and abroad. For example, Yu Xunfa and other performers who have certain prestige in the field of flute. He is also a prolific writer of national instrumental music. Many flute pieces he adapted and created have become the repertoire that flute players often choose to play and are deeply loved by the audience.

Lu Chunling has been playing flute for 60 years. He has been working hard in the flute garden and has formed his strong style. "Jiangnan Silk and bamboo" is a fertile land for Lu Chunling to grow up in his bamboo flute playing art. The fresh, lively and meaningful characteristics of Jiangnan Silk and bamboo have become the keynote of his playing style. And he adapted Jiangnan Silk and bamboo music into a popular flute solo.

Over the years, in addition to playing, he has also created many excellent flute repertoires, such as "the present and the past", "the good news", "Jiang nanchun", "the first lesson of the construction site" and "on the training ground". As a flute player, he has visited and performed in more than 20 countries and regions, and adapted some foreign folk songs for flute performance, which has been warmly welcomed by the audience. He is an influential flute player at home and abroad. His flute music includes "Flying Partridge", "song of joy", "small cattle", "six boards of Chinese flowers" and his music "past and present" and "good news", which have become the reserved repertoire of the flute and have been published. Lu Chunling is one of the outstanding representatives of the Southern School of flute art in China, and is known as the "Magic Flute" at home and abroad.

On May 29, 2017, at the "90 Spring Concert of Lu Chunling's flute art", Lu Chunling's disciples came to the stage one after another to play his most famous works. He also put on a rose red robe and blew his favorite "partridge flying". A partridge is embroidered on his robe, which is a vivid painting by Cheng Shifa. On the stage, 97 year old Lu Chunling is still sweet and bright in voice and skillful in fingering, leaving behind the "king of Chinese flute".

Foreign exchange

Since 1954, Lu Chunling, as a friendly envoy of the Chinese people, has visited 30 countries and regions in Europe, Asia and Africa. During her visit, Lu Chunling never missed the opportunity to learn from her foreign counterparts, to learn from the national and folk music of various countries, and to adapt them into flute music. These foreign folk music, after his performance, also injected new blood, with a new style, become a part of Lu Chunling flute art.

style of art

His works are pure and mellow, pure and sweet in tone, delicate in performance and deep in breath control. And be able to use tremolo, tremolo, calendar, percussion, etc. The creation of flute repertoire includes "the past and the present", "the good news", "Jiangnanchun", "the first lesson of the construction site", "on the training ground", etc., and the arrangement of flute repertoire includes "Flying Partridge", "happy song", "small cattle", "Zhonghua liuban", etc., which have become the reserved repertoire of flute. No matter in the leading city of flute performance or in the whole Chinese music circle, it has a pivotal position. Over half a century of flute teaching career and artistic practice, it has formed its unique school model. His performance is respected by the music circles and confidants at home and abroad for its subtle tone, subtle fingering and rich timbre. Especially in the south of the Yangtze River, his unique system is a master of flute.

Lu Chunling's unique style of flute art is greatly influenced by Kunqu Opera, which emphasizes "Qi sinks into Dantian". The method of this kind of luck is that breathing with the help of the strong support of abdominal and lumbar muscles, so that the breath size can be controlled freely. In addition to luck, he also paid special attention to pushing the upper thumb inward and the lower thumb outward to keep the balance of the flute body, and to coordinate the distance of the air door, the tightness of the mouth and the contrast of the strength. Because of this, his voice is beautiful and mellow, solid and full, strong but not impetuous, weak but not empty.

Secondly, Lu Chunling often uses the second overtone, which is seldom used by others, in his music. Because the second overtone is played on the flute, the flute membrane is almost non vibrating. At this time, the timbre of the flute is not only pure, but also small in volume, which makes it easy to express a quiet atmosphere. In addition, in terms of the fingering skills of decorative melody, Lu Chunling paid more attention to the use of small tremolo and tremolo besides using the commonly used song and percussion of Jiangnan Silk and bamboo to enhance the charm of music. The use of small tremolo can make the music more gorgeous and lively, and make the melody more fluent. But the time value of small tremolo is very short, and it is difficult to require fingers to vibrate closely and evenly. It can be seen that Lu Chunling has done a lot of hard work on the finger tremolo.

An important way to beautify and embellish timbre is to use tremors. There are two kinds of tremors, one is Qi tremor, and the other is that Qi tremor should not be used to ensure the purity of timbre when the flute is playing weakly. In order to avoid monotony, Lu Chunling often uses tremors to beautify the timbre. In addition, finger tremor can be used with a single finger, two or three fingers, or even five or six fingers. In addition, the different methods of finger flapping and the different distance between the fingers and the sound hole will cause different effects, thus enriching the expressive force of the music. When appreciating Lu Chunling's performance or learning his music, we should appreciate it carefully.

In December 1999, he was awarded the "meritocracy Award for the elderly" by Shanghai.

Main works

Lu Chunling is a flute player who records the most records in China.

In each period, his treatment of music is obviously different. In the early 1960s, his performance was simple and honest, but he was good at creating musical image, depicting artistic conception and rendering atmosphere with vivid notes. This can be seen from the records "little cattle", "happy song" and "partridge flying" made in the 1950s. When people listen to his playing, they often expand their imagination with the sound of the flute and immerse themselves in the artistic conception he created.

Cattle herding

It was originally the "tune blowing" in traditional Chinese opera. The music can be divided into two parts. The first part takes the folk music laoliuban as the introduction, and the following melody is soothing and slightly free. Listening to this beautiful melody, it is not difficult to imagine the scene of a shepherd boy riding on the back of an ox, holding a piccolo and singing in the face of the wind in March. The first part of the music is the feather mode, and the sentences are often repeated. The repeated phrases describe the happy scene of the shepherd boy and the village girl asking, answering and singing. The latter part of the music turns to the mode of Zheng, which forms a sharp contrast with the former part. In this part, because the tone is moved four degrees higher, the timbre is more bright, and supplemented by the interweaving and contrast of the continuous tone and dun tone, the scene is more fiery and full of vitality. "Small cattle" is outlined by Lu Chunling with the flute of a picture of spring grazing, a folk painting of Jiangnan water.

Happy song

It used to be the music of Jiangnan Silk and bamboo. Most of Jiangnan's silk and bamboo music has its certain performance program: Adagio, Adagio and allegro. Allegro is the prototype of the music, while medium and adagio are the slowing down and adding flowers of the prototype. The song of joy, which is adapted as a solo, is more compact by deleting the middle board and leaving only the flowery Adagio and the lively allegro.

Partridge flying

It was originally Hunan folk music. After it was introduced into Shanghai, it evolved into Jiangnan Silk and bamboo music at the beginning of this century, and became a reserved program of Shanghai silk and Bamboo Group National Music Research Society at that time.

On the evening of June 14, 1924, at the Radio Concert, the National Music Research Society performed this piece with a team of 13 people.

In 1926, Yan Tongfan also included this song in his collection of Chinese elegant music. After zhegufei evolved into Jiangnan Silk and bamboo music, it had three kinds of music, slow, medium and fast, just like other silk and bamboo music. However, in order to avoid lengthy ensemble, often delete the board.

Partridge flying

It is Lu Chunling's most frequently recorded and recorded music. Although each version of the performance is not exactly the same, it also retains the basic style of Jiangnan Silk and bamboo: gorgeous and fluent melody, more use of free music, attention to the charm of Southern Qudi, even the transition of the tempo between Adagio and Allegro from slow to fast, which is also the turning form of Jiangnan Silk and bamboo. Nevertheless, Lu Chunling's "Flying Partridge" is obviously different from that of silk and bamboo. He focused on the depiction of image and the creation of artistic conception, so that every person could be happy

Chinese PinYin : Lu Chun Ling