Sè pǔ 瑟譜
Manual of the Sè-Zither by 熊朋來 (Xióng Pénglái)
About the work
A six-juan treatise and song-book for the sè 瑟 — the long, twenty-five-string ritual zither — by the early-Yuán Sòng-loyalist Xióng Pénglái. The work argues that of all stringed instruments only the sè was authorized by ancient ritual to “second” the singing voice in the temple-hall (shàngyú gē 堂上侑歌); since the teaching of the sè had been lost, those who recited the Shī had been left without a notation. Xióng’s response was twofold. He composed two sèfù 瑟賦 (“rhapsodies on the sè”) explaining the physical principles of the instrument, then assembled the present edition: a string-pitch chart, the 60-mode rotation chart, an introduction to the yǎlǜ tōngsú 雅律通俗 (the conversion between elegant ritual and popular notation), the fingerings, an “old notation” of twelve odes already preserved by Zhào Yànsù 趙彥肅 from the Kāiyuán shí’èr shī pǔ (Tang dynasty), a “new notation” of seventeen odes that Xióng himself had composed, the ritual-shrine yuèzhāng pǔ 樂章譜 for the xuégōng shìdiàn 學宮釋奠 (the Confucius-temple seasonal sacrifice), and a closing miscellany (hòulù 後錄) of all sè references in the classical tradition. It is the most detailed surviving work of pre-modern Chinese performance practice for any single instrument before the Míng qín pǔ tradition.
Tiyao
[Your servants] respectfully report: Sè pǔ in 6 juàn, by Xióng Pénglái of the Yuán. Pénglái’s Wǔjīng shuō is already catalogued elsewhere. The general thesis of this book is that, in ritual, only the sè serves to second the singing in the temple-hall; no other stringed instrument has that function — which the ancients regarded as weighty. From the time the teaching of the sè fell silent, those who recited the Shī were left without a notation. Pénglái accordingly composed two sèfù in which to develop the principles, and then drew on ancient meaning while incorporating new ideas to assemble the present edition. It opens with a chart of the string-pitches; next a chart of the sixty rotation-modes; next the yǎlǜ tōngsú pǔlì 雅律通俗譜例; next the fingerings; next the “old” Shī notation, comprising twelve pieces (Lù míng, Sì mǔ, Huáng huáng zhě huá, Yú lì, Nán yǒu jiā yú, Nán shān yǒu tái, Guān jū, Gé tán, Juǎn ěr, Què cháo, Cǎi fán, Cǎi pín) preserved by Zhào Yànsù from the Tang Kāiyuán shí’èr shī pǔ; next the Shī xīn pǔ (“new notation”), comprising seventeen pieces (Zōu yú, Qí yù, Kǎo pán, Shǔ lí, Zī yī, Fá tán, Jiān jiā, Héng mén, Qī yuè, Jīng jīng zhě é, Hè míng, Bái jū, Wén Wáng, Yì, Sōng gāo, Zhēng mín, Jiōng) all of which Pénglái himself composed; next the Yuèzhāng pǔ, the ritual yuèzhāng notation for the xuégōng shìdiàn; and ends with the Sè pǔ hòulù, “Closing Miscellany of the Sè Manual,” a compendium of every classical statement on the sè. — His string-pitch chart treats the central string as the supremely-clear (jí qīng) string, kept blank and not played; this rebuts Master Jiāng’s Sètú which uses all 25 strings. We must note: Niè Chóngyì’s Sānlǐ tú states that the yǎ sè has 23 strings and uses 19 of them in normal performance, the remaining 4 being called fān or “supernumerary”; the sòng sè has 25 and uses all of them. Moreover the Zhuāngzǐ and Huáinánzǐ both contain the line “strike one — and all 25 strings respond” — so Master Jiāng’s account does have ancient warrant and cannot be dismissed wholesale. The 60 modes laid out in the rotation-chart all derive from the Lǜlǚ xīn shū (KR1i0003). Yet for the 12 gōng he uses the Lǐjì zhèngyì sequence “huángzhōng first, línzhōng second…” rather than Master Cài’s “huángzhōng first, dàlǚ second…”; and he replaces the “èr biàn” (two derived tones) with “èr shǎo” (two minor tones) — the minor responding to the principal but not to the senior — which is in fact less precise than the Lǜlǚ xīn shū. Furthermore, in the huángzhōng mode, only huángzhōnggōng uses 7 principal pitches; in wúyìshāng one is principal, one is half, and 5 are derived halves; in yízéjué two are principal, two are half, and 3 are derived halves. Pénglái lists 7 principal pitches before the huángzhōnggōng but does not record principal-versus-derived nor half-versus-derived-half for wúyìshāng downwards — this is also unintelligible. — The Yuèzhāng pǔ uses the Tang yuè method of three concords, with the gloss: “If dàlǚ serves as jué, then within the dàlǚ mode start the tune from zhònglǚ and end the tune there; if tàicù serves as zhǐ, then within the tàicù mode start from nánlǚ and end there; if yīngzhōng serves as yǔ, then within the yīngzhōng mode start from yízé and end there. But for huángzhōng serving as gōng there is no specification.” A further note: “In the present shìdiàn, in welcoming the spirits, only huángzhōnggōng — one tune — is repeatedly performed.” — Now, Fàn Zhèn’s Huángyòu xīn yuètú jì says: “Huángzhōng serving as jué means yízé serves as gōng; the jué of huángzhōng means gūxǐ serves as jué. The twelve pitches with respect to the five tones all follow this principle.” The popular formulation drops the zhī particle and simply says “tàicù is huángzhōngshāng”, “gūxǐ is huángzhōngjué”, “línzhōng is huángzhōngzhǐ”, “nánlǚ is huángzhōngyǔ”. Fàn’s exposition is most clear. Now Pénglái’s “dàlǚ serves as jué and we begin from zhònglǚ” means dà-lǚ-of-jué, tài-cù-of-zhǐ, yīng-zhōng-of-yǔ — which is not the same as “dàlǚ serves as jué”, “tàicù serves as zhǐ”, “yīngzhōng serves as yǔ”. As for “huángzhōng serves as gōng” and “huáng-zhōng-of-gōng”, there is one huángzhōng — they cannot be different. Pénglái uses the Tang system but then turns around and says “only huángzhōnggōng is repeatedly performed”: is this not precisely a fence-sitting argument, betraying his own dis-ease with the matter? — As for the Hòulù, it cites the saying that Yáo invented the 15-string sè — which appears in the Lǚshì chūnqiū, but Pénglái by mistake of memory attributes it to the Lǐjì Yuèjì. This is a small flaw. — Yet of all the music-pitch treatises in the field, the manuals for the qín far outnumber those for the sè. By the early Eastern Jìn there was still the matter of Huán Yī singing Cáo Zhí’s poetry to the sè, but thereafter the transmission grew very thin; the lines “twenty-five strings strummed in the moonlight” by Qián Qǐ, or “the brocade sè without occasion has fifty strings” by Lǐ Shāngyǐn, are mere poetic whim — not actual fact. The few ancient sè settings that remain are in the suburban-altar and ancestral-shrine and assembly yǎ music, of one variety only. Pénglái’s labour, in the wake of the lost manuals, in collation and assembly, has preserved what little remained of the outline. The historians say of him that he understood music thoroughly and was particularly skilled in playing the sè — which sets him apart from those Confucians who, ignorant of the modes, prate about music theory in the abstract. Preserving him still suffices to show what was left of the ancient music. Respectfully edited and presented in the ninth month of Qiánlóng 46 (1781). Editor-Generals: Jì Yún, Lù Xīxióng, Sūn Shìyì. Editor-in-chief: Lù Fèichí.
Abstract
The Sè pǔ is the most detailed and best-preserved pre-modern Chinese performance manual for any single ritual instrument. Xióng Pénglái’s combination of theoretical apparatus (string-pitch chart, 60-mode chart, yǎlǜ / tōngsú conversion table, fingerings) with two distinct repertoires — the “old notation” of twelve Shī odes preserved from Zhào Yànsù’s transmission of the lost Tang Kāiyuán shí’èr shī pǔ, and seventeen of his own “new” compositions — gives modern researchers their best window onto the actual performance practice of the sè in Yuán-period ritual contexts. The closing yuèzhāng pǔ for the xuégōng shìdiàn (Confucius-temple seasonal sacrifice) is one of the few surviving full ritual scores from the period. The Sìkù compilers’ technical reservations — that Xióng’s modal nomenclature is inconsistent (mixing Lǐjì zhèngyì with Lǐlǚ xīn shū), that he replaces èr biàn with the less-orthodox èr shǎo, that his accommodation of the Tang three-concord system is incomplete — register the work’s transitional position between Northern Sòng theoretical orthodoxy and the Yuán Confucian-academy practice of the period. The work is the principal modern source for the controversy over whether the central (13th) string of the 25-string sè is to be played: Xióng holds it is silent; the Sìkù compilers note classical attestations to the contrary. Composition cannot be precisely dated; the work is a mature production from the second half of Xióng’s teaching career in Jiāngxī (the Yuán shǐ notes his musical pre-eminence). The bracket 1300–1323 (his last quarter-century) is defensible, with completion before his death in 1323.
Translations and research
- Joseph S. C. Lam. 1998. State Sacrifices and Music in Ming China: Orthodoxy, Creativity, and Expressiveness. SUNY Press. — Detailed examination of yuè-zhāng notation in continuity with the Sè pǔ.
- Bell Yung. 1997. Celestial Airs of Antiquity: Music of the Seven-string Zither of China. Madison: A-R Editions. — Limited but pertinent comparative material.
- 楊蔭瀏. 1981. 中國古代音樂史稿. Beijing: 人民音樂出版社. — Treats the Sè pǔ as the principal Yuán source.
- 葉國良. 2010. “熊朋來《瑟譜》研究.” 中國文哲研究通訊. — Recent specialist study.
Other points of interest
The “old notation” preserved in the Sè pǔ — the twelve Shī odes attributed to Zhào Yànsù’s transmission from the lost Tang Kāiyuán shí’èr shī pǔ — is the principal route by which any vestige of Tang ritual song-melody may have survived. Modern performance reconstructions of Confucius-temple music routinely begin from the Sè pǔ notations.