Professor Jia Daqun teaches composition at the Shanghai Conservatory, and has emerged as one of the leading composers of his generation. His career in visual art was abandoned when his vision became impaired. Undeterred, he decided to devote his attention to composition, importing the principles of form, line and color from Chinese calligraphy and painting into his compositions and teachings.
Our performances feature Professor Jia's brilliant Flavor of Bashu, for two violins, 3 percussion, and piano. Bashu is based on Sichuan opera forms, with the fiddles (singers) accompanied by the orchestra (percussion and piano). Each of the three movements has its own thematic subtitle.
I - High Pitched Tune. The main feature is that it has no accompanying instrumental music. It only has solo voice and percussion, and occasionally, other vocal accompaniment occurs behind the curtain. Thus, in this movement, two violins are singing as the actors in drama. Sometimes, violins were used as a percussion instrument.
II - Veins in Rock. Sichuan is a province with many hills and rocky mountains. This is especially true around the Three Gorges area, where one can find many unusual mountain shapes. Some of them are majestic and some are delicate. I visited Three Gorges twice and always intended to write a piece about it. It employs piano and metal percussion instrument to illustrate the strength of the mountains and the use of violins to illustrate the subtle change of the mountains: vertical, horizontal and slanting...
III - Facial Makeup. Types of facial makeup in Chinese Opera are highly appreciated in the world of art. Based upon the character of roles in the drama, this movement describes four typical facial makeup: Sheng (man), Dan (lady), Jing (general) and Chou (clown). The following audio excerpt is the conclusion of this movement:
