Gulls and Herons Forget Scheming, played by Wu Zhaoji
The credits read: “Soaring aloft between sea and sky, the seabirds mix their hearts with the elements and forget all calculation. This piece has a deep resonance and, if played at night, opens the heart and lightens the spirit.”
As much as I love the great work of European classical music, I always feel like someone is lecturing me, especially when the said works are Really Great, like Beethoven's Ninth Symphony or Bach's Mass in B Minor. Someone is yelling at me "Stop what you are doing, and listen to me! This is much more important!" And I have no choice but to obey and be overwhelmed by the vastness of the universe, in contrast to which whatever I am doing at the moment seems insignificant.
But there is more than one way to show the vastness of our lives. You can fill the space with a thousand elaborate creations, or you can simply point to space – the pluck of a string attached to a piece of pine wood, reverberates in the furthest reaches of the universe. So now we can afford to relax and stretch our bodies out on a bamboo mat, like those loosely clothed sages in the paintings, who are often seen with the instrument under their arms. Each note of the guqin is a tiny dent or ripple in silence, which immediately smooths itself, before the next ripple arises. In terms of musical logic it is hard to say how each note relates to the next. Maybe we are all alone, and this is ultimate freedom. You can't trace the music, and it is difficult to hum. It never gets stuck in your head no matter how many times you listen to it. It is like clear water running through the ears, "wiping out the traces / of the people and the places that I've been." (Kris Kristofferson) It nourishes the wilderness within.
But there is more than one way to show the vastness of our lives. You can fill the space with a thousand elaborate creations, or you can simply point to space – the pluck of a string attached to a piece of pine wood, reverberates in the furthest reaches of the universe. So now we can afford to relax and stretch our bodies out on a bamboo mat, like those loosely clothed sages in the paintings, who are often seen with the instrument under their arms. Each note of the guqin is a tiny dent or ripple in silence, which immediately smooths itself, before the next ripple arises. In terms of musical logic it is hard to say how each note relates to the next. Maybe we are all alone, and this is ultimate freedom. You can't trace the music, and it is difficult to hum. It never gets stuck in your head no matter how many times you listen to it. It is like clear water running through the ears, "wiping out the traces / of the people and the places that I've been." (Kris Kristofferson) It nourishes the wilderness within.
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