Lü Wencheng ( 吕文成,

pinyin Hanyu Pinyin, or simply pinyin, officially the Chinese Phonetic Alphabet, is the most common romanization system for Standard Chinese. ''Hanyu'' () literally means 'Han Chinese, Han language'—that is, the Chinese language—while ''pinyin' ...

: Lǚ Wénchéng, or ''Lui Man Sing'' in

Cantonese Cantonese is the traditional prestige variety of Yue Chinese, a Sinitic language belonging to the Sino-Tibetan language family. It originated in the city of Guangzhou (formerly known as Canton) and its surrounding Pearl River Delta. While th ...

jyutping The Linguistic Society of Hong Kong Cantonese Romanization Scheme, also known as Jyutping, is a romanisation system for Cantonese developed in 1993 by the Linguistic Society of Hong Kong (LSHK). The name ''Jyutping'' (itself the Jyutping ro ...

: Leoi5 Man4 Sing4) (1898 in Zhongshan - 1981 in Hong Kong) was a Chinese composer and musician. He composed '' Autumn Moon Over The Calm Lake'' () in the 1930s, one of the best known works of Cantonese music. He also played the '' yangqin'' and was a

Cantonese opera Cantonese opera is one of the major categories in Chinese opera, originating in southern China's Guangdong Province. It is popular in Guangdong, Guangxi, Hong Kong, Macau and among Chinese communities in Southeast Asia. Like all versions of ...

singer. His music shows a strong influence of the traditional music of the Shanghai area as a result of living almost thirty years there.

Life

Lü was born in 1898 in

Zhongshan Zhongshan ( zh, c=中山 ), alternately romanized via Cantonese as Chungshan, is a prefecture-level city in the south of the Pearl River Delta in Guangdong province, China. As of the 2020 census, the whole city with 4,418,060 inhabitants is n ...

Guangdong ) means "wide" or "vast", and has been associated with the region since the creation of Guang Prefecture in AD 226. The name "''Guang''" ultimately came from Guangxin ( zh, labels=no, first=t, t= , s=广信), an outpost established in Han dynasty ...

Province, but grew up in

Shanghai Shanghai, Shanghainese: , Standard Chinese pronunciation: is a direct-administered municipality and the most populous urban area in China. The city is located on the Chinese shoreline on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the ...

when at the age of three he and his parents moved to Shanghai. There he developed the

gaohu The ''gaohu'' ( 高胡; pinyin: ''gāohú'', ; Cantonese: gou1 wu4; also called ''yuehu'' 粤胡) is a Chinese bowed string instrument developed from the ''erhu'' in the 1920s by the musician and composer Lü Wencheng (1898–1981) and u ...

, composed and performed ''Guangdong yinyue'', and made recordings. In 1932, he moved to Hong Kong, where he lived until his death in 1981. His daughter, Lü Hong (吕红), is a professional singer, and the wife of Chinese musician Lui Tsun-Yuen.

Works

Lü is considered to have been a master of Cantonese music (''Guangdong yinyue'') and

folk music. He developed, or co-developed,co-invented by Lü and his teacher Situ Mengyan (司徒梦岩), according to Du, Yaxiong. ''Traditional Music Composers'', article in Encyclopedia of Contemporary Chinese Culture p.843, edited by Edward L Davis, Routledge 2005. the

in the 1920s from the ''

erhu The (; ) is a Chinese two-stringed bowed musical instrument, more specifically a spike fiddle, that is sometimes known in the Western world as the ''Chinese violin'' or a ''Chinese two-stringed fiddle''. It is used as a solo instrument as ...

'' by raising its pitch and using steel strings instead of silk, and changing its playing position from on the thigh to between the knees. He composed '' Autumn Moon Over the Calm Lake'' (; pinyin: Píng Hú Qiū Yuè) in the 1930s, and this piece remains to this day one of the best known works of Cantonese music. His piece "Tiger down the Mountain" (; pinyin: Xià Shān Hǔ) is quoted in the Chinese Rhapsody by Xian Xinghai.

Compositions

Lü composed over 100 pieces, including: * bù bù gāo () Higher step by step * chén zuì dōng fēng 沉醉东风 Intoxicated by the easterly wind * jiāo shí míng qín 蕉石鸣琴 * luò huā tiān 落花天 Flowers falling from sky * píng hú qiū yuè () Autumn Moon Over Calm Lake * qīng méi zhú mǎ 青梅竹马 Happy childhood * qí shān fèng 岐山凤 Phoenix of Mount Qishan * xǐng shī 醒狮 Awakening lion * yín hé huì 银河会 Meeting in the Milky Way * yú gē wǎn chàng 渔歌晚唱 Fisherman's song at dusk * xià shān hǔ 下山虎 Tiger down the Mountain

Audio sample

Performance of Lü Wencheng's Autumn Moon Over Calm Lake (平湖秋月)
by Jiyang Chen
78 RPM recording of Lü Wencheng's Tiger down the Mountain (下山虎)
performed by Lü Wencheng

References

;Sources *Du, Yaxiong. ''Traditional Music Composers'', article in Encyclopedia of Contemporary Chinese Culture p. 843, edited by Edward L Davis, Routledge 2005.

External links

1898 births 1981 deaths 20th-century Chinese composers Musicians from Guangdong 20th-century Chinese musicians People from Zhongshan {{china-musician-stub