DESCRIPTION:
Seven Tunes Heard in China, for cello (1995)

I. Seasons
II. Guessing Song
III. Little Cabbage
IV. The Drunken Fisherman
V. Diu Diu Dong
VI. Pastoral Ballade
VII. Tibetan Dance

Yo-Yo Ma, cello

Bright Sheng wrote these brief pieces for solo cello as a way to understand the instrument before composing a concerto commissioned by Yo-Yo Ma. Sheng studied the scores of the standard solo cello works, from Bach to Britten, then set about transforming the folk tunes in much the same way Bartók and Kodály did Hungarian folk music, hoping to convey "the roughness, the savageness" of the original music. The result was, in terms of performance technique, an extremely difficult version that Sheng ended up revising with the aid of one of his students, who was also a cellist. The set opens with an extremely lyrical setting of a song about "Spring From Quinhai," the cello sounding somewhat like an erhu. Second is a very teasing "Guessing Song" from Yunnan with an almost drone-like pedal tone under much of the tune. "The Little Cabbage," from Hebei, is another lyrical piece, this time a child crying for its mother. The fourth tune, "The Drunken Fisherman" is played entirely without bow. The right hand plucks while the left hand strums with a plectrum to imitate the sound of the qin, an ancient zither-like instrument. Harmonics, including double-stopped ones and thumb harmonics, are frequently used in the fifth tune, "Diu Diu Dong," from Taiwan, a song about a train. A "Pastoral Ballade" describes the Mongolian landscape, from wide blue sky to green grass. As the accompanying text compares the sheep in the distance to pieces of silver on the grass, the music becomes brighter and harder and more abstract to reflect the metal, abruptly pausing before the return of the calm, pastoral melody. The set ends with a lively dance from Tibet, which requires the cellist to tap accents out on the cello's body like a drum, the right hand flashing from fingerboard to body and back. The original version of the work was premiered by Yo-Yo Ma on October 9, 1995. [allmusic.com]

Art by Cai Guo-Qiang