Moonlit Night on the Spring River was originally a pipa solo, and it was named Sunset Flute Drum (also known as Sunset Flute Song, Xunyang Pipa, Xunyang jathyapple and Xunyang Qu). About 1925, this piece was first adapted into a national orchestra. After liberation, it has been adapted by many people, which is more perfect and deeply loved by domestic and foreign audiences.
Through euphemistic and simple melody, smooth and changeable rhythm, clever and delicate orchestration and clever performance, music vividly depicts the charming scenery of the riverside on a moonlit night and praises the charm of Jiangnan water town. The whole song is like a long scroll of landscape painting, with delicate strokes, soft colors, beautiful and elegant, and fascinating.
The first paragraph, "Bells and Drums in Jianglou", describes the setting sun reflected on the river, and the smoke rippled. Then, the band played a beautiful theme in unison, and the phrases were linked and euphemistic. The drums are soft and profound (fragment 1). The second and third paragraphs show the artistic conception of "Mount Dongshan on the Moon" (the second paragraph) and "Wind returns to water". Then, if you see the river blowing gently, flowers swaying, reflections in the water, layers of trance. Entering the fifth stage of "deep clouds", the magnificent scenery of "there is no dust in the sky on the river, and there is a solitary moon wheel in the sky" arises spontaneously. The band played in unison, speeding up the pace, just like the picture of white sails, fishing songs in the distance, singing one by one from far and near. In the seventh paragraph, the pipa is played with a sweeping wheel, just like a fishing boat breaking through the water and setting off waves lapping on the shore. The climax of the whole song is the ninth paragraph "Alas, it is to return to the ship", which shows the artistic conception of "Alas, yes" from far and near by breaking water and splashing waves. Far away from the ship, all is silent, and the river is more quiet. The whole song ends in a melodious and slow melody, which makes people memorable.
This is a famous pipa tradition Wen Qu, which has been circulated for a long time in the Ming and Qing Dynasties. Music scores were first seen in the manuscripts of Ju Shilin (1820 years ago) and Wu (1875). On 1895, Li Fangyuan included this song in the compilation of "The New Pipa of the Thirteen Groups of Northern and Southern Schools". 1929, when Shen Haochu compiled Yang Zhengxuan Pipa Music, he named it Sunset Flute and Drum. 1925, Liu He of Shanghai Datong Music Association adapted this piece into an ensemble of bamboo and silk, and changed its name to Moonlight on the Spring River according to Pipa.
Quanqu is the most common multi-voice structure in national instrumental music. Peng Xiuwen, the conductor of the National Orchestra of the Central Broadcasting Orchestra and a master of folk music, handled this song artistically and delicately. He made full use of the rich instrumental colors of the big band, skillfully arranged, and the musical instruments increased and decreased, making the sound of the band rich in high and low, strong and weak, light and heavy, and the thickness changed, and the layers were distinct. In music performance, it not only carries forward the elegant style of classical rhyme, but also makes music full of inner passion, emotion and vitality.
Yin Biao, a classical guitarist from China, adapted this piece into a guitar solo "Xunyang jathyapple" and won the classical guitar championship of Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macao on 1988. Li Haiying arranged it for a piano solo. Liu Zhuang adapted for Mori official quintet, and Chen Peixun adapted for symphony.