Two Chinese Paintings (2015)
I. Wu Man / Ancient Echo
II. Traditional / Silk and Bamboo (inspired by Huanlege)

Wu Man
(b. 1963)

Composed and arranged for
50 For The Future:
The Kronos Learning
Repertoire

Realized by Danny Clay
(b. 1989)

Artist Statement

“After two decades of collaborating with the Kronos Quartet, I am finally beginning to understand Western string instruments. With the group’s encouragement and support, I was able to create these—my first works for string quartet.

“Two Chinese Paintings is a two-movement suite which, taken with Glimpses of Muqam Chebiyat, resembles a set of portraits of traditional cultures from around China. In Chinese traditional music, instrumental pieces often have poetic titles to express their content and style. I decided to continue this tradition with this collection. The inspiration for these suites came from styles of traditional music in China familiar to me, including Uyghur Maqam of Xinjiang province, a pipa scale from the 9th century, and the Silk-and-Bamboo music, or teahouse music, from my hometown of Hangzhou.

“‘Ancient Echo,’ the first movement of Two Chinese Paintings, is based on a scale found among the oldest tunes for pipa. The second movement, ‘Silk and Bamboo’ is a variation on the tune ‘Joyful Song’ (Huanlege) from the collection of Silk-and-Bamboo.

“I feel quite grateful to be able to bring these old styles of traditional music into the repertoire of Western string ensembles. The left-hand portamento, or sliding, technique called for here is quite distinct from the types of expression found in Western music. I hope that audiences will come to better understand the richness and diversity of music from China through these stories.

“I’d like to thank Kronos for their trust and encouragement, for letting me be a part of their Fifty for the Future project, and for giving me this opportunity to share my musical experiences with young string quartets around the world!”

Wu Man

Wu Man initially developed Two Chinese Paintings in traditional Chinese musical notation (the numbered system), as seen below in her score for “Silk and Bamboo.”

• Numbers 1–7 correspond to the seven notes in a diatonic major scale
• A dot above a note raises it one octave, while a dot below a note lowers it one octave
• A plain number represents a quarter note, and each underline halves the note length. (i.e. one underline = eighth note; two underlines = sixteenth note; etc.)

Learn more about Chinese musical notation here.

To develop Two Chinese Paintings, Wu Man first recorded the piece on her own instrument, the pipa. After recording the first layer, she then created three more layers, one on top of the other, resulting in the four-part pipa tracks here. The recording was then realized by Danny Clay. Hear Wu Man’s original pipa recordings here.