Baishi Daoren shiji 白石道人詩集

Baishi Daoren gequ 白石道人歌曲, also called Baishi Daoren ciji 白石道人詞集, is a collection of songs, with music scores added, of the famous Song-period 宋 (960-1279) writer Jiang Kui 姜夔 (1155-1221), courtesy name Yaozhang 堯章. He lived in Shaoxi 苕溪 (in today's Zhejiang province) close to a place called Baishi Dongtian 白石洞天 "Cave Heaven of White Stones", and was therefore known by the style Jiang Baishi 姜白石 or Baishi Daoren 白石道人. Of his collected poems, not much is left. Apart from the "songs", the collection Baishi Daoren shiji 白石道人詩集 survives. The chapter on music (126-142 Yuezhi 樂志) in the official dynastic history Songshi 宋史 includes some theoretical writings of Jiang, namely Dayue yi 大樂議, Wuxian qin tushuo 五弦琴圖説, Qixian qin tushuo 七弦琴圖説, and Jiuxian qin tushuo 九弦琴圖説, the last three being descriptions of zither variants.

The collected poems Baishi Daoren shiji include 132 pieces, arranged according to type and verse length.

The Gequ collection, with a length of 4 juan and an appendix (Bieji 别集) of 1 fascicle, assembles airs (ciqu 詞曲), among others, one zither song (qin ge 琴歌, titled Gu yuan 古怨) , 10 songs under the headline Yue jiu ge 越九歌 and 17 lyric songs set to fixed tune patterns (cidiao gequ 詞調歌曲). The book was finished in 1202.

In the book, 28 lyric songs are provided with musical notation. Among them, the ten pieces titled Yue jiu ge are ritual songs for the worship of deities, and their melodies are recorded using the lülü character notation (lülü zipu 律呂字譜, see pitch-pipes). The earliest surviving example of this notation for songs appears in Zhu Xi's 朱熹 (1130-1200) commentary Yili jingzhuan tongjie 儀禮經傳通解. This work records the "Twelve songs from the airs and odes with musical notation" (Feng ya shi'er shi pu 風雅十二詩譜) transmitted by Zhao Yansu 趙彦肅, said to date back to the Kaiyuan reign-era of the Tang dynasty. Thus, the ten pieces of the Yue jiu ge constitute another early example of the lülü character notation in Chinese music history.

The zither piece Gu yuan "Ancient lament" is the earliest surviving zither song. Its melody is recorded in jianzi notation (jianzipu 減字譜) for the guqin 古琴 zither. Although jianzi notation had already taken shape by the mid-Tang dynasty, no earlier musical scores survive. Jiang's book thus represents the earliest extant example of jianzi notation for the zither. Moreover, in the explanatory text preceding the score, Jiang Kui provides a detailed discussion of the "partial shang mode" (ce shang diao 側商調) tuning method used in this piece, making it the earliest recorded example in China of a pure-temperament tuning system for the zither.

Figures 1-2. Early musical notations in the Baishi Daoren gequ 白石道人歌曲

Left: Lülü 律呂 notation of the song Di Shun 帝舜, tune from Chu 楚, from the collection Yue jiu ge 越九歌 "Nine songs from Yue". The song stars with the words Yangyang di qi 央央帝旂 "Wide the sovereign's banner". To the right of the words, the musical note is given, with one note per syllable (nan rui lin nan 南蕤林南). Right: The earliest example of the gongchepu (sic) 工尺譜 notation, for the song Xinghua tianying 杏花天影 "Apricot blossoms as sky shadows". The song starts with the words Lüsi di fu yuanyang pu 綠絲低拂鴛鴦浦 "Green silken strands hang low, brushing the mandarin-duck shore". Sibu congkan 四部叢刊 edition.

The remaining seventeen lyric songs are all set to fixed tune patterns and are recorded using the gongche notation (gongchepu 工尺譜, a special reading). Although the gongche notation had formed no later than the Northern Song dynasty, earlier sources preserve only isolated notation symbols rather than complete musical scores. Consequently, Jiang Kui's seventeen gongche-notated songs constitute the earliest surviving complete examples of this kind of musical notation.

Among the seventeen pieces, Zuiyin shang xiaopin 醉吟商小品 and Nishang zhongxu di yi 霓裳中序第一 were written by Jiang Kui to preexisting melodies. Yumei ling 玉梅令 was composed by Fan Chengda 范成大, with lyrics supplied by Jiang Kui; the remaining fourteen pieces were entirely composed by Jiang Kui himself.

Figure 3. Early musical notation in the Baishi Daoren gequ 白石道人歌曲

Notes for a zither tune called Gu yuan 古怨 "Ancient lament". The song starts with the words rimu sishan xi yanwu an qian pu 日暮四山兮烟霧暗前浦 "At dusk, [between] four hills — mist and haze darken the shore in front [of me]". Right to the words is the jianzipu 減字譜 notation for the zither accompaniment. The headline Fan sheng 泛聲 signifies an interlude of two lines. The chapter starts with remarks on the tuning of the seven strings (tiao xian fa 調弦法).

The most important editions of the Baishi Daoren gequ are Lu Zhonghui's 陸鐘輝 print from 1743, Zhang Yiqu's 張亦樞 edition from 1749, the editions in the series Jiangcun congshu 疆村叢書, Sibu congkan 四部業刊 and Congshu jicheng chubian 叢書集成初編, and the 1959 edition by the Renmin Wenxue Press 人民文學出版社, called Baishi shici ji 白石詩詞集. Baishi daoren shiji is the title of the collection in the imperial series Siku quanshu 四庫全書.