Mid-Autumn Festival falls on 9/14 this year. Traditionally this is a big holiday most Chinese people rush to their family for reunion. No other holiday except Spring Festival is more important than 中秋節. There are a lot of poems related to the moon & the mid-autumn festival. But there are not many nice songs composed for the occasion. Some like 中秋怨 does not have universal appeal. Rather, it is for persons with broken family. Perhaps most people choose to 吟詩 instead of 唱歌. The most famous poem for the occasion is 水調歌頭 by 苏軾. There are some songs composed for this poem. One of them is "但願人長久". In western world, since there is no such festival, you don’t find any music composed for this occasion. However, there is some music either dedicated to the moon or related to the moon. Doris Day sang “By the Light of the Silvery Moon”. It is a very lovely song except that she sang for the Thanksgiving holiday, a very late autumn event. For something classical, the most famous one is Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata, the other is DeBussy’s Clair de Lune (月光曲). I happen to remember the 2nd movement of Eine Kline Nacht Musik (by Mozart) has been adapted as moon related song (Meditation under the Moon) used in some elementary school. As to the aria of opera, there is one dedicated to the moon & well known. It is "Lied An Den Mond (Song to the Moon)" in Rusalka by Dvorak. Rusalka is a water spirit who sings this aria to plea to the moon for help in finding her prince. In 2001, Masterpiece Theatre released a movie “The Song of the Lark” featuring this song as the main theme. I think it is proper and fitting to sing this song under the moon on mid-autumn festival if you are a woman in love. For a man in love, he should play Moonlight Sonata, the 1st movement, very romantic. For the rest, just try Clair de Lune (play by piano) or the 2nd movement of Mozart’s Eine Kline Nacht Musik (小夜曲).
但願人長久
鄧麗君
By the Light of the Silvery Moon
Lied An Den Mond
2nd movement of Mozart’s Eine Kline Nacht Musik
Moonlight Sonata, the 1st movement
Clair de Lune
PS: Moonlight Sonata was not named by Beethoven. It was added in 1832 by a music critic, Ludwig Rellstab, who said the 1st movement reminded him of moonlight over Lake Lucerne in Switzerland. I am sure some of you have visited Switzerland & seen this lake. It is one of the most beautiful lakes in Europe. If you have a chance to cruise the lake, you will see a nice building along the shore. It happens to be a museum of Richard Wagner, Tribschen. I visited the place in 1984. It is worth visiting if you are fit & can walk a mile to see it.
2 comments:
Mark Lin,
Thanks for so many beautiful music. There are all sensitional, but it is diffcult to connect them with the moon unless it is mentioned in words. I think music may be able to express the emotion of a tranquill night, but whether this is due to the moon, the stars, or the contuors of the mountains may be hard to tell.
There are many kinds of music. Some like 荒山之夜 or 田園交响曲, you know right away that they are figurative music like painting. Music moves with time, has more variables & dimension that makes it more interesting & influential. Music like Brahms' violin concerto is more abstract & tends to have more interpretations and so the impact to each individual will be quite different. As to the music related to moon, some of them has lyrics so they are figurative & you know right away. Music like Clair de Lune, we have to use our imagination & music sense, the sixth sense of human being.
ps: Even painting like Mona Lisa is subject to interpretation. Is she pregnant? Why does she smile that way? One interpretation: She smiles because she is not pregnant even she screws around with so many men. Another interpretation: She is pregnant & she smiles because she knows the baby is not from her husband. So the world is not really black or white. It is subject to our interpretation.
Post a Comment