In Shi Jing Cantata,
Zhou sets four poems from The Book
of Songs. This is reputedly the
earliest known collection of Chinese
poetry containing some three hundred
poems dating from between the 11th
and 6th centuries BC. Unlike
the other pieces in this selection of
vocal works by Zhou, it is set in an
English translation. Each poem juxtaposes
natural images with human situations,
with repetition, which makes these texts
particularly suited to musical setting.
The variety of the natural images as
well as of their human counterparts
suggested by the words is vividly evoked
in Zhou’s settings. These are by in
turn lyrical, dramatic and impressionistic.
This is achieved through subtle, refined
and colourful scoring, avoiding easy
picturesqueness. These qualities are
amongst the most remarkable characteristics
of Zhou’s music which manages to blend
Western and Eastern musical traditions
in a most successful and effective way.
This is also to be heard in Pipa
Ballad in which the voice is
effectively accompanied by pipa
(Chinese lute) and cello. This long
narrative poem from the Tang Dynasty
is set in Cantonese dialect in preference
to Mandarin, which (so we are told)
is considered to be more capable than
Mandarin of conveying the subtlety,
phonetics and tones of Chinese poetry.
The important thing, however, is that
this fine setting is at once simple
and sophisticated, and beautifully evocative.
In Konghou Fantasia,
Zhou turns once again to a text from
the Tang Dynasty in which the poet pays
some heartfelt tribute to the Konghou
harp player Li Ping, which he does with
a wealth of contrasted images that the
music reflects once again with much
imagination and subtlety as well. This
beautiful piece is also warmly melodic,
almost as an opera aria. The piece is
scored for strings and three Chinese
string instruments: erhu (two-string
fiddle), pipa (lute) and zheng
(zither), a trio that Zhou also used
in Out of Tang Court (available
on BIS CD-1222 reviewed here some time
ago).
These instruments also
accompany the singer in A Poetess’s
Lament setting words by Li Qing-zhao
who was, so we are told, the best-known
woman poet in Chinese history. Zhou’s
setting perfectly matches the sorrowful,
bitter and uneasy mood suggested by
the words. The vocal part is often redolent
of traditional Chinese singing.
Green Song,
actually a vocalise for voice and pipa,
is an arrangement of an earlier work
Green for bamboo flute
and pipa composed in 1984. A
quite beautiful short work of great
refinement as well as passion.
In Li Sao Cantata,
composed in 1988, Zhou’s music is rather
more "modern", i.e. atonal
and angular, with fewer allusions to
traditional Chinese music that characterise
much of his more recent music. Though
the vocal part may still allude to that
of the traditional Chinese opera, the
music as a whole is rather more overtly
expressionistic, often dramatic and
fiercely energetic. Zhou is first and
foremost a lyricist, and this comes
through here, too, although the music
is a somewhat tougher proposition than
any of the other works. It may be less
readily accessible, but it remains,
for all its complexity, an impressive
and gripping piece of music of great
expressive strength.
This very fine release
usefully illustrates other aspects of
the music of Zhou Long, a composer I
have come to consider as one of the
most endearing personalities of his
generation. All these often beautiful
pieces are well served by excellent
and committed readings, and a very fine
recording. I enjoyed it from first to
last, and I recommend it wholeheartedly.
Hubert Culot
Lan Rao (soprano); Music From China; Members
of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestraa;
Deutsche Kammerphilharmonieb; Geoffrey
Simona, Muhai Tangb 
