“THOUGHTS OF A QUIET NIGHT” BY ZHAO JIPING: MUSICAL INTERPRETATION OF TANG-DYNASTY CHINESE CLASSICAL POETRY IN THE CONTEXT OF STYLISTIC SYNTHESIS OF EAST AND WEST

Abstract

The article is devoted to the art song “Thoughts on a Quiet Night” by Zhao Jiping, composed on the basis of the eponymous poem by the eminent Tang-dynasty poet Li Bai, and examines it as an example of the synthesis of traditional Chinese poetic imagery and modern compositional thinking. The focus of the study is the interaction between music and poetry, in which the profound symbolism of the classical text finds multidimensional realization in the musical language of the work. Particular attention is paid to the analysis of poetic images – the moon, night, road, and home – which possess established semantic meanings in Chinese culture and acquire new psychological depth in musical interpretation. The article reveals the specific features of the song’s intonational and melodic language, which is based on a combination of pentatonic structures with techniques of European musical thinking of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The use of impressionistic harmonic devices – unstable modal-harmonic sonorities and variant development of thematic material – creates a distinctive emotional and psychological space in which states of inner concentration, nostalgia, and contemplation are expressed. Special emphasis is placed on the role of the pentatonic system as the foundation of intonational thinking and as a bearer of national identity, as well as on the features of textural organization that combine elements of impressionistic sound painting with traditional principles of Chinese musical language. The article demonstrates that Zhao Jiping’s art song represents an organic synthesis of Eastern spiritual tradition and European compositional technique, in which poetic text and musical form interact as a unified semantic whole. This approach marks a new stage in the development of Chinese chamber-vocal music of the late twentieth century, oriented toward reinterpreting national cultural heritage through the prism of contemporary artistic thinking.