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14. About to Return Melody
- Standard tuning:2 5 6 1 2 3 5 6 played as 1 2 4 5 6 1 2 |
將歸操
Jiang Gui Cao 1 Confucius turns back at the Yellow River 3 |
Like numbers 13, 15 and perhaps 16, this melody connects to an episode in the life of Confucius. The picture at right illustrates the present story, as recounted in his family biography, Section 47 of the Records of the Grand Historian.4
Confucius, once again unemployed, was on his way west to see Zhao Jianzi of Jin. However, when he arrived at the banks of the Yellow River he heard that Zhao's advisers Dou Mingdu and Shen Hua had been executed. Confucius sighed, saying that it was a beautiful river, but he was not fated to cross it. That if you kill young animals, the unicorn will not come. If you kill fish by emptying their ponds, the dragon will not come. If you destroy the eggs in a nest, the phoenix will not come. How could he then go on to Jin? So he returned to the village of Zou, where he composed Zou Cao. Zou Cao is given as an alternate title for Jiang Gui Cao.
The preface in Taigu Yiyin relates a shortened version of this story, but does not identify the source of the lyrics. Yuefu Shiji5 identifies them as by Han Yu (768-824), who wrote using the voice of Confucius.
This title is also found in five later handbooks to 1828.6 All have the same lyrics set to different melodies, except Huiyan Mizhi (1647), which has a melody in three sections with no lyrics.
Original preface>7
As Confucius' wheeltracks circled the earth, the Dao was not following. He headed west to see Zhao Jianzi, but heard of the death of Dou Mingdu. By the river he sighed and said, "Beautiful are the waters, and vast. As for my crossing it, that is (not my) fate." Later someone fixed this as a song and spread it as a Qin Melody (Qin Cao). Its meaning is still relevant.
Music and Lyrics: One section 8
A largely syllabic setting, following the structure of the lyrics:
([4+4] x 4, then [5+4] x 1, then ([2+2] x 1, then [5+4] x 1)
Water in autumn, its color is dark.
I was about to cross, but do not have the motive.
....(translation incomplete)
Footnotes (Shorthand references are explained on a
separate page)
1 7599.117 relates the stories from Shi Ji and Yuefu Shiji. The illustration can be found in several collected illustrations of the life of Confucius. (Return)
2 Taigu Yiyin does not indicate mode. (Return)
3 From a reprint of a collection of Qing dynasty prints illusrating the life of Confucius. (Return)
4 Translated by Yang Xianyi and Gladys Yang in Records of the Historian; Hong Kong, Commercial Press, 1974, p.14. (Return)
6 Zha Fuxi's index (13/136/242) finds them in 1511, 1539, 1585, 1647, 1802 and 1828. (Return)
7 Chinese original not yet online. (Return)
8 Han Yu's original lyrics are as follows,
Return to the Taigu Yiyin ToC or to the Guqin ToC.