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32. Beating Clothes Melody
- shang mode, standard tuning: 5 6 1 2 3 5 6 played as 1 2 4 5 6 1 2 		搗衣曲
Dao Yi Qu 1

"Beating Clothes" refers to the traditional method of washing them by putting them in water where it flows over rocks, then beating them with a stone or club. The song here is sung by a woman whose husband is a soldier on the frontier.

In Fengxuan Xuanpin (1539) Dao Yi Qu is a song in one section.2 It is grouped with shang mode pieces. It has no preface or attribution, and is musically unrelated to the 23 later pu connected to this this title.3

The second surviving tablature, in Yang Lun Taigu Yiyin (1589), is called Dao Yi rather than Dao Yi Qu; some later versions are (also) called Qiushui Nong.4 None of these 22 renditions is musically related to the earlier Dao Yi Qu.5

This later melody uses the tuning called qingshang (or guxian): from standard tuning the 2nd, 4th and 7th strings are tightened half a tone. The Yang Lun version is a song in 12 sections. The lyrics of Sections 11 and 12 are the same as those of the Fengxuan Xuanpin version, with a short addition in the middle. At least four later handbooks use these longer lyrics.

The Yang Lun Taigu Yiyin preface attributes its version to Pan Tingjian of the Tang dynasty.6 Later prefaces have the same attribution.

A descendent of the qingshang version is found in the Mei'an Qinpu.7 There are several recordings available.

There is a transcription of yet another Dao Yi in Guqin Quji, I (pp. 260 - 264). It uses huangzhong tuning (from standard tuning lower the first string and raise the fifth). It has eight sections and is transcribed as played by Long Qinfang from a handbook dated 1880.8

Not complete.

 
Original preface

None

 
One section
A tentative translation of the original lyrics is as follows, 9

Beat clothes, beat cloths, keep beating clothes,
  beat them until late at night when the moon is setting.
Arms weak and unable to handle the heavy pestle and mortar,
  anxious heart just fearing the slowness of the beating.
I am not the concubine of a businessman,
  a businessman exchanging goods east and west.
I am not the wife of a vagrant,
  alone at night bitter at someone.
My husband is serving the government on the barbarian frontier,
  with golden chain mail astride an excellent steed.
Following his commander he has been gone 30 years,
  at death he should be honored with temple food and made a lord.
In this way he is to part (again) for who knows where,
  so I pound clothes for him and give them to him to use.

 
Footnotes (Shorthand references are explained on a separate page)

1 12840.2 has nothing about poetry or music. (Return)

2 I have not been able to find the source of the lyrics. (Return)

3 Zha Guide: 15/162/356 (Return)

4 Qiushui Nong 秋水弄 (Autumn Waters Melody)
In addition to being an alternate title for later Dao Yi, Qiushui Nong is also mentioned in connection with the musically unrelated Yueshang Cao. The melody Qiu Shui (4 from 1647) also seems unrelated. See also an early Ming melody list.

Qiuye Wen Zhen 秋夜聞砧 On an Autumn Evening Hearing the Stone
This melody (25505.134xxx; 29749.xxx), the title of which may refer to clothing being beaten, seems to survive only in the same early Ming melody list mentioned above. Could it be related to one of the Dao Yi? (Return)

5 There is considerable variety amongst these versions. (Return)

6 潘廷堅 Pan Tingjian
Bio/xxx or 潘庭堅 Bio/2527 (Yuan/Ming); 18737 same. For Tingjian 9553.58 庭堅 has a 潘(牛+方)字庭堅 but his dates are 1205 - 1246 (Bio/2519). 9792.77 廷堅 has no 潘 Pan. (Return)

7 See Fredric Lieberman, A Chinese Zither Tutor, p.131ff (Return)

8 龍琴舫 Long Qinfang plays it according the to version of 錢壽占 Qian Shouzhan as found in his handbook 錢氏十操 Qianshi Shi Cao (19 Melodies of Mr. Qian, 1880). (Return)

9 The original lyrics, which are not attributed, are as follows:

搗衣，搗衣，復搗衣，  搗到更深月落時。
臂弱不勝砧杵重，       心忙惟恐那搗聲遲。
妾身不是商人妾，       商人貿易東復西。
妾身不是蕩子婦，       寂寞空房為誰苦。
妾夫為國戎邊頭，       黃金鎖甲的那跨紫騮。
從渠一去三十秋，       死當廟食生封侯。
如此別離尤不惡，       年年為君搗衣與君著。

These have the basic structure 7 x (7+7), with filler syllables 那 added on one line, 的那 on another, and two extra characters at the end. (Return)

Return to the annotated handbook list or to the Guqin ToC.