After my last post about Liang Zhu, there was some interest in the sheet music. I realized that it’s actually quite an advanced piece, I would say it requires at least 5 years of pretty serious piano study to attempt this piece. So I went back through my music and found two more pieces that I loved playing, one that is much easier (I think I learned this after 2-3 years of piano), and one that is slightly easier but considerably shorter.

I will be uploading all MP3’s and sheet music to this dropbox folder! Liang Zhu is in there, as are the two songs I am discussing in this post. Disclaimer: copyright, I don’t own any of the sheet music or the MP3’s, yada yada…  Apologies also for my poor scanning quality!

I laugh a little as I’m typing up the background to these pieces, because – like a lot of Chinese music from the past 50 years, it is steeped in Communist propaganda. So pardon the silly background information and just appreciate the nice music 🙂

Bei Feng Chui (North Wind Blows) is a famous song from the opera/ballet Bai Mao Nu (transl. White-haired girl). Bai Mao Nu is based on real-life stories of peasant girls… in the beginning, there is a very poor girl and her father, unable to pay rent; their evil landlord murders the father and enslaves the girl. She manages to escape, living in a cave for many years, causing her hair to turn white. Then there is a silly “happy” ending (not from the real-life stories it is based on) involving her long-lost fiance defeating Japanese armies and redistributing land, or something… like I said, propaganda!

So here is the original, vocal version of Bei Feng Chui! If you have never heard Chinese opera before, you are in for a great…surprise 😛 Peking Opera is particularly, err, interesting but in general Chinese opera is extremely sharp and pitchy and, well… just listen and you will get what I mean.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TExTKfuUXx4

Here is a beautiful orchestral arrangement, perhaps better to listen to if you are unaccustomed to Chinese opera! I really love the melody. (The piano arrangement is similar sounding to this one.)

In the dropbox folder, I have included an MP3 of the *piano version* of Bei Feng Chui. still scrounging around for my sheet music. Will add it once I find it and scan it! This one is relatively easy, I learned it when I was quite young.

The second piece is called Liuyang He (Liuyang River). Liuyang River is a famous river near where Chairman Mao was born. The whole song is basically praise for Chairman Mao and everything he has done for China…

Here is a fairly classic vocal/orchestral arrangement

Here is a video of Chinese pop singer Jane Zhang singing a bit of Liuyang He. This is from the show Super Girl, similar to American Idol (for all female contestants), the show that made Jane Zhang famous. She is a really talented vocalist. She actually sings modern music with a considerably lower voice, so I was very surprised to hear her sing Liuyang He is such a high register – as I mentioned above, Chinese traditional music/opera is traditionally sung in this high, sharp way.

Here is Jane Zhang singing “normally,” by the way – such great versatility!

So that’s it for now, out of the Chinese songs I have played, these three are my favorite! (The other three are very technically difficult but not that pretty, so I figured no real point in sharing)

If you have any particular songs you are looking for a piano arrangement for, email me or drop a comment and I will see if I have it!