Explore the Harmony in Chinese Contemporary Choral Art:

"CCTV National Young Singer Grand Prix" as an Example

Lu Jingyuan, Lee Chie Tsang Isaiah

Faculty of Humanities,Artsand Heritage Universiti Malaysia Sabah, 88400kota Kinabalu, Sabah, Malaysia

Keywords: Chorus, Singing method, Synergism

Abstract: The history of chorus in China can be traced back to late 20th century and has been developing rapidly. The

"CCTV National Young Singer Grand Prix", as one of the top competitions of Chinese singing art since

1984, has actively promoted chorus culture, providing an important platform where chorus groups can

appreciate and learn. This paper explores the process of its development and the way of harmony of chorus

in China. The paper is based on synergism theory and takes the "CCTV National Young Singer Grand Prix"

as the research object. Through personal observation, more than 10 works including "Chun Xiao", "Dong

Zu Da Ge", "Meng Gu Xue", etc. will be analyzed through the singing technique, singing method, singing

synergism. The possibility of harmony and collision of different natures of chorus art is obtained, expecting

to improve the spirituality of chorus and provide theoretical and practical reference for the majority of

chorus art workers.

1 INTRODUCTION

The Chinese choral art entered the stage of rapid

development and prosperity from the 1980s (Yang,

2012). Since its development, the chorus groups of

various forms and scales

have gradually developed

from a simple chorus form to a certain level of

professional, artistic and appreciative choral art form

today. The "CCTV National Youth Singer Grand

Prix" (Qingge Contest) was founded in 1984. As one

of the top events in Chinese singing art, in 2008 it

officially launched a chorus event, which caught the

attention of hundreds of millions of viewers, and is a

feast of Chinese choral art collision and display. It is

of great significance to improve the performance

level of Chinese chorus and the appreciation level of

the chorus. The grand contest attracts local

professional and non-professional chorus groups

from different regions. Professional chorus groups

include: the General Political Choir of the People's

Liberation Army, the Chorus of the Art Academy of

the People's Liberation Army, the Choir of the

Tianjin Conservatory of Music, the Choir of the

Xi'an Conservatory of Music, the Men's Choir of the

Chinese Armed Police Corps, the Inner Mongolia

Youth Choir, the Dai Song Choir, the Second

Artillery Tianda Choir and over thirty provincial and

central representative teams. The grand contest also

invited many famous conductors, composers, and

writers as CCTV live judges for two months. These

prominent figures include Cao Ding, Li Xincao,

Yang Hongnian, Zhao Jiping, Gu Jianfen, Yu Qiuyu,

and Yan Su.

This article explores the development of Chinese

modern choral art by analyzing its development in

the excellent choral works of Qingge Contest. The

author's research focuses on the synergy of chorus

and chorus singing technique. The chorus singing

method, through the different nature of the choral art

harmony and the possibility of collision, enhances

the rich spirituality of the chorus.

2 CHORUS SYNERGY

The theory of synergy is a systematic science theory

founded by the famous German physicist Professor

Hermann Haken. This theory holds that the system is

omnipresent and all-encompassing. Any one thing is

not a system, but a sub-system and there is nothing

that can escape from the system or exist

independently (Haken, 1997). Anything that leaves

one system will fall into another system. The

synergistic theory of chorus refers to the full play of

the aesthetic function of choral art based on the

theory of synergy. This brings about the

Jingyuan, L. and Isaiah, L.

Explore the Harmony in Chinese Contemporary Choral Art: "CCTV National Young Singer Grand Prix" as an Example.

DOI: 10.5220/0008764603450350

In Proceedings of the 1st International Conference on Interdisciplinary Arts and Humanities (ICONARTIES 2019), pages 345-350

ISBN: 978-989-758-450-3

345

synchronous and complementary elements between

the chorus and the thought, culture, and psychology.

These synchronous and complementary elements

will optimize the overall function of the chorus,

which surpasses the sum of the parts. We will give

full play to people's imagination and creativity.

Chorus synergy means that each subsystem can

cooperate with each other, infiltrate each other,

complement each other, and promote the interactive

movement between the various subsystems. The

orderly result of synergy is a high-level summary of

this principle.

The principle of synergy tells us that three basic

conditions are needed to generate synergy within the

system: first, the system is open and free; second,

each subsystem within the system must have a

strong unpredictability; third, there are widespread

rises and falls in the system( Haken and Guo, 1983).

If we use these three conditions to analyze the

chorus of the People's Liberation Army Art

Academy, Chun Xiao, we will find the following: 1.

The chorus work is unaccompanied and has a more

complete traditional style in its structure. 2. Within

the whole work, the chorus members, the vocal

accompaniment, the conducting gestures and the

body language interpretation of the works are

impromptu. 3. This work exhibits certain modern

popular creative thinking. The tonal aspect reflects

the combination of tonality or atonality and the use

of improvisational elements to portray the

background of the music. This includes the use of

vocals to create natural sound effects such as

imitating bird sounds, the sounds of Beijing Opera

singers and the noises of crowded environments.

3 CHORUS TECHNIQUE

The use of the concept of synergy between chorus

subsystems is an important way to pursue harmony

in chorus. The beauty of harmony between man and

nature, the pursuit of man to find the "similarity or

dissimilarity" is the aesthetic feature of oriental art.

It is the aesthetic characteristics pursued by Chinese

contemporary choral art (Xie, 2005). In a chorus

competition, we can do a good job of incorporating

various systems within the chorus which shows a

good combination of the various environments

around the competition. However, there is a high

level of difficulty, especially when some works

require singing technique, language, and artistic

performance skills. The synergy of sound, language,

pitch and vocal method becomes more and more

important.

3.1 Voice

The development of chorus voice training and

singing methods in countries around the world is

based on the Italian vocal method (Ma, 2002). From

the perspective of legacy and development, China is

no exception. Almost all of the voices of the national

young singer TV contest chorus are based on the

Italian vocal method, which is based on mixed sound

and half-sound. For example General Political

Choir, Xi'an Conservatory of Music Choir, Tianjin

University Choir, Northwest University for

Nationalities, Harbin Teacher's University Music

School Boys Choir, Nanjing School of Art "Meng"

Girls Choir, Shenyang Conservatory of Music

Northern Women's Folk Song Choir, China Armed

Police Boys Choir, Yunnan "Small Wells" Miao

Peasant Choir, Sichuan Conservatory of Music

Choir, and also, the Beijing Language University

Chinese and foreign students choir.

According to my personal observation, the

singing voice of the chorus group in a grand contest

can basically be summarized into three

characteristics: the performance of the first voice is

to adopt the original ethnic singing method, such as

the chorus of Inner Mongolia, and the "Dong Zu Da

Ge". The singers are all in national choirs, and the

voices are basically unadulterated, simple and pure.

The second voice is close to modern pop music such

as jazz. The third is the voice of foreign classical

singing and the Chinese traditional singing. Most of

the singers are professional groups, music

academies, and college choirs. They all express the

characteristics of classical chorus in the East and

West: they are soft, lyrical, beautiful, harmonious,

mostly vocal and semi-acoustic.

3.2 Vocal Method

The vocal method of the choruses in the grand

contest is diverse. Due to its multi-voice

characteristic, the vocal method is based on the

chorus works themselves and the singing ability of

their singers. However, the development of

vocalization method is according to guidance or

conduct, and the performance ability as well as the

overall working together of the chorus (Yang, 2002).

In order to achieve the unity, harmony, and overall

balance and special effects of the voice, the choirs

who were selected to participate in the National

Youth Song Competition invited famous national

conductors and vocal guides. For example, the

artistic director of the Inner Mongolia Youth Choir

is the conductor Aaron Göhler. The Haizheng Song

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and Dance Troupe invited art director Meng Dapeng,

while the People's Liberation Army Art Academy

invited Sang Yesong, the famous conductor. Peiyang

Chorus of Tianjin University invited Ren Baoping,

Wu Lingfen, etc. to train, such as in circulatory

breathing, and the use of the overall chest and

abdomen breathing method. In the rehearsal, they

had strict requirements of vocal method for each

chorus member. We have seen multiple voices in the

rehearsals, such as the "Cannon" and "polyphonic"

vocalization method, "soft and harmony"

vocalization method, and vocal practice method

specially formulated for different singing methods.

For example, the Inner Mongolia vocal method use

the long tone of primitive freedom as the basis of the

chorus. "Dong Zu Da Ge"

is a "second-level

vocalization". This chorus inherits the traditional

culture of the Dong ethnic group. Using various

vocal methods can lay a foundation of vocal range

and shades of sound for many chorus groups.

3.3 Pitch

A chorus depends on the ideal tone, good pitch, and

accurate rhythm (Yang, 1982). The most basic of

these is the requirement for pitch. Since the chorus

works more often with multi-voice elements, the

pitch is often subject to a variety of factors such as

speed, rhythm, harmony and melody constraints.

3.3.1 Speed

Under normal circumstances, the singing speed can

be too fast, and the emotions are easily excited,

causing emotional and intellectual imbalance. If not

controlled, it will cause the vocal organs to be

nervous, the breath to be too shallow, and the pitch

too high. On the contrary, if the speed is very slow

and becomes weak, the breath lacks support, the

vocal organs are too loose, and the pitch can easily

be low. (Shi, 2000) For example, “Hebei Laoxiang”

sang by the Choir of Industrial and Commercial

College in Hebei University, which is an adaptation

of "Hebei Bangzi". Its melody span is very large (5

degrees or more). This work has many variations.

Especially in the last part of the work, there are

repeated and gradually accelerated designs.

Inevitably, the intonation of the chorus members is

unstable during the long span singing which is

gradually accelerated. The speed and melody span of

the chorus inevitably affected the pitch.

3.3.2 Rhythm

The rhythm plays an important role in the pitch. In

the case where the voice is constant, the pitch is

generally not easy to stabilize. For example, When

the Blue Power Chorus sang "As Long As I Have

Music"

, the rhythm of the whole chorus affected the

singing of the whole group. The chorus consists of a

rhythm which is alternating in length, and is a

combination of tension and relaxation. During the

performance, the members of the team are not aware

of the dynamic factors that affected the rhythm, so it

was easy to reach an unstable pitch. Therefore, a

good pitch is associated with a good sense of

rhythm. When we grasp the core of the rhythm, we

will grasp the accurate pitch.

3.3.3 Harmony

Chorus is composed of multi-voice elements. When

there is frequent transition of voice, the pitch is most

likely to be unstable at this time. The premise upon

which a singer sings well is by mastering the

harmony of the pitch, as this helps the singer to

achieve a stabilized pitch (Yang, 1982). When the

harmony intensity changes, it is often necessary to

make adjustments in the pitch, so the chorus

members will experience a sense of harmony. The

feelings of harmony has a direct impact on the

chorus pitch, especially in the process of singing

when the harmony changes, the singer needs to pay

great attention to the pitch. The most common two

cases are: 1. Non-acoustic part does not match the

acoustic part, so that the overall harmony lacks the

artistic appeal of the sound. 2. Non-acoustic part is

affected by the change of acoustic part, which has a

negative effect on the overall harmony. However, in

the chorus contest, the harmony effect produced by

the acoustic and non-acoustic part made us marvel at

the whole chorus group. In the whole performance

of the Dong Zu Da Ge chorus group. the harmony

was very obvious. We could hear the effect of the

two harmonious sounds which were very pure. In the

case where one of the voices did not change its

pitch, the other voice was alternately converted into

a first degree and a second degree voice. This

produced the effects of collision between harmony

and disharmony. The fierce collision between the

sound effects could be heard up to a few minutes. In

the choral art at that time, such a subtle design of the

harmony effect was rarely heard of. It is really

beautiful. We all know that the changes that happen

for a long period in the second level of voice do not

interfere with each other, thus the difficulty level is

quite high. Generally speaking, when the differences

Explore the Harmony in Chinese Contemporary Choral Art: "CCTV National Young Singer Grand Prix" as an Example

347

in the second voice are sung, the non-acoustic part

will be affected by the change of the acoustic part.

These few minutes of effects which brings about a

stable harmony can only be honed in a few years.

The song "The song of cicada in May"

of the Dong

Zu Da Ge maintained an amazing harmony effect in

the singing, and the collision between harmony and

disharmony added a greater artistic appeal to the

song.

3.3.4 Relativeness of Pitch

In chorus singing, the pitch problem can be listed as

one of the primary factors to ensure the quality of

the chorus. The relative pitch concept generally

plays a stable role in the pitch of the acappella. We

cannot always talk about physics when explaining

the pitch of the chorus. We cannot talk about the

"absolutely unchanged" pitch concept. That is to say,

the so-called "absolute accuracy" without harmony

is meaningless in practice. For example, there are

many acappella choruses in the contest. We all know

that an acappella chorus mainly relies on vocals or

some instruments to perform. The relative stability

of the pitch in the performance is one of the most

important parts of assessing the acappella. For

example: Inner Mongolia Youth Choir's "Meng Gu

Xue"

is a very difficult chorus work. The beginning

part is entered with unaccompanied vocals. During

the singing, the voices are alternately changed. The

pitch between the parts are slightly heard. There was

deviation, but was soon adjusted to the normal state

by the relative polarity of the pitch. This is the

characteristic of the prominent chorus group. The

chorus part of the song showed the working together

of the matouqin and the vocal part. This collision of

the characteristic musical instrument and the vocal

depicted the innate fusion of the Mongolian people's

natural sounds and the vast and beautiful grassland.

Finally, returning to the unaccompanied vocals, the

vocal singing is more difficult at this time. This is

because the whole chorus is based on the voice part,

imitating the sound of the horse galloping on the

grassland, the sound from far and near, and from

high to low. It is a good use of the relative

characteristics of the pitch. We can hear the human

voice depicting the picture of nature.

3.4 The Language of Singing

The language of singing is the product of the

combination of literary language and music

language. Language is the basis of singing. (Wang,

2006) There are quite a lot of Chinese chorus

language. Language understanding, and accurate

pronunciation is an important part of chorus. The

characteristics of multi-ethnic language make

Chinese chorus works have a very rich and diverse

national style, which plays a very important role in

the formation and development of Chinese chorus

style. It has become a chorus of multi-language style

and singing techniques. Therefore, we must master

the chorus language. For example, the Nankai

University Student Choir sang "Hunting the Spirit"

and used a large number of national vocals,

combined with a beautiful melody to accurately

express the unique cultural characteristics in

northern Shanxi.

The beauty of language is often used in Chinese

poetry. Listening to the language of singing will

have a beautiful and fascinating feeling. This is

Chinese music creators have incorporated poetry

into the creation of chorus. For example: Hebei

Communication University Choir's "Yi Qin and

Lushan Pass" portrayed the characteristics of

Chinese poetry language which are the "collecting",

"releasing", "urgent" and "slow" of the rhythm and

harmony. It is often said that the rounded and

harmonious chorus sound, accurate pronunciation

combined with training method will make the

singing language perfect. Some even adapted folk

songs, utilizing its lyrics and words in the chorus,

thus highlighting the unique Chinese chorus. Some

of these words generally have no practical meaning

in the language of singing, but plays a role in

depicting language and enriching the content of the

works. For example, the "Bao Shu Tune" of the

Shandong University Yangge Choir. This is a chorus

with lines and words that are based of Shandong folk

songs. There are many words in the lyrics; for

example, "land", "that", "lengleng", etc. which sound

natural and fun. However, some chorus works are

very difficult, and the language is quite difficult to

grasp. For example, the Balaiji sung by the Peiyang

Chorus of Tianjin University. This unaccompanied

work is very difficult from the aspects of music,

singing, sound techniques, etc. However, the artistic

level of the performance of the Peiyang Chorus of

Tianjin University is quite prominent. The difficulty

level is increased by the difficulty in the change of

tone and sound technic. The lead vocal part should

have been influenced in terms of singing language

and impromptu emotional expression. However, this

work has achieved great success in concerts

performed abroad. This shows the singing language,

singing skills and emotional expression are mutually

interactive.

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4 CHORUS SINGING STYLES

Choral singing is of great importance in choral art.

Every choral member should skillfully use "Choral

Singing" to sing. A deep understanding of "Choral

Singing" will play an important role in the effect of

choral art.

4.1 Bel Canto

Bel Canto, which has been recognized by the world

as a scientific method of vocalization, not only for

solo, but also for chorus. There are many singing

styles in Bel Canto chorus singing, such as: "musical

chorus", "half-voice singing", and "pop chorus". In

the "half-voice" method, the singer needs to control

the volume of the vocals by singing with a softer

voice. This is one of the more popular singing

methods in Europe at this stage (Yang, 2008).

The audience of Bel canto chorus is very wide,

which has greatly promoted the development of

chorus art in the whole world. This is especially

evident in China. For example, one of the works in

Youth Singer Competition, the “Caoyuan Muge”

performed by Shanxi University. Most of the

“Caoyuan Muge” in early Chinese competitions

were close to folk style singing. The “Caoyuan

Muge” heard in this Youth Singer Competition has

achieved the unity of Bel canto singing with the folk

style. I think the reasons are the artistic tension of

bel canto itself and the contrast of tone color is more

suitable for grassland. Another reason is that, most

of the chorus singers in Chinese universities have

learned how to use Bel canto to perform chorus.

This kind of performance will not lose the song’s

folk style. At the same time, the expression of the

voice has been improved. The students from Shanxi

University have mastered these advantages in this

competition. They presented us a Mongolian chorus

in an international style. The chorus singing method

of “Dajiang Dongqu” and “He Is Standing Guard

There” is Bel canto with native characteristics; while

the chorus works “Nvzhen Shenqu” from the

Northeast Normal University Choir and “Youyin

Shiren” from the China University of Mining

Technology Choir are all traditional western singing

works. These works have been carrying the

inheritance concept of Bel canto for hundreds of

years. They are very classic and decorous. What

they convey to the audience is a distant, solemn and

natural sound picture. The singing of such works

should be carefully chosen. If the singing method

deviates from the core content of the works, the

beautiful harmony of music will be defective.

4.2 The Original Native Chorus

Singing Method

Contemporary Chinese chorus not only contains

profound Western classical chorus singing works,

but also the "original" chorus singing works of

China's natives. The original chorus, through the

influence of Western chorus, produced various kinds

of styles. The original native chorus singing method,

for example Dong Zu Da Ge, is a multi-voice

performance with no conductor, and no

accompaniment, and the rhythm is not fixed. This

song has a long history in China and it has been

passed down orally, based on the people's memory.

The villagers in the whole village formed their own

singing groups, not only according to the sexes,

male and female, but also according to different ages.

People learned to sing songs. Even from childhood,

the males and females started to form their own

singing groups. Upon entering adolescence, the

vocal songs between the male and female singers

increased, and the difficulty level also gradually

increased to the level that we see today. Their voices

are like the beauty and splendor of the sky.

4.3 The Original Native Chorus

Singing Method

Folk Chorus Singing is a unique singing method that

integrates various Chinese ethnical vocal music art

forms. Some of the singing is a combination of

Chinese traditional opera singing and Bel canto

singing. As a diversified and integrated singing art

form, folk singing is popular with local citizens.

Folk singing has several characteristics, such as:

broader ranges, brighter voice, more intimate

language pronunciation habits, diverse singing styles,

etc.

There is a group of ethnic chorus singing which

is the Xiaoshuijing Miao Peasant Choir in Yunnan.

They reflect the unique characteristics of the Miao

peasant. This chorus group is composed of more

than 40 Miao farmers, who have simple appearances.

They have a singing voice that is very pleasant. It is

very touching to the audience. Their singing is based

on the Bel Canto's ethnic singing method. Without

professional training, the chorus work "Ci Gang"

very complete, and won the judges' high praise in

CCTV's competition. It won the 13th place. The

singing of the Xiaoshuijing chorus group was trained

since a young age. This tradition was started by

European missionaries in Xiaoshuijing Village and

were passed on to the villagers, then from generation

to generation. Their voice concept is still very stable.

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349

The singing voice is clear. It has a very simple voice.

It is a very good representative of the ethnic chorus

singing. Therefore choosing chorus singing is a

group's traits, and the best use of this trait is another

important way of achieving harmony in chorus

singing.

5 CONCLUSIONS

Through the National Youth Singer TV Competition,

we have seen the excellent works, performances,

singing, and voices of Chinese chorus in recent years.

The way to explore harmony in Chinese

contemporary choral art is to explore from the

perspective of competition. This includes the chorus

synergy, chorus singing styles and chorus singing

techniques. It shows that Chinese choral art is

constantly improving with the development of the

times. The artistic appeal of choral art can be

enhanced through the different nature of choral art

and the possibility of collision. The discussion on

harmony in chorus singing in this article is by no

means an exhaustive one. Other discussions on

harmony in chorus singing are needed and must

continue. However, the author will continue to study

the related topics of choral art harmony in the future

work in order to make new contributions to the

development of research in this field.

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Xie, L., 2005. The Value Standards of Chinese

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Ma, G., 2002. Chorus, Shanghai Music Publishing House,

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Yang, H., 2002. Children’s Chorus Training, Beijing

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