''Dabo River Caprice'' ''( 达勃河随想曲 )'' is a work for Chinese Orchestra, composed by

He Xuntian He Xuntian (; born in 1952 in Suining, Sichuan) is a composer and professor of music composition at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music. Biography In 1982, he graduated from the Composition Department of the Sichuan Conservatory of Music. In 1 ...

in 1982.

Introduction

This piece consists of two movement, the first being adagio and the second, allegretto. It depicts the exotic beauty of Dabo River and the joyful scene of Baima Tibetans living there. For the first time, grand chorus was included in folk

orchestral music An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families. There are typically four main sections of instruments: * bowed string instruments, such as the violin, viola, ce ...

.
This piece was composed in 1982. It has won a number of

prizes A prize is an award to be given to a person or a group of people (such as sporting teams and organizations) to recognize and reward their actions and achievements.

, including the 1st Prize in the Third National Musical Compositions Competition. It has been performed in more than ten countries around the

world In its most general sense, the term "world" refers to the totality of entities, to the whole of reality or to everything that is. The nature of the world has been conceptualized differently in different fields. Some conceptions see the worl ...

Instrumentation

''Dabo River Caprice'' is scored for the following orchestra:

Woodwinds Woodwind instruments are a family of musical instruments within the greater category of wind instruments. Common examples include flute, clarinet, oboe, bassoon, and saxophone. There are two main types of woodwind instruments: flutes and reed ...

:''Bangdi'' (梆笛) I, II :''Qudi'' (曲笛) I, II :''Hengxiao'' (横箫) I, II :''Gaoyin sheng'' (soprano ''sheng''; 高音笙) :''Zhongyin sheng'' (alto ''sheng''; 中音笙) :''Zhongyin

guan Guan may refer to: * Guan (surname), several similar Chinese surnames ** Guān, Chinese surname * Guan (state), ancient Chinese city-state * Guan (bird), any of a number of bird species of the family Cracidae, of South and Central America * Guan ( ...

'' (alto ''guan''; 中音管) :''Diyin guan'' (bass ''guan''; 低音管) I, II Plucked strings :''

Pipa The pipa, pípá, or p'i-p'a () is a traditional Chinese musical instrument, belonging to the plucked category of instruments. Sometimes called the "Chinese lute", the instrument has a pear-shaped wooden body with a varying number of frets rang ...

'' (琵琶) I, II :''

Yangqin The trapezoidal yangqin () is a Chinese hammered dulcimer, likely derived from the Iranian santur or the European dulcimer. It used to be written with the characters 洋琴 (lit. "foreign zither"), but over time the first character changed ...

'' (扬琴) :''

Zhongruan The ''zhongruan'' (), is a Chinese plucked string instrument. The ''zhongruan'' has a straight neck with 24 frets on the fingerboard and 4 strings. It is usually played with a plectrum (guitar pick). It can also be played with fingers (index f ...

'' (中阮) :''

Daruan Ruan may refer to: Buildings *Ruan Center, office building in Des Moines, Iowa *John Ruan House, historic mansion in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Places *Ruan, County Clare, Ireland *Ruan, Loiret, France *Mont Ruan, Switzerland *Ruan Major and Ru ...

'' (大阮) :''

Konghou The () is a Chinese plucked string instrument. In ancient China, the term came to refer to three different musical instruments: a zither and two different types of harp. Today, usually refers the modern '' concert harp'', which was invente ...

'' (箜篌)

Percussion A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Exc ...

Timpani Timpani (; ) or kettledrums (also informally called timps) are musical instruments in the percussion family. A type of drum categorised as a hemispherical drum, they consist of a membrane called a head stretched over a large bowl traditionall ...

(定音鼓) :

Vibraphone The vibraphone is a percussion instrument in the metallophone family. It consists of tuned metal bars and is typically played by using mallets to strike the bars. A person who plays the vibraphone is called a ''vibraphonist,'' ''vibraharpist,' ...

(颤音琴) :

Xylophone The xylophone (; ) is a musical instrument in the percussion family that consists of wooden bars struck by mallets. Like the glockenspiel (which uses metal bars), the xylophone essentially consists of a set of tuned wooden keys arranged in the ...

(木琴) :

Tubular bells Tubular bells (also known as chimes) are musical instruments in the percussion family. Their sound resembles that of church bells, carillon, or a bell tower; the original tubular bells were made to duplicate the sound of church bells within a ...

(管钟) :

Suspended cymbal Classical suspended cymbal A suspended cymbal is any single cymbal played with a stick or beater rather than struck against another cymbal. Common abbreviations used are "sus. cym.," or "sus. cymb." (with or without the period). Most drum kit ...

(吊镲) :

Maraca A maraca (), sometimes called shaker or chac-chac, is a rattle which appears in many genres of Caribbean and Latin music. It is shaken by a handle and usually played as part of a pair. Maracas (from Guaraní ), also known as tamaracas, were r ...

s (沙锤) :

Tambourine The tambourine is a musical instrument in the percussion family consisting of a frame, often of wood or plastic, with pairs of small metal jingles, called "zills". Classically the term tambourine denotes an instrument with a drumhead, though ...

(铃鼓) :

Temple block Temple blocks are a type of percussion instrument consisting of a set of woodblocks. It is descended from the muyu, an instrument originating from eastern Asia, where it is commonly used in religious ceremonies. Description It is a carved ho ...

(大木鱼) :''Pengling'' (碰铃) :''

Paigu The Chinese ''paigu'' (排鼓; pinyin: páigǔ; also spelled ''pai gu'') is a set of three to seven tuned drums (in most instances five are used), traditionally made of wood Wood is a porous and fibrous structural tissue found in the ste ...

'' (排鼓) :''

Yunluo The ''yunluo'' (simplified: 云锣; traditional: 雲鑼 pinyin: yúnluó, ; literally "cloud gongs" or "cloud of gongs"), is a traditional Chinese musical instrument. It is made up of a set of gongs of varying sizes held within a frame. It was a ...

'' (云锣) Voices :Folk

soprano A soprano () is a type of classical female singing voice and has the highest vocal range of all voice types. The soprano's vocal range (using scientific pitch notation) is from approximately middle C (C4) = 261 Hz to "high A" (A5) = 880&n ...

(民风女高音) :Folk

tenor A tenor is a type of classical music, classical male singing human voice, voice whose vocal range lies between the countertenor and baritone voice types. It is the highest male chest voice type. The tenor's vocal range extends up to C5. The lo ...

(民风男高音) Bowed strings :''

Gaohu The ''gaohu'' ( 高胡; pinyin: ''gāohú'', ; Cantonese: gou1 wu4; also called ''yuehu'' 粤胡) is a Chinese bowed string instrument developed from the ''erhu'' in the 1920s by the musician and composer Lü Wencheng (1898–1981) and use ...

'' (高胡) :''

Erhu The ''erhu'' (; ) is a Chinese two-stringed bowed musical instrument, more specifically a spike fiddle, which may also be called a ''Southern Fiddle'', and is sometimes known in the Western world as the ''Chinese violin'' or a ''Chinese two-s ...

'' (二胡) :''

Zhonghu The ''zhonghu'' (), short for ''zhongyin erhu'' () is a low-pitched Chinese bowed string instrument. Together with the erhu and gaohu, it is a member of the huqin family. It was developed in the 1940s as the alto member of the huqin family (sim ...

'' (中胡) :''

Gehu The ''gehu'' (革胡; pinyin: géhú) is a Chinese instrument developed in the 20th century by the Chinese musician Yang Yusen ( 杨雨森, 1926–1980). It is a fusion of the Chinese huqin family and the cello. Its four strings are also tu ...

'' (革胡) :''

Diyingehu The bass ''gehu'' (低音革胡; pinyin: ''dīyīngéhú'', ; also called ''digehu'' or ''beigehu'' 倍革胡, literally "bass ''gehu''") is a Chinese bowed string instrument in the ''huqin'' family. It was developed by Yang Yusen along with ...

'' (bass ''gehu''; 低音革胡) Notably missing from the instrumentation are the ''

suona ''Suona'' (IPA: /swoʊˈnɑː/, ), also called ''dida'' (from Cantonese / '' īdá'), ''laba'' or ''haidi'', is a traditional Chinese music instrument with double-reed horn. The suona's basic design originated in ancient Iran, then called "Sur ...

'' family of instruments, the ''diyin sheng'' (bass ''sheng'') and ''

liuqin The ''liuqin'' (Chinese: , pinyin: ) is a three, four or five -stringed Chinese mandolin with a pear-shaped body. The range of its voice is much higher than the ''pipa'', and it has its own special place in Chinese music, whether in ...

''. Due to the limited adoption of ''gehu'' and ''diyingehu'', many Chinese orchestras use the

cello The cello ( ; plural ''celli'' or ''cellos'') or violoncello ( ; ) is a Bow (music), bowed (sometimes pizzicato, plucked and occasionally col legno, hit) string instrument of the violin family. Its four strings are usually intonation (music), t ...

and

double bass The double bass (), also known simply as the bass () (or #Terminology, by other names), is the largest and lowest-pitched Bow (music), bowed (or plucked) string instrument in the modern orchestra, symphony orchestra (excluding unorthodox addit ...

as substitutes for these parts.

Performance

''Dabo

River A river is a natural flowing watercourse, usually freshwater, flowing towards an ocean, sea, lake or another river. In some cases, a river flows into the ground and becomes dry at the end of its course without reaching another body of wate ...

Caprice''
8 February 2003,

John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts (formally known as the John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts, and commonly referred to as the Kennedy Center) is the United States National Cultural Center, located on the Potom ...

China Broadcasting Chinese Orchestra The China Broadcasting Chinese Orchestra (; also called Central Broadcasting Traditional Instruments Orchestra) is a major Chinese orchestra based in Beijing, comprising a large group of traditional Chinese musical instruments. It is a consolidatio ...

''Dabo

Caprice''
6 February 2003,

Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts (also simply known as Lincoln Center) is a complex of buildings in the Lincoln Square neighborhood on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. It has thirty indoor and outdoor facilities and is host to 5 millio ...

China Broadcasting Chinese Orchestra

References

External links

Dabo River Caprice
published by People's Music Publishing House 2008 {{He Xuntian Compositions by He Xuntian 1982 compositions