(b Zhanghua, 6 Sept 1929). Taiwanese composer and ethnomusicologist. After studying the violin in Japan in his teens he entered the music department of the National Taiwan Normal University in 1949, studying composition with Xiao Erhua. On graduation he moved to Paris, studying the violin with Collette de Lioncourt at the Ecole César Franck, the history of music with Chailley and composition with Jolivet at the Sorbonne, and analysis with Messiaen at the Conservatoire (1954–9). After his return to Taiwan he taught at several of Taiwan’s music departments and introduced avant-garde ideas to the country. As Taiwanese audiences were accustomed to ‘pentatonic Romanticism’ rather than atonality, his first concert in 1960 was received with shock rather than enthusiasm. Nevertheless, Hsu continued to encourage his students to compose in advanced styles and co-founded several associations for the promotion of contemporary music: the Chinese Composers’ Forum (1961), the Waves Group (1963), the Five (1965), the Chinese Society for Contemporary Music (1969) and the Asian Composers’ League (1971). In the late 1960s he began to study Taiwan’s traditional music. He founded the Centre for Chinese Folk Music Research (1967) with Shi Weiliang, undertook extensive fieldwork and published his findings, and initiated the first public concerts of Taiwanese folk music (1977). The most distinguished representative of the musical establishment in Taiwan, Hsu directs the Graduate Institute of Music and chairs the department of music at Taiwan Normal University; he is the country’s foremost authority on Taiwanese traditional music. Among his many honours are the National Award of Literature and Arts (1992); he was made an Officier of the Légion d’Honneur in 1997.
His studies of Taiwanese traditional music have provided abundant stimulus for his compositions. His works exhibit a skilful synthesis of traditional style with Western contemporary compositional techniques. It is ironic that the increasing tolerance and interest for contemporary music in Taiwan that he himself sparked off in the 1960s has made his own work appear conservative. Although he was a central figure of the avant garde (for example, Baishe zhuan (1979–87) was the first modern opera by a Taiwanese composer), his music does not employ radical compositional techniques. In the piano pieces You yitian zai Yelina jia (1960–62), particular techniques of Chinese instruments provide the inspiration. The grace notes and phrasing of the slow third fugue capture the intricacies of qin-play, while the constant repetition of notes in the third toccata evokes the lunzhi (finger roll), a technique characteristic of the pipa. His more recent work for piano and Chinese orchestra Baijia chun (1981) also retains certain Chinese elements both in form and content, though it adheres to certain Western concepts such as the dialogue between the soloist and the orchestra. The dominance of pentatonicism, the use of a theme evolving out of variations rather than variations evolving from a theme, and the employment of such techniques as heterophony all stem from the Chinese musical tradition; moreover, the entire piece is constructed as a daqu (‘great suite’), a form developed during the Tang dynasty. Hsu’s Five Piano Pieces (1975–84) testify to different episodes in the life of the composer and appear to sum up his compositional experience. The last piece in the series, Xunzhao, which progresses from polytonality to pentatonicism, could illustrate his return from a modernist aesthetic to the melodic idiom of Chinese folksong, which remains the dominant influence on his life and compositional style.
|
Stage: Chang E ben yue [Chang E flies to the Moon] (ballet), op.22, 1968; Taohua kai [Peach Blossoms] (folk ballet), op.31, 1977; Baishe zhuan [The Legend of the White Snake] (op, Da Huang), op.33, 1979–87; Taohua guniang [Peach Blossom Girl] (folk ballet), op.28, 1983; Chen San Wu Niang [Chen San and Wu Niang] (folk ballet), op.39, 1985 |
|
Orch: Zuguo song zhi yi: guangfu [Ode to the Fatherland I: Restoration], op.11, 1963–5; Zhongguo qingdian xuqu [Chin. Festival Ov.], op.18, 1965–80; Xianyue erzhang [2 Movts for Str Orch], op.26, 1970; Baisha wan [White Sand Bay], sym., op.29, 1974; Baijia chun [Spring for All], op.36, pf, Chin. orch, 1981; Zuguo song zhi er: ererba [Ode to the Fatherland II: 28 Feb 1947], op.45, 1993 |
|
Choral: Bingche xing [Ballad of the Army Carts] (Du Fu), op.8, 1958–91; Bai Qiu shi wushou [5 Songs on Poetry by Bai Qiu], op.12, 1961; Zanghua yin [Song of Burying Flowers] (Cao Zhan), op.13, 1962; Guofu song [Ode to the Father of the Nation] (Huang Jiayan), op.15, 1965; Xibei minyao ji [Collection of Folksongs from the Northwest], 1965; Senlin de shi [Poem of the Forest] (children’s cant., Yang Huan), op.25, 1970–81; Shitou shan de haizi [The Children of Lion’s Mountain] (children’s cant., M. Deverge), op.37, 1983; Wushou Zhongguo minyao [5 Chin. Folksongs] |
|
Solo vocal: Gequ sishou [4 Songs] (Guo Moruo, Xu Zhimo, M. Manim, Hsu), op.1, 1v, pf, 1956; Ziduqu ershou [2 Songs] (Hsu), op.2, S, pf, 1957–8; Bai Qiu shi sishou [4 Songs on Poetry by Bai Qiu], op.4, B, pf, 1958–9; Liangshou shineiyue de shi [2 Poems for Chbr Ens] (Chen Xiaocui, Kora Rumi), op.5, S, chbr ens, 1958; Nü Guanzi (Wei Zhuang), op.14, S, str orch, perc, 1963; Taiwan minyao ji [Collection of Taiwanese Folksongs], 1v, pf, 1965; Yang Huan shi shi’er shou [12 Poems by Yang Huan], op.23, 1v, pf, 1969–73; Ertong gequ [Children’s Songs] (Yang Huan), op.24, 1v, pf, 1970; Youyi ji diyi ji [First Friendship Collection], op.32, 1v, pf, 1978–9; Qiao [The Bridge] (Deverge), op.42, S, orch, 1986; Duchang [Solos], folksong arrs., 1v, Chin. insts |
|
Chbr and solo inst: Sonatina, op.3, vn, pf, 1957; Sonata, op.6, vn, pf, 1959; Trio Xiangchou san diao [Nostalgia: 3 Tunes], op.7, pf trio, 1957–9; Qnt, op.10, fl, cl, vn, vc, pf, 1960–87; You yitian zai Yelina jia (Un jour chez mademoiselle Hélène), op.9, pf, 1960–62; 5 Preludes, op.16, vn, 1965–6; Mang [The Blind], op.17, fl, 1966; Suite Tongnian de huiyi [Reminiscences of Childhood], op.19, xun, 1967; 3 Huqin Pieces, op.20, huqin, 1977; Jin se [Beautiful Zither], op.21, pipa, 1977; Sonata, op.27, cl, pf, 1973–83; Trio Taiwan, op.28, pf trio, 1973; Rensheng chaqu wushou (5 Episoden aus dem Leben), op.30, pf, 1975–6; Zhongguo minge gangqinqu diyiben [First Book of Chinese Folksongs for Piano], op.34, 1980; Zhongguo minge gangqinqu dierben [Second Book of Chinese Folksongs for Piano], op.35, 1981; Taiwan zuqu [Taiwanese Suite], op.41, trad. Chin. insts, 1983; Dou E Yuan [Dou E’s Lament], op.43, vc/va, 1988; ‘Liusandiao’ bianzou yu zhuti [Variations and Theme on the Folksong ‘Catching the Umbrella’], op.44, vn, 1991 |
|
MSS in C.C. Liu Collection, Institute of Chinese Studies, U. of Heidelberg |
|
Principal publishers: Yueyun, Yueyou, Yuefu, Gérard Billaudot |
Dubuxi yanjiu [A study of Debussy] (Taibei, 1961/R)
Bali yuezhi [A musical journal of Paris] (Taibei, 1962/R)
Zhongguo yinyue wang nali qu? [Whither Chinese music?] (Taibei, 1964/R)
Minzu yinyuejia [Nationalist musicians] (Taibei, 1967)
Xian jieduan Taiwan minyao yanjiu [The present stage of research into Taiwanese folksongs] (Taibei, 1969/R)
Xiyang yinyue yanjiu [A study of Western music] (Taibei, 1969)
Yinyue baike shouce [An encyclopedic handbook of music] (Taibei, 1969)
Zhongguo xin yinyue shi hua [Anecdotes from the history of new Chinese music] (Taibei, 1970/R)
Dubuxi [Debussy] (Taibei, 1971)
Wenyue lingmo [Titbits of music] (Taibei, 1975/R)
Taiwan gaoshan minzu yaoji [Collection of Taiwan aborigines’ songs], 2 vols (Taibei, 1976)
Zhuixun minzu yinyue de gen [In search of the roots of our national music], 3 vols (Taibei, 1979/R)
Taiwan Fulaoxi minyao [The folksongs of the Fulao of Taiwan] (Taibei, 1982)
Duocai duozi de minsu yinyue [The many colours and faces of folk music] (Taibei, 1985)
Minzu yinyuexue daolun [An introduction to ethnomusicology] (Taibei, 1985)
Yinyue de gushi [Music in stories for children] (Taibei, 1985)
Minzu yinyue lunshu gao [Essays on folk music], 3 vols (Taibei, 1987–92)
‘Zhongguo xin yinyue shi: Taiwan bian 1945–85’ [History of new music in China: Taiwan], Zhongguo xin yinyue shi lunji, ed. Liu Jingzhi (Hong Kong, 1990), 211–32
‘The Republic of China’, New Music in the Orient, ed. H. Ryker (Buren, 1991), 217–24
Zhongguo de yinyue [The music of China] (Taibei, 1991)
Taiwan yinyue shi chugao [A first draft history of music in Taiwan] (Taibei, 1992)
Yinyue shi lunshu gao [Essays on the history of music] (Taibei, 1994)
CC (Chew Shyh-ji)
KdG (Schu-chi Lee)
Liu Dangmei: Xiandai Zhongguo gangqin yanjiu [Research on modern Chinese piano music] (Tainan, 1986), 133–52
Wang Zengyuan: ‘Taiwan zhuming yinyuejia Hsu Tsang-houei jiaoshou tan Taiwan minjian yinyue’ [Famous musician Hsu speaks about Taiwanese folk music], Renmin yinyue (1989), no.7, pp.17–21
J.D. Vaughan: The Piano Music of Hsu Tsang-houei (DMA diss., Peabody Institute of the John Hopkins U., 1993)
B. Mittler: ‘Mirrors and Double Mirrors: the Politics of Identity in New Music from Hong Kong and Taiwan’, CHIME, no.9 (1996), 4–44, esp. 7, 11–16
Luo Zhongrong, ed.: Xiandai yinyue xinshang cidian [Dictionary for the appreciation of new music] (Beijing, 1997), 678–80
B. Mittler: Dangerous Tunes: the Politics of Chinese Music in Hong Kong, Taiwan and the People’s Republic of China since 1949 (Wiesbaden, 1997), 199, 318–21
Liu Jingzhi: Zhongguo xin yinyue shilun [Essays on Chinese new music], ii (Taibei, 1998), 706–9
BARBARA MITTLER