The repertoire Autumn Yearning By The Dresser is dated from ancient China. No one knows who or when this piece of music was composed. The earliest known printed music sheet for this repertoire was published in Qing Dynasty, the last dynasty in China’s feudal society. However, it might have been composed even before Qing Dynasty. This repertoire is associated with the story of Wang Zhaojun, a women from Chinese Han Dynasty and married to the head of XiongNu to stop the war between the two countries. This piece of music expresses Zhaojun’s homesick when she was by the dresser in XiongNu on an Autumn day. This melody is generally well-known in the Cantonese speaking area due to it was adopted as the music in the last chapter, Fragnance Sacrifice, in the Cantonese opera Di Nu Hua, which tells a tragedy of a Princess in Ming Dynasty who suffered a lot and later commitede suicide for the collapse of the country. The version of this Xiao solo in the post is from this Cantonese opera, and it was arranged by the musician Wang YueSheng.
This is one of my most favourable pieces of music. At the time when I was studying in Xi’an, I often played it at my casual time. I was attracted to this tune not only because the characteristics of music, but also because of the history and historical stories associated with it. Playing this type of music is as if travelling to the past and talking to people from the ancient time, especially when using an intrument with several thousands years of history such as the Xiao. This is the greatest beauty that I admire. This is also the reason why Xiao is my favourate musical instrument despite I also sometimes play with concert flute and classical guitar. This is also the reason why Xi’an is my favourable city in China.
