Liezi Rides the Wind - 列子御風 - guqin

Liezi Rides the Wind is reconstructed from the music in Shenqimipu 神奇秘譜 - published in 1425. The very short preface to the piece says that it was composed by Mao Minzhong, a very famous guqin player who lived at the end of the S. Song dynasty. This is actually fairly plausible as the piece might have been composed around 1300 or so and the piece might have been preserved for a 125 years or so. Mao Minzhong was said to have fled Hangzhou when it was captured by the Mongols and fled to the hills. Later on he was invited to play at the court of Kublai Khan but passed away before that happened. A fair number of pieces are attributed to him including ZhuangZhou MengDie, Yu Ge, and even Pingshaluoyan.

This piece is essentially a magical mystery tour that attempts to depict the flight of Liezi "riding the wind" (or a dragon or a crane or possibly a rug?) and journeying through the cosmos. Liezi of course is the Liezi said to be a Daoist sage and in this case possibly a "xian" or flying immortal. The section headings include utterances like "not knowing if the wind is flying me" or "not knowing if I am flying on the wind".

Musically the piece has two tonal centers which are strings 3 (primary hence "jiao" mode) string 2 (secondary which is a major to minor mode change). This mode change adds to the "changes" experienced on the journey. The piece has a number of register changes too and moves up and down the qin playing surface from low notes to high notes and includes some very nice harmonic passages. There are also a smattering of non-pythagorean tones which add color to the journey.

This piece is played on a redwood top/wenge bottom guqin made by Jim Binkley in Portland Oregon. The redwood is recycled wood. A clear lacquer finish is applied to the guqin.