In the early days, traditional zheng music was divided into two schools, north and south. The five schools represented were "Zhejiang, Shandong, Henan, Hakka, and Chaozhou". In modern times, the difference between schools has become very small, and almost every school has its own characteristics. long.

shaanxi zheng

The Shaanxi region is the birthplace of Chinese zheng, but the zheng music of "The Voice of the Real Qin" is almost never heard. The zheng or zheng is rarely used; only in the Yulin area is the guzheng used as an accompaniment instrument, and it appears in the accompaniment of the Yulin ditty together with the yangqin, pipa and sanxian. In the late 1950s, Mr. Zhou Yanjia, the president of the Shaanxi Qinzheng Society and a performer, put forward the slogan "Qinzheng Returns to Qin". A lot of work has made the people of Shaanxi familiar with the zheng again. The records of guzheng in Xi'an drum music, Qin Opera and other historical materials have inspired Shaanxi zheng people. There are also the great efforts of zheng masters such as Cao Zheng, Gao Zicheng and Wang Shengwu, and the help of many zheng colleagues. After nearly 30 years of practice, Shaanxi has gradually resumed playing the Qin sound of the zheng.

Henan Zheng

Judging from the texts recorded in the "Historical Records" and "Han Shu", the zheng has been widely developed in the Qin and Han dynasties. In the Eastern Han Dynasty, Emperor Guangwu established the capital Luoyang, and the Northern Song Dynasty established the capital Bianliang (now Kaifeng), both in the Henan area, and the folk music "Zheng Weizhi" has long been popular in this area. It has been integrated with the local folk music "Zheng Wei's Voice" and developed into a famous Zhongzhou ancient tune in later generations. The repertoire of Henan Zheng comes directly from folk rap music and opera music. Henan Quzi is a folk rap music with a long history. It declined after the Qing Dynasty. Only the Nanyang area is still very prosperous, so it is also called Nanyang Guziqu. Its important components are the "Brand Song" with lyrics and the "Bantou Song" with pure instrumental music. The zheng is an important accompaniment instrument. At the same time, it is also played independently from rap. The representative repertoires of the existing Henan Zheng School are almost without exception the Bantou and Paiqu of Henan tunes. In the past, when artists met each other, they often played a bantou song first to meet friends, and renamed it "High Mountains and Flowing Water" by borrowing the story of Boya and Ziqi.

Shandong Zheng

According to the "Warring States Policy" record: "Linzi is rich and solid, and its people all love the yu, hit the building, and play the zither", so many people call the Shandong zheng the Qi zheng. Its spread is mainly in the Heze area including Yuncheng and Juancheng, and the Liaocheng area in Luxi. Most of Shandong zheng tunes are directly related to Shandong qin books and folk music. Some of them are qin tunes that appear as a prelude to qinshu. Similar to Henan bantou tunes, there are sixty-eight pieces of "big board tunes", such as "Autumn Moon in the Han Palace", "Hongyan Bringing Books", etc.; it was named after the 1950s It is "High Mountains and Flowing Water" and is widely popular throughout the country. In addition, there are also evolved from the singing and music of Shandong Qinshu, such as "Fengxiang Song" and "Die Broken Bridge".

Chaozhou Zheng

Chaozhou zheng, popular in Chaozhou, Guangdong, has a special musical structure and unique technique. The guzheng has its own style and is different from other musical instruments. The more important thing is the change of the left hand pressing the portamento, that is, the so-called rhythm filling. Therefore, it is difficult to describe the genre and development of zheng music. In Chaozheng, the use of this technique can be said to be very wonderful. In fact, it is the change of pressing the notes with the left hand to achieve the combination of several scales and modes, and the temperament is also different from the twelve-equal temperament and other folk music. Chaozhou zheng is delicate, subtle and unique with its smooth and gorgeous right hand and unique addition flower playing method of glissando with the left hand. The main tunes of Chaozhou Zheng are "heavy six", "light six", "live five" and "reverse line". Among them, the "Chongliu" tune is more euphemistic; the "Light Six" tune is fresh and lively;

Hakka zither

That is, Guangdong Han Le zheng music. Guangdong Hanle has a long history. According to legend, in the long historical period from the ninth year of Emperor Jin'an (AD 405) to the fall of the Song Dynasty, with the people in the Central Plains moving southwards many times, they brought the quaint "Zhongzhou ancient tune" and "Zhongzhou ancient tune". After combining with local music, language and customs, a unique style of music has gradually formed. The locals call it Hakka music, or Waijiang string and Confucian music, which are mostly found in the eastern part of Guangdong, including It is popular in some areas such as Meixian, Huiyang and Shaoguan.

zhejiang zheng

The use of "shaking fingers" in Zhejiang zheng is performed by the fine shaking of the big finger, and the effect is very similar to the performance of a long bow on a bowed stringed instrument. Strictly speaking, this is not found in other genres of traditional zheng music, because in other genres, the so-called "shaking fingers" or "round fingers" are actually made with the big finger for relatively fast "support" and "split" , and Zhejiang Zheng's "shaking finger" shows its own characteristics and is different from other schools.

Fujian Zheng

Historically, people from the Central Plains moved south several times on a large scale, bringing with them rich Central Plains culture and making the originally backward southwestern Fujian prosperous year by year. The guzheng music of the Central Plains also spread to the southwestern part of Fujian with the southward migration of people from the Central Plains. From the late Ming and early Qing dynasties to the early years of the Republic of China, a kind of folk instrumental music ensemble prevailed in the counties in southwestern Fujian. It is often called "Han music string" in various parts of western Fujian. The most prominent feature of this form of folk instrumental music is that the guzheng is used as the main instrument, and it takes the lead in setting the beat, especially in Zhao'an and Yunxiao counties. The history of Fujian's "Ancient Music Ensemble" is actually the history of Fujian zheng. The "Ancient Music Ensemble" mainly plays the guzheng in the form of performance, which is similar to the "Zhongzhou Ancient Music" and "Xian Suoya Music" in Bantou, Henan. It is said that Minnan zheng, Henan zheng, Shandong zheng, Hakka zheng, Chaozhou zheng, and Wulin zheng are homologous and divergent, and they may all originate from the ancient Qin zheng.

korean zither

According to the official history of the Korean peninsula, "Records of the History of the Three Kingdoms", it is recorded: "King Gasil of Gaya made a twelve-stringed qin. It resembled the rhythm of the December moon. It was ordered to make its music. Although Gayageum is slightly different from the zheng system, it is roughly the same.”

Japanese koto

At the beginning of the 8th century, the thirteen-stringed zheng of the Tang Dynasty was introduced to Japan, and it has evolved into the music zheng, that is, the traditional Japanese musical instruments such as the Chinese Tang zheng, the zhuzheng, and the vulgar zheng. The structure of the three is basically the same: there are 13 strings on the Tong wooden rectangular speaker surface, and each string is supported by a column. The string names are called one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, bucket, Wei, and towel from far to near. The body is straight. Since ancient times, the zheng has been compared to a "dragon", and the parts have been named accordingly.