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Glory of School Songs |
| CCTV.COM 2002-10-11 11:10:44 |
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When you mention the songs ‘The Girl Next To Me’, ‘Unfenced Campus’ and ‘Bunk－mate Above Me’, many people, especially young people who have graduated from university in the last eight year, will identify them with school songs, or ‘campus ballads’, as music critics have termed them. They are part of school culture and imbued with the dreams and passions of young people. Center Stage will present you with school songs from different periods of time since the beginning of the last century.
At the beginning of the last century, imperial examinations were abolished. New styles of schools were established and music education was introduced. Students, for the first time, could learn music at school. Because there were few professional music teachers they had problems composing new songs for students, so school songs at this time were mainly tunes of folk songs and ditties filled with new word. Some overseas students also brought back foreign songs and dilled them with Chinese word. These school songs were considered to be a pioneering form of music at the time.
In the 1930s and 1940s, school songs became colorful. Some songs sang about the motherland, while some others described school life.
In the middle of the 1980s, a group of school songs surged into the mainland from Taiwan, including ‘Penghuwan, My Grandmother’s Home’, ‘Memories in Drizzles’ and ‘A Small Country Road’. These songs are so simple, fresh and full of childish playfulness that the soon became popular among university students.
In the beginning, mainland schools songs were usually written by boys to girls they admired, as way of expressing their love. Gradually, with the girls involved, the topics of school songs have become wider and wider. They not only sing to their classmates, but also their teachers, families and about their campus life. In the 1980s, Peking University had held school song competitions.
In 1994, an album was released entitled ‘Campus Ballads 1’. All the songs were written and sung by Beijing’s university students. In the album not only the influence of Taiwanese school songs was seen, but the musical elements of mainland pop songs, rock and roll, and some classic songs from Europe and America, including ‘sound of Silence’, ‘Country Road’, and ‘Yesterday Once More’ were also in them.
Due to the limited life and musical experience of school singer, most of the school songs are exclusively of students. Some critics have criticized them as simple and all too similar. But they capture the moods of students at that time and contain important clues as to the influences and aspirations of the student body.
The glory days of school songs have passed now. There haven’t been so many school songs heard these years, nor have any more popular campus singers emerged. Will the ‘spirit’ come back again？ We look forward to that day, or to the next exciting wave of Chinese youth culture.
Please join Center Stage on CCTV－9 on October 19th and 20th.
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Editor: Yang Yang CCTV.com
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