Music of China

This week we discussed the music of China. Our questions come from the reading by Prof. Helen Rees. She discusses two contexts in which "authenticity" is contended. First, she describes tourists' fascination with "Ancient Naxi Music." She says that this music is not as "ancient" as it is marketed to audiences. One main reason why Rees says this is because of the commercialized nature of the concerts. The concerts were in fact advertised to tourists; this very element screams a more contemporary setting rather than heavily ancient.

In a different way, Western scholars accused the modern Chinese orchestra as not being "authentic" enough. The main element to this argument is the fact that "authentic" is a subjective term to the many Western tourists. This term is also relative to the other experiences tourists have had that have been marketed as "authentic." Various tourists had experienced concerts of brightly adorned youths prancing to pre-recorded music. In juxtaposition to the aforementioned scenario, the "Ancient Naxi Music" concert for sure seemed authentic. Rees also argues that the strongest ally to the authenticity of the concerts has NOT been its commitment to the tradtions of Naxi music. It has been the "hundreds of obviously fabricated so called "folk" or "tradtional" performances" that their audiences have experiences previous to the Naix music concert. The next question here would be whether or not these lesser forms of "authentic" music provide some sort of framework for a continuum of authenticity? In my opinion the answer is yes. There are in fact many gray areas to what we denote "authentic." Therefore even the obviously fake representations of a music culture can still provide some sort of insight into that culture's musical traditions to an outsider.