【古琴Guqin】人类送向太空的第一首中国音乐《流水》The First Chinese Music Sent into Space - Flowing Waters (Liu Shui）

🌊 Flowing Waters (Liu Shui)

This piece originates from the celebrated "soulmate" (zhiyin) story of Bo Ya and Zi Qi from the pre-Qin period, first recorded in the Liezi · Tangwen, and has been passed down through the ages. The earliest surviving score appears in the Shen Qi Mi Pu (1425) compiled by Zhu Quan of the Ming dynasty. According to the preface, High Mountain and Flowing Waters were originally a single piece, split into two during the Tang dynasty. By the Song dynasty, Flowing Waters had already evolved into an eight-section composition. After a thousand years of transmission and transformation through the Song, Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties, it was revised into the "Great Flowing Waters" by the Sichuan-school qin master Zhang Kongshan in the Tianwenge Qinpu (1876). He added dense fingering techniques in the sixth section to depict rushing torrents, later known as the "Seventy-two Rolling and Brushing" (qishier gunfu). This gave rise to the distinction between the "Great Flowing Waters" and the "Lesser Flowing Waters" from the Shen Qi Mi Pu.

Mr. Guan Pinghu based his version on this Tianwenge score. According to recollections of his friends, in his youth he traveled to Jinan to study under the Sichuan-school master Daoist Qin Heming, from whom he systematically learned the renowned Flowing Waters. He then integrated the essence of the Sichuan school, carefully revising the fingering and defining the rhythmic structure, ultimately establishing the performance version that has become the most widely transmitted in modern times.

In 1977, this piece was engraved on a gold-plated record and carried into space aboard the Voyager spacecraft, as one of the sounds representing human civilization sent to the universe.

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Based on the Tianwenge Qinpu, as interpreted by Guan Pinghu
Guqin: Zhou Yinghua
Recording / Mixing: Tang Bin
Cinematography: Lin Zeqin
Post-Production: Bai Wuxia
Presented by: Zi De Guqin Studio