In Luoyang city in central China's Henan province Chinese archaeologists have found a large number of instruments and music scores used by a famous 100,000-member imperial band which performed during Empress Wu Zetian's reign in the Tang dynasty (618-907 A.D.).
According to a local cultural official, the discovery site will become a new tourist attraction in Luoyang.
Historical records show that the band was sponsored by Empress Wu Zetian. But in the late Tang dynasty, was dismissed because the depleted national treasury could no longer afford the band.
The excavated articles include wind and percussion instruments such as the flute and the sheng (reed pipe wind instrument).
The ancient musicians wrote down scores by "gongchi", a traditional Chinese musical scale, but the melodies were passed on from generation to generation by oral teaching only. As a result, most have been lost over the past thousand years.
The city recently organized a new band consisting of 20 elderly musicians to revive the ancient art.
The local tourism bureau has invited senior musicians and experts to systematize the ancient music scores and to train new musicians in the ancient band music.
Experts have also launched study projects on the performance methods of the ancient imperial band and introduced more instruments including chimes (a set of bells) and guqin (a seven-stringed plucked instrument) to the band.
In addition, a reproduction of Tang dancing will also be included in the performance program of the band.
(China Daily November 3, 2001)
