Min Huifen
Min Huifen, born on December 23, 1945 in Yixing, Jiangsu Province, is a national first-class actor and a famous erhu player.
He has successively served as an erhu soloist in the China Art Troupe, Shanghai Orchestra, Shanghai Art Troupe, and Shanghai Chinese Orchestra. He was also the vice chairman of the Chinese Musicians Association. He is a representative of the 4th National People's Congress and a member of the 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference.
Died of illness in Shanghai on the morning of May 12, 2014 at the age of 69.
Chinese name: Min Huifen
Nationality: Chinese
Ethnicity: Han
Birthplace: Yixing, Jiangsu
Date of birth: December 23, 1945
Date of death: May 12, 2014
Occupation: Erhu player
Graduation school: Shanghai Music Academy
Main achievements: Shanghai Literature and Art Award
Second Prize in the 12th "Shanghai Spring" Creation
The First China "Golden Record" Award
Baosteel Elegant Art Award
Served as Vice Chairman of the Chinese Musicians Association
Deputy to the 4th National People’s Congress, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th and 9th , member of the 10th National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference
Representative work: "Random Thoughts on the Great Wall"
Place of death: Shanghai Renji Hospital
Life experience
Min Huifen was born on December 23, 1945 in Yixing, Jiangsu. His father, Min Jiqian, is a disciple of the famous erhu player Liu Tianhua. Influenced by her family, Min Huifen loved music since childhood. At the age of 8, he learned Erhu from his father Min Jiqian and showed extraordinary talent in music. In 1956, 11-year-old Min Huifen moved to Nanjing, the ancient cultural capital, with her father's job transfer, and entered the "Red Scarf Art Troupe", a juvenile home in Nanjing's Gulou District, as an erhu solo performer and the orchestra conductor of the troupe.
In 1958, at the age of 13, he entered the Middle School Affiliated to the Shanghai Conservatory of Music, specializing in Erhu, and studied under the Erhu educators Wang Yi and Lu Xiutang. In 1963, at the 4th Shanghai Spring Concert National Erhu Competition, Min Huifen conquered the audience and judges with her song "Singing in Sickness" and won first place in the competition.
Since 1979, she has performed in more than ten countries and regions including the United States, Canada, and France.
In 1981, Min Huifen, who was in her prime as an artist, unfortunately suffered from cancer. She had undergone six major surgeries and fifteen rounds of chemotherapy in five years, but she was tenacious and optimistic and worked hard to return to the stage as soon as possible. . In September 1987, she returned to the stage and was invited to participate in the first "China Art Festival" and performed "Capriccio on the Great Wall" with the China National Traditional Orchestra; in January 1988, she was invited to participate in the "Dragon Music Week" and collaborated with the Shanghai Chinese Orchestra for the first time. Performed the Concerto "Capriccio on a Theme of Honghu Lake". Later she gave successful performances in Shanghai and Singapore.
In addition to creating performances, Min Huifen, who is still in her 60s, also puts a lot of energy into the popularization of folk music and the cultivation of new talents. Almost every year she holds more than 20 folk music popularization concerts.
In July 2006, Min Huifen attended the Guangzhou Advanced Audio Exhibition with her masterpiece "Tianxian".
Died of illness in Shanghai Renji Hospital on the morning of May 12, 2014 at the age of 69.
Anecdotes
Music Enlightenment
Min Huifen said that among her peers, she started learning piano at a very young age like herself. Not long after liberation, there were no students studying music, especially folk music. The girl playing the erhu seems incredible.
Min Huifen’s hometown is in Yixing, Jiangsu Province, the hometown of Jiangnan silk and bamboo. Jiangnan silk and bamboo, southern Jiangsu percussion, various folk songs, and minor tunes. Even when she was a child, she attended temple fairs and the music of monks and Taoists all night long attracted her, and she was deeply interested in the nation. The fascination with music took root deep in her young mind. Min Huifen was born in a musical family. His father, Min Jiqian, is a disciple of Liu Tianhua, the pioneer of national music. He is good at playing erhu, pipa, sanxian and other Jiangnan silk and bamboo instruments. Among various national musical instruments, Min Huifen especially likes the erhu. Its charm lies in the fact that it is particularly close to the emotions of the Chinese people, and its timbre is like Chinese people talking and singing.
Min Huifen still keeps the erhu from when she first learned art. It was a homemade erhu left behind by one of her father’s colleagues after she got married and moved away. The barrel was covered with cheap toad skin. At the age of 8, Min Huifen began to learn piano from her father. That old erhu made Min Huifen's brilliant career in the future.
Diligent and studious
During the "Cultural Revolution", all kinds of music sounds at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music disappeared, the piano was smashed, and the teacher was labeled as a "double agent" and imprisoned in " Bullpen”. Min Huifen is still learning-oriented. She not only practices erhu, but also jinghu and violin. Zhang Qisong, a classmate in the Vocal Music Department, also gave Min Huifen an erhu record played by blind A Bing, an old folk artist. However, Min Huifen did not have a record player to listen to the record. Later, Min Huifen went to the Shanghai Film Orchestra to rehearse and found the record room there. After everyone had left after rehearsal, she took out A Bing's performance record and listened to it. While listening, trying to figure it out, and practicing at the same time, she was so obsessed with the record that she was able to play the erhu exactly as it was on the record.
Min Huifen realized that she should have her own understanding of A Bing and her own understanding of life. When she talked about the treatment of the middle section of "Er Spring Reflects the Moon", it was not like some people said it was longing or longing, but rather dull. Some people say that her bowing technique in playing "Er Quan Ying Yue" is very similar to a dead brush in calligraphy, and she strongly agrees with this metaphor.
Special Task
In 1975, Min Huifen received a special task: to record a batch of Peking Opera arias for Chairman Mao Zedong. Using Erhu to perform Peking Opera singing requires not only developing the charm of Peking Opera singing, but also maintaining the characteristics of Erhu itself. In order to master the characteristics of Peking Opera singing, Min Huifen traveled to Beijing and Shanghai, seeking advice from famous Peking Opera masters everywhere. Not only did she learn to sing herself, but she also Carefully explore the differences between the different genres.
She recorded a large number of famous Peking opera songs such as "Xiaoyaojin", "Zhan Huangpao", "Wolong Diaoxiao", "Lianyingzhai" and "Crying Spirit Pai" using the erhu, which were deeply loved by Chairman Mao. The success of the erhu in Peking Opera singing has greatly expanded Min Huifen's artistic vision, and she has developed a strong interest in using opera singing to broaden the scope of erhu performance. Over the years, in addition to premiering a large number of erhu pieces such as "River Water", "Capriccio on the Great Wall", "Wedding Farewell", "Deep Night", etc., she has never given up on the exploration of "vocalization of instrumental music performance".
Main achievements
Personal works
The Northeastern folk music "River Water" performed in 1973 became his representative work. The large-scale Erhu concerto "Capriccio on the Great Wall" premiered in 1980 and received high praise and wide spread. In addition, she is also engaged in the creation of erhu solos, such as "The Wish of the People of Honghu" (arranged based on opera music), "Yangguan Sandie" (adapted from ancient music), "Baoyu Crying Soul" (arranged based on Yue opera music) , erhu and band "Music Poems - Heart Song" (cooperated with Qu Chunquan), all have certain influence and have been included in the teaching materials of higher conservatories.
Instrumental Music Research
In the 1960s, erhu performer Min Huifen proposed a playing style and method of erhu vocal performance. In her decades-long artistic career, she has put the concepts and methods of Erhu intonation into practice, adapted and created some pieces with the characteristics of Erhu intonation, such as her self-written and performed opera "Red Guards of Honghu Lake" Excerpts from "The People's Wish of Honghu" etc.
The erhu tone is a special performance method created by this famous folk music master, which has also made her a leading master figure in the folk music world today.
Artistic style
Performing style
Min Huifen has extensively dabbled in folk opera and music, such as Jiangnan Sizhu, Chaozhou music, Peking Opera, Yue Opera, lyrics, music, etc., and learned from them Essence, constantly exploring erhu playing techniques and enriching the expressive power of erhu. Her performance is full of passion, and her handling of the connotation of the music is delicate and expressive.
In the long-term artistic practice, Min Huifen has developed a playing style that is passionate but implicit, touching but not flattering, exaggerated but not crazy, sad but not sad.
In her performance, she can grasp the artistic conception that the music wants to express, and use the big rhythmic law of succession, transition, and integration to combine her emotions with "momentum" and "charm". Through the rhythm, pitch, strength and weakness of the music, she can The manner in which she performs on the stage arouses people's imagination, and all of this is actually accomplished naturally in a series of ingenious and uninterrupted moments, which fully reflects her superb erhu artistic attainments.
The opera music works performed by Min Huifen can deeply grasp the style and charm of the works, and understand the deep spirit of the opera's acoustic dynamics. This is because it does not imitate the performance form of this style from the surface, but from the fundamentals. Starting from the charm of the work, and then carrying out perceptual feelings, experiences and rational thinking, in order to achieve a superb artistic realm.
Aesthetic Concepts
She was deeply influenced by the Stanislavian system of experiential performances and integrated herself with the erhu. She fully accepted Chinese opera and used plum (Mei) The performance style that is both experiential and expressive, represented by Lan Fang's system, has formed a unique stage music performance, which is closely related to her courage to explore opera music works.
In Min Huifen's comprehensive psychological activities of aesthetic re-creation, her aesthetic concepts, ideals, and tastes directly affect psychological factors such as perception, experience, imagination, and comprehension, and she has a comprehensive aesthetic that creatively blends subject and object. Viewing emphasizes overall grasp and comprehensive feeling. The emotional exchange between the subject and the object during the performance, and the subject's experience and communication of the aesthetic emotions of the object, all reflect the aesthetics of moving people with emotion.
Creative Ideas
In the process of performing the singing tunes of various Peking Opera art schools, Min Huifen highlights the intuitive image of the work, uses creative expression methods to reveal the vividness of the work, and pursues aesthetics The emotional theory of music advocates that music should reveal people's inner world. The aesthetic values ??of unity of beauty, unity of emotion and reason, and unity of form and spirit advocated by the Chinese national cultural tradition, and the balanced, moderate, and implicit artistic style displayed are clearly reflected in her musical performances.
Honors received
Won the first prize in the 4th "Shanghai Spring" Chinese Erhu Competition, the Shanghai Literature and Art Award, and the 12th "Shanghai Spring" Creation Second prize, the first China "Golden Record" Award, Baosteel Elegant Art Award, and the title of "National Outstanding Literary and Art Worker".
Social evaluation
She strives for excellence in art, studies hard and practices hard, and has comprehensive and solid basic skills. She pays more attention to the in-depth exploration of the connotation of the music and expresses it in detail. The sound of the piano is full of artistic charm and the performance is full of passion. (Inner Mongolia Morning News)
Min Huifen gradually became synonymous with "erhu". (Yangzhou Daily)
"One of the most famous string players in the world", "even the rests are full of music". "It played out the sorrow of the world." The first person to walk into the Golden Hall carrying the erhu, letting the world know the erhu and Chinese folk music. (Xinhuanet)