Title: The cavalry

Composer:Tong Leung-tak

Year: 1965

Genre:

• Solo
• Original composition
• Erhu with instrumental ensemble

Call No.: SC320

Description: "The Cavalry" is an erhu solo piece composed by Tong Leung-tak. At the time of composition in 1965, Tong was presumably living with soldiers stationed in Tibet, a province at the frontier of the People's Republic of China. Some of the piece's musical features, especially the minor pentatonic mode, are often attributed to Tibetan folk music. The score in the archive in Music Office illustrates a version of the piece that includes an accompanying ensemble of yangqin, pipa, zhongruan, cello, and da gehu (aka diyin gehu). In a style not unlike Huang Haihuai's Saima ("Horse Racing"), the melody alternates between dense semiquaver passages and song-like phrases, while accompanying instruments offer static chordal support. The piece also features erhu bowing techniques such as the gallop-like paogong (comparable to "ricochet" for Western string instruments) and the imitation of horse neighing using a sustained high pitch.

Note:

Instrumentation: erhu (1), yangqin (1), pipa (1), zhong ruan (1), da ruan/gehu/cello (1)