The Oldest Magick
Nineteen: Ancient China
By Lew Paxton Price
Due in part to the complexities of the language of music and, probably, to the difficulties of translating ancient Chinese, there is much erroneous information about the Chinese musical scales and related subjects. This is evident because much of the information is mathematically impossible and therefore could not have been the case. Also, there are conflicting accounts—but musical math can help distinguish the correct ones. As best as I can judge, the following is correct.
As far back as we can go into Chinese prehistory, the pentatonic scale has reigned supreme. Indeed, that is the case with all the cultures (with which I am familiar) because the human ear prefers this scale. Even today our best music, the songs that have stood the test of time, is still basically pentatonic. And Chinese music still is as well.
The Chinese eventually based their old pentatonic scale upon five notes: Kung, Shang, Chiao, Chih and Yu. The first note, Kung, is from a pipe called Huang Chung, meaning Yellow Bell, and is the basis for the entire scale. Supposedly, this Huang Chung (the official five note scale, and what we call the circle of fifths) were established during the reign of Huang Ti (2697 BCE).
The Chinese believed that it was upon music that their entire civilization rested. Good music and the proper scale meant a prospering China. And the entire musical scale rested upon the Huang Chung which was set by a bamboo pipe (like a panpipe) of a particular theoretical length.
The Huang Kung established the first note, Kung. A pipe two-thirds the length of the first pipe set the next note. A pipe two-thirds the length of the second set the third note, and so forth for a total of thirteen pipes, each two-thirds the length of the previous pipe. This system of lengths was theoretical because the actual pipe is a certain amount shorter than the quarter wavelength upon which it is based. However, the Chinese knew this and tried to take it into account.
This means that each pipe produced a sound with a wavelength two-thirds as long as the wavelength of the one before it. This is the wavelength required to make a note that is the fifth note up on our modern diatonic scale from the reference note with which we begin, so we call this note a fifth." If we continue to go up in pitch by shortening each succeeding pipe to two-thirds, then each pipe is the fifth" note up from the one preceding it. When we use thirteen pipes in this fashion, the thirteenth is almost an exact same note as the one with which we started but is eight octaves higher. This thirteen note sequence we call a circle of fifths." Very probably, this circle is the basis for the piano keyboard, because the circle of fifths covers seven full octaves and eight octaves of the reference note.
The Chinese originally based the first five notes of this system upon a Huang Chung of about nine inches in length which would have produced approximately the note we call F sharp (F#) today. Progressing upward on this circle of fifths, we have the following:
Note: F# C# G# D# A#
Name: Kung Chih Shang Yu Chiao
This is the Chinese pentatonic scale shown as the first five notes in the circle of fifths. If we rearrange them to be consecutive notes within an octave, we have the following:
Note: F# G# A# C# D#
Name: Kung Shang Chiao Chih Yu
This pattern of five notes corresponds to the black notes on a piano keyboard. And the intervals between them are not all the same. There are larger gaps between A# and C#, and between F# and the D# of the next lower octave.
The location of the larger gaps within the sequence of notes gives the notes a distinctive tune" when one plays them in order. This tune we call a mode. On a scale of five notes with larger gaps occurring at certain points, there are five possible modes—one for each note with which it is possible to begin.
The black notes on the piano keyboard constitute only a portion of the scale we use and, in a sense, this was also true in ancient China. Because, within the circle of fifths, there are every one of the same twelve notes we use today. Given as a circle of fifths, and beginning with Kung, we have: F# C# G# D# A# F C G D A E B.
These twelve notes allow one to play tunes in different keys. In ancient China this was much more important than it is for us today. The ancient Chinese had a zodiac of twelve signs just as we do. Their first sign (the one we call Aries) began just after the vernal equinox (as does Aries). To this sign, they attributed the note Kung (F#). A half step up from Kung was G, which they attributed to their second sign (our Taurus). And G# was attributed to their third sign, of course. Each sign they knew only by a number and a note. The Chinese did not give them animal names until much later. And each sign was like one of our months. Indeed, our months are simply misbegotten travesties of what was once a very good calendar based upon equinoxes, solstices and signs.
The note attributed to each sign (month) was the key in which all music was to be played during that time. For this was the key most prevalent in the world at this time and it would not be in the prescribed order of things to change it. A change in key for that time could presage a change in thinking and that could eventually foment revolution. And revolution or change of any kind might be adverse to the emperor. Ergo, each emperor took great pains to choose the correct Huang Chung and to see that the correct key was played during each sign. They based the signs upon the position of our yellow sun in the heavens—that might be why they chose the name Huang Chung (Yellow Bell).
As in most cultures, after a period of time with the pentatonic scale, the Chinese noticed the two large gaps. To cure the gaps below Kung and below Chih, they added two other notes to the standard scale. They adopted these notes during the Chou dynasty (1027256 BCE) and called them pien-Kung and pien-Chih, meaning below Kung and below Chih. The Chinese now had the diatonic scale officially. However, they continued to use the pentatonic scale almost exclusively. The old circle of fifths had given the Chinese the chromatic scale long before, but they used it only to change keys for tunes written in the pentatonic scale.
The Chou came from the northwest and were keepers of herds and flocks. It is likely that they brought with them much of the knowledge we think of as Western from Europe via mid-Eurasia. In any case, the diatonic scale that the West knew well became part of China with the addition of the two new notes. The Chou dynasty is classical age of China, which saw a renaissance in prose, poetry, history, philosophy, agriculture, flood control, military techniques, diplomacy, astrology, arts and music.
The new seven note system in China allowed two more modes in which people could write music. China now had seven modes just as old Sumer had before 2600 BCE.
1989 by Lew Paxton Price | 
