In July 1949, the newly liberated Shanghai held a grand commemorative meeting to commemorate the 14th anniversary of the death of musician Nie Er. At this meeting, Nie Er's membership in the Chinese Communist Party was officially revealed. Nie Er's comrade-in-arms Yu Ling expressed a wish at the commemorative meeting: he must write a play for Nie Er, so that Nie Er's image and song can be reproduced on the screen.
Ten years later, in 1959, the film "Nie Er" created by Yu Ling and Nie Er's former friends was released, which was the first musical biopic in New China and one of the few color films at that time. The new China, who has just turned ten years old, commemorates the composer of the national anthem in this form, recording the experience of how a warm-blooded patriotic young man grew up to become a people's musician.
What worries did this 23-year-old revolutionary, whose life was frozen in his lifetime? To this day, in the musician's hometown, how are people commemorating him and remembering him?
"I am born for society"
In 1959, as one of the tribute films for the 10th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China, the color feature film "Nie Er" shot by Shanghai Haiyan Film Studio was released. The film uses "Pioneer" composed by Nie Er as the opening song.
△ Poster of the movie "Nie Er"
People's musician Nie Er, whose original name was Nie Shouxin, was born in 1912 in Kunming, Yunnan Province, and was the fourth oldest in the family. In 1930, at the age of 18, Nie Er graduated from the Yunnan Provincial First Normal School and was arrested by the Nationalist government for participating in the student movement during his time at the school.
△ Nie Er in the student era. Profile picture
Nie Sulun's grandson Qingshan, nie's third brother, introduced, "Grandpa said at that time that there was a provincial secretary general's child who was his good friend, and one night he ran to his house and said, 'Something big has happened, your brother is on the blacklist, and your brother's name is on the arrest list on my father's desk.'" And I also specifically asked my father if he was really arrested, saying that this time he must really arrest him, and all the people on the blacklist were arrested. ’”
Nie Er returned to his hometown of Yuxi, Yunnan, for a while, and then took the job opportunity of his third brother Nie Xulun, from Kunming to Vietnam via the Yunnan-Vietnam Railway, and then by sea to Shanghai, to work in "Yunfeng Shenzhuang", which was engaged in trade between Yunnan and Shanghai. 18-year-old Nie Er went out on a long trip, and it was inevitable that there were worries in his heart.
At that time, Nie Er had a first love girlfriend, named Yuan Chunhui, everyone was a girl, who was from the liberal arts class of Donglu University, the predecessor of Yunnan University, and she sometimes came to the house after Nie Er escaped. My mother wrote a letter urging him to get married, asking him when he could return to Yunnan and handle the marriage first. Aoyama said.
Nie Er refused to go home to complete the marriage in his reply. 90 years later, his nephew Aoyama read out the sentence in the letter to a young man of the same age as Nie Er. "Nie Er's letter to his mother said, 'Mom, I was born for society.' I want to make great facts in this human society. ’”
△ Nie Er's reply to his mother. Photo courtesy of Aoyama
Nie Er's alma mater, Yunnan Provincial First Normal School, has undergone changes and becomes the current Kunming College. On June 6, 2021, a statue of Nie Er was unveiled here.
The red cloth was unveiled, and Nie Er stood in front of everyone in the posture of playing the violin, and his coat seemed to be raised in the wind.
△ Portrait of Nie Er of Kunming College. Photo by journalist Jay Gordon
"There should be a Chinese 'Marseillaise'"
In the 1959 film, Nie Er celebrates the victory of the Northern Expedition with his classmates in Kunming, playing the national musical instrument of his hometown, the yueqin. When he arrived in Shanghai, he exchanged the money saved from pulling a cart for a second-hand violin. He was also good at singing, and together with his colleagues in the troupe, he comforted the wounded anti-Japanese soldiers, and he took the lead in singing the war song "Marseillaise" during the French Revolution.
Aoyama heard from his grandfather that singing Marseillaise and wanting to write "China's Marseillaise" were the seeds that Nie Er had planted when he was a student. Nie Er felt that "Marseillaise" was particularly exciting and energetic, and as soon as he sang this song, everyone was enthusiastic, and he said that there should be a Chinese "Marseillaise". Therefore, the birth of the "Volunteer March" is definitely not accidental. In fact, when he was in this school, he had already strengthened his belief. ”
In 1935, "The March of the Volunteer Army" as the theme song of "Children of the Storm" spread throughout the country with the film and records.
Prior to this, Nie Er worked at Shanghai Lianhua Pictures and EMI Records. In 1933, through the introduction of Tian Han, Nie Er joined the Communist Party of China.
△ Nie Er (left) with Tian Han. Profile picture
"The March of the Volunteers" became his masterpiece
Less than two months after the release of Children of the Storm, on July 17, 1935, Nie Er drowned while swimming on the beach of Theonuma in Fujisawa City, Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan.
Many years later, some people on the Internet still asked: Why did a patriotic young man who wrote anti-Japanese songs go to an "enemy country"?
In fact, there is already an answer in the 1959 film.
Historical records record that when Nie Er set off from Shanghai, he was sent off by friends such as Zheng Junli, Yuan Muzhi, and Zhao Dan.
More than 20 years later, Zheng Junli served as one of the directors and screenwriters of the movie "Nie Er", and Zhao Dan took the initiative to ask to play Nie Er. The film does not tell the story of Nie Er's arrival in Japan. During his stay in Japan, Nie Er completed the final draft of the "March of the Volunteer Army" and sent it back to Shanghai, which became his masterpiece.
△ The filming scene of the movie "Nie Er", the left one is Nie Er played by Zhao Dan. Profile picture
On the seashore where Nie Er was killed, Fujisawa citizens initiated the establishment of the Nie Er Memorial Square. Every year on July 17, local bands play Nie Er's works here, including the Volunteer March. In 1981, Fujisawa And Kunming became sister cities.
△ Nie Er Memorial Square on the shores of the Hoonuma Beach. Photo by journalist Jay Gordon
This great song later became the national anthem of the People's Republic of China. On October 1, 1949, it was played in Tiananmen Square in the capital Beijing.
In 2019, in a grand performance celebrating the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China, the Symphony Orchestra of 1000 People played a movement in the center of Tiananmen Square, and the melody also contained elements of the "March of the Volunteer Army". Among them, 50 musicians are from the Kunming Nie Er Symphony Orchestra in Nie Er's hometown, which bears his name.
△ On October 1, 2019, the 1000-person symphony orchestra played music in Tiananmen Square
Huang Yi, one of the four conductors of the evening, the orchestra's artistic director and chief conductor, said, "When we saw us playing that night, flowers bloomed in the sky, and the love and dedication that burst out at that moment for such a cause was a moment that each of us would never forget in this life." ”
"I saw him in tears, but he was still smiling on the surface"
Yongdao Street, where Nie Er's former residence is located, is now part of Kunming's old street and has become a lively attraction and leisure place.
On weekend afternoons in early June, there were calligraphy and painting exchanges and photography exhibitions on the streets, literary and artistic performances in small squares, and the Victory Hall of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression was filming a program celebrating the centenary of the founding of the Party.
This is the hometown of the 18-year-old revolutionary Nie Er, who has not been able to return since he left. After 90 years, the display cabinet of the former residence has a copy of the violin he played, and his first love girlfriend Yuan Chunhui is on a black-and-white photo with his classmates.
△ The picture of the movie "Song for the Country"
"There is a flower in Yunnan called burmese osmanthus flower, and little girls are willing to buy one, and the white thread is wrapped around it, which is very fragrant." There was no perfume at that time, and when Nie Er died, his violin box and diary were full of Burmese osmanthus flowers, dried up. As many times as he and Yuan Chunhui met, there were as many Burmese osmanthus flowers. The girl gave it to him, and he kept it until his death. Nie Er's nephew Qingshan said.
Burmese osmanthus is also called white orchid in Shanghai. Aoyama made this story into his film "Song for the Country" and dedicated it to the ancestor Nie Er. At that time, thousands of revolutionary youths who did not return after leaving home, as one of them, the name Nie Er was passed down along with music.
Aoyama recalled, "When I was 9 years old, when my father was still alive, he and my grandfather went to Xishan to visit the grave. Taking a brick tape recorder, Grandpa put a tape on Nie Er's tomb, which was the violin song "Dream Song". I asked my grandfather why he had to play this every time he came, and he said it was the music that he and Nie Er had broken off. Nie Er was not yet 19 years old at the time, and after eating rice noodles at home, the night after everyone gathered and left, he played this song. Grandpa said very vividly, he said that everyone, including Nie Er's eldest sister, was in tears, only Nie Er was laughing. But Grandpa said, 'I saw him in tears, but he was still smiling on the surface.' ’”
Source: People's Daily News