Shen Xingong (1870-1947), real name Shen Qinghong, character Shu Kui. "Heart Work" was a pseudonym used later in composition.
Shen Xingong was born in the Shen family, which was once a prominent family in Shanghai. During the Jiaqing and Daoguang years, the Shen family mainly engaged in ship transportation and had a huge fleet. But after the Opium War, the Shen family's ships could not compete with foreign ships, and their careers soon declined.
Shen Xingong's father was named Shen Yueban (1841-1892). When Shen Yue was fifteen or sixteen years old, the family's business was not bad. So the family asked him to study business so that he could take over the family business in the future. Unexpectedly, the business "cooled" later, and the family let Shen Yuecang go home to manage the family affairs. The so-called "from frugality to luxury, from luxury to frugality". The Shen family, who are accustomed to a good life, are still unwilling to live a frugal life after the family business collapses, which makes Shen Yuezhan encounter many difficulties in managing family affairs. But Shen Yuebar is a loyal person, relying on his hard work and fine management, the life of the Shen family can still be maintained.
In 1860, Shen Yue married his daughter-in-law Liu Shi. Liu shi is a native of Qingpu (now a municipal district of Shanghai), the family is to show people feng shui, the Shen family once asked the Liu family to find a cemetery, so shen Yue bar and Liu clan acquaintance, marriage. In 1863, Shen Yuechang's eldest son, Shen Qingchang, was born. In 1870, Shen Yuecang's second son, Shen Qinghong (Shen Xingong), was born.
In 1874, Shen Yuecang went to collect debts from other places, but never returned. The Shen family had not seen Shen Yue for many days, so they asked to be separated, and each family began to eat separately, and the Shen family's house was divided. The debts of the Shen family fell under the name of the Shen Yue family. Since then, various creditors have come to Liu to ask for debts, and Liu and his children live a life of fear and fear every day.
Where did Shen Yue bar go? Saying that it is to collect debts is actually to hide debts. Because the year is approaching, the creditors want to collect debts, and the family can't help, Shen Yue bar is really rudderless, decided to abandon the family and go out to hide debts. When Shen Yue left, he thought of a way out for himself - to become an official. He hopes that he can improve his family's life through his career.
Through some connections, Shen Yuebar contacted a "distant relative" official in Hunan, who said that if Shen Yuebar came to Hunan, he could help to make some connections and ensure that work was arranged. This made Shen Yueban's life appear a glimmer of hope, and Shen Yuebar also specially changed his name for the sake of his career, Shen Yuemu.
However, Shen Yuemu really arrived in Hunan to find that the "distant relatives" actually did not have any real power and could not help arrange work, and they were extremely disappointed. Shen Yuemu thus stayed in Hunan for half a year and has not been able to find an errand. During this time, he heard that if he went to some small places, he would have more hope of becoming an official. As a result, Shen Yuemu managed to find an idle job in Lizhou. This job was specifically at the beginning of the first fifteenth year, putting on a dress and waiting with the Taoist monks for the adults to come to incense, which was extremely boring. The boring life did not let Shen Yue bar idle, he used his free time to read and study to prepare for the future.
Shen Yuemu's diligence was noticed by the leaders, and after a long-term investigation by the leaders, it was finally decided to let Shen Yuezhuan go to Chenzhou as an official. This was a great thing for Shen Yuemu. First of all, there is a guarantee of treatment, and secondly, the official at that time can generally be served for one year, and if the ability is good, it can be served for up to three years. This incident was enough to change the life of Shen Yue's family. Therefore, Shen Yueban decided to take his family over.
In 1877, Shen Xingong came to Chenzhou with his family because his father took up a job in Chenzhou. Contrary to expectations, Shen Yuemu only worked for one year and then became unemployed. After Shen Yuemu lost his job, the whole family had no financial resources and lived on a shoestring, so after traveling to many places, the whole family decided to live in Shen Xingong's mother's mother's mother's home, the Qingpu Liu family. During this period, although the living conditions of the Shen family were unstable, Shen Xingong had been insisting on studying, learning from his mother at the earliest, and later learning with his eldest brother, accumulating a lot of knowledge. In 1890, through his years of study and accumulation, Shen Xingong won the 7th place in the county examination, the 1st place in the prefectural examination, and the 2nd place in the middle Xiucai. In the same year, Shen Xingong's eldest brother died of illness, and he went to the Shanghai Commodity Donation Bureau to teach classes at the Weng Zi Wenjia Academy. In 1892, Shen Yuemu died of illness in Changsha, and Shen Xingong helped the coffin back to Qingpu, where the Liu family was located, and the family of four was now only Shen Xingong and his mother. In 1893, Shen Xingong returned to Shanghai to teach, during which time he went to Gezhi Academy to listen to the "pen calculation" class of the British dean John Freyer. "Western learning" is completely new to Shen Xingong, which is different from the knowledge he has learned in the past, which makes him interested in "Western learning". This is the enlightenment of Shen Xingong's "Western studies".
In 1894, the year the Sino-Japanese War broke out, the school where Shen Xingong used to work was closed because his master died. Shen Xingong thus entered "John's" Academy to teach "Chinese Books" classes. During his teaching, Shen Xingong and his colleagues learned English and sang Kunqu opera, and further came into contact with "Western Learning" and "Music", which laid the foundation for his future musical activities. In 1897, Shen Xingong was admitted to nanyang public school normal school, majoring in mathematics, English, physics, during the school study, Shen Xingong gradually began to realize the characteristics of Western learning, and began to pay attention to the dissemination of Western learning. In 1898, Shen Xingong once said to himself: "There is great hope for restoration, and we are rejoicing in the heavens." It can be seen that Shen Xingong at this time is looking forward to a new ideological culture.
Under the impetus of restoration ideas such as "education to save the country", Shen Xingong traveled east to Japan in 1902 to study teacher training at the Hongwen Academy in Tokyo. Soon after, the Japanese government, together with the Qing court Chincha, persecuted Chinese students, and the incident provoked a protest from all the students, and some students withdrew from school, and Shen Xingong was one of them. After dropping out of school, Shen Xingong transferred to the Japanese Tsinghua School founded by the Chinese themselves, and after entering the school, Shen Xingong organized a "music workshop" among international students, inviting Singing Professor Mijiro Suzuki of the Tokyo Higher Normal School to teach music lessons, and the participants also included Zeng Zhichen and so on. During this period, Shen Xingong began to compose music, and his debut work was "Boys' First Ambition" (originally known as "Gymnastics - Military Exercises"), which was later popular in China.
In 1903, Shen Xingong returned to China.
After returning to China, Shen Xingong taught at the Affiliated Primary School of Shanghai Nanyang Public School, teaching science and gymnastics. At the same time, he created a "singing" class and created a large number of songs, which was widely circulated at that time and had a great impact, and even many teachers from the mainland came to Shanghai to study and hired Shen Xingong to "guide the path of music and song". Within the scope of Shanghai, Shen Xingong was invited to teach music and song at Wuben Girls' School, Longmen Normal School, Nanyang Middle School, and "Shanghai Society". As a result, the collective singing atmosphere of school groups was created nationwide, which was the beginning of collective singing in the history of modern Chinese music, and the expression of this "collective singing" was gradually called "school music".
In 1904, Shen Xingong published the "School Singing Collection" (the first collection), which was the first school music textbook in modern China. After that, Shen Xingong created and published "School Singing Collection" (second collection) (1906), "School Singing Collection" (third episode) (1907), "Re-edited School Singing Collection" (all six episodes) (1911), "Republic of China Singing Collection" (all four episodes) (1913). wait. He created a large number of musical works.
Generally speaking, "school music songs" are mostly written in simple scores, and the tunes are generally from Japan, Europe, the United States and other countries, and musicians refill the words with Chinese. To put it simply, it is to use foreign songs to fill in Chinese words, which can be divided into two types: "filling in words according to the song" and "filling in the song according to the word" when creating. Later, there were also works by some composers who composed their own tunes. Among Shen Xingong's creations, the more representative works are: "Bamboo Horse", "Yellow River" and so on.
Since the 1920s, a variety of styles and forms of musical works have emerged in the history of Chinese music, which has led to the decline of the music and song movement. Since then, Shen Xingong has mainly practiced various social activities, and rarely composed music.
Shen Xingong, who experienced bitterness in the feudal era, experienced the cold and warmth of the old society. In the process of continuous growth, I felt the development trend of "new culture", and gradually realized the power of music, through my own learning and practice, I brought the form of "chorus" in Western music to China, and promoted the practice of music and song in education in the new era. The emergence of "school music" means that foreign music has officially entered China, and Chinese music has entered a new era.
"Singing" is the simplest of all musical expressions, but it can best express people's emotions and hopes. The use of the "collective singing" model of singing was rare in China before, and it could be promoted in the early 20th century, on the one hand, because the "new style of school" was developed at that time, and there was a demand for "music" classes, and on the other hand, because in the turbulent era of the time, people were eager to get inner comfort through "collective" and "unity". At that time, Chinese folk songs, opera and other art forms were still widely used and disseminated in the folk, and xuetang music, as a form of expression after the "localization" of foreign music, impacted the development of Chinese national folk music, and the two gradually formed two musical styles, which had an impact on Chinese society at the same time.