Earticle

It is commonplace to acknowledge that musical instruments provide an important and unique source for ethnomusicological studies, making it essential for us to document, research, and learn to perform during our fieldwork. But what should we do if we inherit a stock of instruments at our home institute that were not collected from the field, yet remain undocumented and unstudied systematically? No doubt one would suggest beginning work on them as soon as possible, but the question is ‘how?’ By using the Chinese instrument collection in the Music Department of the Chinese University of Hong Kong as an example, this paper shows how studying instrument collections in our own institutions can offer valuable information as well as stories about a historical past that may have been previously unknown. At the same time, it raises a challenge to, and a critical question about, our ethnomusicological nature: how can we balance or make sense of the ‘pure’ and ‘applied’ aspects of the field? The instruments embody not only an individual agenda and research idea, but also the collective memories and histories of institutions, captured through the process of collecting. This paper reports on several stages and outcomes of a project that involved our own students and department members contributing collectively to a project revolving around the instrument collection. The plan included a postgraduate seminar, a catalogue publication entitled Captured Memories of a Fading Musical Past: The Chinese Instrument Collection at the Music Department of the Chinese University of Hong Kong (2010), individual and group research, and an online database. The case touches on several research issues including the preservation, interpretation, translation and knowledge transfer of ‘musical culture’ in the age of globalisation, and the associated knowledge produced by academic institutions by means of musical instruments. This study explores a case of applied ethnomusicology; that is, researchers not thinking ‘for’ the community but putting ourselves ‘in’ the centre of the community. It further encourages us to consider how to make ethnomusicology not merely a discipline for the study of distant indigenous cultures, but one that is meaningful for our own institutions and for ourselves.

Peking opera was introduced to Hong Kong audiences almost ninety years ago. Throughout the twentieth century Peking opera existed in Hong Kong in a diversity of activities. Although it gained little positive response from the local community, it was still able to develop in Hong Kong society with support of the mainland emigrants community. While the old Peking opera activities gradually faded out in contemporary Hong Kong, they were replaced by some new ones, which drew increasing public attention and appreciation. This paper aims to unfold the political influences on the shaping of Peking opera’s development in Hong Kong. Drawing upon historical sources, government documentations and fieldworks in local Peking opera troupes, I will discus how the adoptions of cultural policies by the external regimes of the Republic of China, originally in the mainland and on Taiwan after 1949, and the People’s Republic of China, as well as the internal power of the British colony and the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region governments brought Peking opera to Hong Kong and enabled the genre to develop.

The 21th Century demands that we view traditional culture from a different perspective to place it in a new context of time. Globalization is a process by which regional economies, societies, and cultures have become integrated into a common standard through a global network of communication. The great significance of traditional culture is apparent not only when it responds to the waves of globalization, under the slogan of ‘What is most unique is most international’. But also it has its meaning when it is considered from a different perspective; cultural industry. It is a worldwide trend for human brain researchers to study brain mechanism of treating memories of the past and the present in one's life in order to develop prenatal education music and treatment of memory diseases such as Alzheimer's and depression. I truly believe that East Asian music can take part in the development process. It is my genuine wish that there will be earnest and open academic discussion among the participants of APSE I hope such discussion will naturally link to a need for developing topics for joint study.

This paper studies the ritual music performed in the Jongmyo Shrine that began during the Joseon Period. The major focuses of this research are the introduction of the Jongmyo Shrine, its structure and system, and the classification and the make-up of the Jongmyo Shrine. This study is based on my doctoral thesis <A Study of System, Philosophical Foundation, and Historical Development of Jongmyo Ancestral Shrine Music>, which was submitted to the Seonggeungwan University in February 2012. This work will be followed by <A Study on Jongmyo Jeryeak II>, which will be published in the near future.