University of Notre Dame
LaBar Performance Hall
February 9, 2024
www.patrickyimviolin.com
Chan Hing-yan: Autumn Comes for violin & sheng (2023)
I. As the Wind Gusts Through
II. By a Guttering Lamplight
III. In Rain’s Chill
IV. Autumn at a Haunted Graveyard
Chan Hing-yan: Autumn Comes
Li He (790-816) was a highly original poet of the Middle Tang (ca. 762-827). His poems showcased intricate structures, extraordinary imagination, and were adorned with exquisite and imaginative language. Within the lines of his poetry, one could often find a profusion of novel and beautiful expressions, along with captivating surreal imagery. His deliberate pursuit of innovation in the realm of creative endeavours was notably avant-garde. Autumn Comes is inspired by Li He's poem of the same title and, through four succinct movements, deliberately interprets the poem's hauntingly melancholic and alluring ambiance.
桐風驚⼼壯⼠苦
衰燈絡緯啼寒素
誰看青簡⼀編書
不遣花蟲粉空蠹
思牽今夜腸應直
⾬冷⾹魂弔書客
秋墳鬼唱鮑家詩
恨⾎千年⼟中碧
Wind through wutong-trees shocks the heart, stalwart men are grieved;
by the guttering lamp, crickets weep in the chill pallor.
Who ever saw a single roll of writing on green slips not rendered up to the florid bugs and gnawed to powdery nothing?
“Tug at the thoughts”? - on such a night one’s guts should be pulled straight;
in rain’s chill, a fragrant soul pays respects to the bookish wayfarer.
In the autumn graveyard, ghosts sing poems of Master Bao whose aggrieved blood endures a thousand years, green jade in the dirt.
(Poem translated by Robert Ashmore)