At the beginning of the Qing Dynasty, there were only two schools of pipa, namely the Northern (also called Zhili / 直隸) school represented by Chen Mufu / 陳牊夫 and Southern (also called Zhejiang / 浙江) school represented by Wang Junxi / 王君锡. The picture below shows a manuscript of the True Pipa Scores of the Two Schools of North and South / 《南北二派琵琶譜真傳》 published in 1819.

The major difference between the two schools is that when applying tremolo, players of the Northern one plucked the strings leftward with the index finger first, then the middle, ring, and little fingers, and finally rightward with the thumb (known as the “upper order” / 上出輪); whereas players of the Southern one did it in the reverse way, i.e., starting with the little finger, then the ring, middle and index fingers, and concluded with the thumb (known as the “lower order” / 下出輪). Since the index finger is more vigorous than the little finger, the upper order is well suited for producing distinctive sounds, while the lower order delicate sounds.

As time passed, different minor schools emerged in various regions, among which five were prominent:

 

1.  Wuxi school / 無锡派

Hua Qiuping / 華秋赘 and Hua Zitong / 華子同 of Wuxi studied the pipa from both the Northern and Southern schools, who later compiled the Hua Collection / 南北二派秘本琵琶譜 in 1818. Being the earliest published sheet music of the pipa, the Hua Collection consisted of three volumes and adopted the Gongche notation / 工尺譜, containing 62 songs and 6 divertimentos. Players who learned the pipa with the Hua Collection were later subsumed under the Wuxi school.

Though there are few disciples of the Wuxi school nowadays, and almost nobody plays the songs in the original version of Hua Collection, the Wuxi school still has a vital role in the development of the pipa, which links the mid-Qing Dynasty with the modern times.

 

2.  Pinghu school / 平湖派

The Pinghu school is represented by Li Fangyuan / 李芳園, born in a family whose members had played the pipa for five generations. Li’s father often traveled with the pipa and communicated with other players, so Li became a pipa maniac under his influence. Not only had he excelled in the art of the pipa, but also published the Li Collection / 李氏譜 (also called 南北派大麗琵琶新譜) in 1895. Li’s disciples were later collectively known as the Pinghu school.

The Pinghu school was passed on from generation to generation, and one of Li’s disciples, Wu Mengfei / 吴夢飛, was very active in the pipa circle and often performed in Shanghai, which helped to promote the Pinghu school significantly. He also compiled the Yiyi Room’s Pipa Score / 怡怡室琵琶譜.

Another person who made great contribution to the Pinghu school was Zhu Ying / 朱英, who compiled the Zhu Ying’s Pipa Score / 朱英琵琶譜. Under the tutelage of Li’s disciple Wu Bojun / 吴柏君, Zhu had achieved several breakthroughs in the pipa techniques, like inventing the way to press the strings with the left thumb and little finger, which refuted the instructions in Hua Collection that these two fingers would not be used.

The performances of the Pinghu school comprise songs of both civil and martial nature: while the civil songs are delicate, often coupled with leisure actions to reinforce aftersounds, the martial songs emphasize momentum, in which the strings are mainly plucked in the “lower order”. Even today, the Pinghu school still influences the styles of modern pipa to a large extent.

 

3.  Pudong school / 浦東派

The Pudong school was passed on from Ju Shilin / 韞士林 of Nanhui County / 南匯縣 during the reign of Emperor Qianlong. Rumor has it that Ju once went to Suzhou by boat, but could not enter the city as the gate had been closed. He therefore played the pipa to amuse himself, and his music touched the garrison inside the city who let him enter the city. Ju left behind a pipa score that was named after him.

Ju had several disciples, among whom Chen Zijing / 陳子敬 and Cheng Chuntang / 程春塘 were as famous as he, excelling in playing martial and civil songs respectively. There was a time when Chen was invited to play the song of The Warlord Takes Off His Armor in certain place of Shanghai, whose pipa sound was so sonorous that the unparalleled might of the warlord was visualized. Chen also invented the technique of mimicking the gongs and drums, which highlights the momentum of martial songs. Shen Haochu / 沈浩初, a disciple of Chen, nurtured numerous pipa players and even complied the Yang Zheng Xuan’s Pipa Score / 養正軒琵琶譜, contributing tremendously to the development of the Pudong school.

The Pudong school is characterized by its majestic martial songs, and the use of large-sized pipas. The vigor shows a large contrast with the delicacy and serenity of its civil songs. It is also featured by a number of traditional techniques, such as pinch rolls; twisting, “flying”, number changing, merging and sweeping of strings; vibrato; tremolo; modulation; as well as the aforesaid mimicking of gongs and drums.

 

4.  Chongming school / 崇明派

The Chongming school was named after its place of origin – the Chongming Island, and could be traced back to the reign of Emperor Kangxi. At that time, the Northern school was just introduced to the nearby area of Chongming Island by persons like Bai Zaime / 白在溅, Fan Shaoyun / 樊花坡 and Yang Tingguo / 楊廷果. Their performance style slowly merged with the indigenous customs and practices, setting the prototype of the Chongming school. Since then, it has been passed on by Jiang Tai / 蔣泰, Huang Xiuting / 黃秀亭, Shen Zhaozhou / 沈肇州, Fan Ziyu / 樊紫雲 and Fan Shaoyun / 樊少雲, and its civil songs are renowned for their meaningful and beautiful style.

The publication of Old Melodies of Yingzhou / 瀞洲古調, edited by Shen Zhaozhou in 1916, has further promulgated the Chongming school. Moreover, Liu Tianhua / 劉天華, the father of modern Chinese music, learned the pipa songs in Old Melodies of Yingzhou from Shen and gave performances in various places, as well as recorded the masterpiece Falling Flowers Coloring the Green / 飛花點翠 in 1928. These also helped to promote the Chongming school to a further extent.

As for the fingering techniques, the Chongming school requires to “apply forceful vibrato sporadically, and pellucid tremolo intensively”, as well as advocates that “standard music should be slow but continuous, fast but not chaotic, not too high in pitch, nor too fast in sentences”. They are specialized in applying tremolo in the “lower order”, so that the sound is soft and delicate, good at expressing leisure and elegant emotions. Meanwhile, they prefer twisting the strings to applying vibrato, because too much vibrato is deemed “inelegant” in their eye, though appealing to the audience’s ear. Therefore, most songs in their collection are civil ditties, among which Falling Flowers Coloring the Green, Chao-Chun’s Bitterness / 昭君怨 and Fishes Playing in the Water / 魚兒戲水 are notable examples.

 

5.  Wang school / 汪派

The Wang school (also known as the Shanghai school) is the sole school named after an individual. It has become an important school of the pipa since the 20th century, and set off the third climax in the history of pipa development.

Wang Yuting / 汪昂庭 (shown in the picture below), founder of the Wang school, first learned the pipa from Wang Huisheng / 王惠生, who also imparted the Chen Zijing’s Pipa Score to him. Later, Wang was tutored by Ni Qingquan / 倬青泉 and Cao Jinglou / 曹靜樓 of the Pudong school, as well as Yin Jiping / 殷紀平 of the Pinghu School, from whom he integrated the strengths of different schools. He revised a lot of ancient pipa scores to cope with actual performance needs, and distributed his manuscripts in Gongche notation to his students. Since then, those who play pipa songs with respect to these manuscripts have been grouped under the Wang school by later generations; and in 1959, Lin Shicheng / 林石城 addressed the Wang school as one of the major pipa schools in his book Pipa Playing Method / 琵琶演奏法 by the first time.

The Wang school is distinct from other Southern schools that they pluck the string in the “upper order” when applying vibrato; secondly, Wang did not stick to traditional playing methods, carefully revised ancient scores to refine them and achieve better results. Hence, their performances are vigorous and touching. Wang has cultivated a large number of outstanding pipa players in the modern and contemporary times, such as Wei Zhongle / 衛仲樂, Sun Yude / 孫裕德, Li Tingsong / 李廷松, Cheng Wujia / 程午加 and Jiang Fengzhi / 蔣風之.

After knowing the different schools of the pipa, it is now time to delve into our main theme – the variety of pipa techniques that we employ with both hands.

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Excerpt from "How to Play the Pipa, The Chinese Lute"- H.H. Lee