陽關一疊

Painting of Ma Yuan (1160 k-1225), detail

A week ago we uploaded here as a musical accompaniment to our report on the exhibition of Aurel Stein’s archive Silk Road photos in Hong Kong, the Classical Chinese music “Three variations on the Yang Pass” performed by Wu Wenguang on guqin, that deep-voiced Chinese zither which also features in the masterful propaganda film of Zhang Yimou The Hero, with the blind musician playing on it during the first clash in the tea house. As this song was written by Wang Wei (699-761), whose beautiful book of poems gave name to our blog exactly a year ago, therefore we have decided to write in his honor some words on this poem before it would submerge among the other knots measuring the speed of the Wang River.


Wang Wei: 陽關三疊 – Three variations on the Yang Pass – Wu Wenguang, guqin solo

We translate this poem according to the method elaborated by us in the “Casa de la Poesía China”. The original text in traditional Chinese characters is followed by a transcription so that it would let you feel to some extent the music of the original poem. Right now it is not so important, as we have also included the poem as an audio file, but we are not always so lucky to find one. The English equivalents of the single words of the poem are displayed in floating windows to let you perceive the original structures of meaning. And finally we publish a translation as literal as we can. Indeed, the power of Classical Chinese poems is given by the fact that they, with very simple words and images, shape a wide space of associations, just like Classical Chinese paintings that use emptiness as a basic mean for their composition. The rest is entrusted to the reader.

渭城朝雨浥輕塵 客舍青青柳色新 勸君更盡一杯酒 西出陽關無故人。 wèichéng zhāo yŭ yì qīng chén kèshè qīng qīng liŭ sè xīn quàn jūn gèng jìn yī bēi jiŭ xī chū yángguān wú gù rén Wang Wei: 陽關三疊 – Three variations on the Yang Pass En Wei la lluvia de la mañana lava el tenue polvo el verde renueva los sauces de la posada te lo pido, amigo, toma otra copa de vino pasando al oeste de Yang no quedan amistades In Wei the morning rain washes off the light dust green, newly green are the willows at the inn I urge you, my friend, to take another cup of wine to the west of Yang Pass there are no old friends

The Yangguan (“Southern Pass”, as it stood to the south-west of the famous Yumen Pass), built by Emperor Wu (156-87 BC) was the westernmost border pass of the Empire, only seventy kilometers from the caves of Dunhuang at the edge of Taklamakan Desert along the Silk Road where Aurel Stein made his discovery, a thousand and five hundred years after Wang Wei, of several thousands of manuscripts hidden from the nomads in a cave library. From here on the rule of the barbarians began. The expression 西出陽關 xī chū yángguān in the third verse literally means “leaving the Yang Pass for the West”, leaving civilization and everything familiar and entering into the threatening Unknown.

Qin Dahu (1938), a painter of the “patriotic realism” in vogue since early 90’s:
西出陽關 – Leaving the Yang Pass for the West

Another traditional title for this poem is “Farewell to Yuan Er on his Mission to Anxi”. The friend of Wang Wei set off to the barbarian kingdom of Anxi to offer them the alliance of the Chinese against the Huns. This makes meaningful the name of Wei in the poem. The town stood on the bank of the Wei river, at the northernmost point of the central territory under firm control of the Chinese army, some thousand kilometers before the Yang Pass. The territories laying to the north of the river were threatened by the attacks of the barbarians, so the envoys leaving for the west were seen off by their friends only to this point. The Annals of the Han Dynasty for example write this on the legendary campaign of Li Guangli in the time of Wu:

General Li Guangli was going to lead the army to attack the Huns. The Prime Minister saw him off all the way to the Wei Bridge.

This tune has been worked up several times since Wang Wei, and it became a distinguished piece in the repertoire of guqin. It is called “Three variations” because traditionally it is played three times in three different variations. It is also often used today as a farewell song. I, for example, heard it at the airport of Shenzhen as the signal of the loudspeaker when I left for the west, to the Pearl River.


Wang Wei: 陽關三疊 – Three variations on the Yang Pass – Liu Weishan (guzheng), Chen Jiebing (erhu), Zhao Yangqin (yangqin), Min Xiaofen (pipa) (5'28")


Wang Wei: 陽關三疊 – Three variations on the Yang Pass – Yu Hongmei, erhu (accompanied on guqin) (5'04")


Wang Wei: 陽關三疊 – Three variations on the Yang Pass – Dai Xiaolian, guqin solo (4'49")


Wang Wei: 陽關三疊 – Three variations on the Yang Pass – Anonymous modern performance from the CD “Gu Yue Xin Yun” (Old Music, New Sound) (7'08")

The Yang Pass today