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Chau Van Singing - Hát Chầu VănHát Chầu Văn in North Vietnam The Vietnamese are very religious but not fanatical. Compared to other categories, cult music was not widely developed. The most significant cult song type is Hát Chầu Văn. This is a kind of incantation music (although it was classified as ritual music), but its purpose was to hypnotize the person who was estranged from the spirits through musical airs, rythms and lyrics.
It is in essence a cantillation where the tunes and rhythm depend on the contents of the sung text and may be linked together into a suite, used in relation to a mythical happening, with hints at some features of modern life. The art of Hát Chầu Văn originated in the Red River delta
and dates back to the 16th century, spreading later to the whole
of the country. During its development course, Hát Chầu Văn
has taken in the essential beauty of folk songs from regions in
the north, the centre and the south. In North and Central Vietnam
it was called Hát Chầu Văn, whereas in the South it was also called
Rỗi Bóng. Hát Chầu Văn in North Vietnam
Hát Chầu Văn in Central Vietnam
Hát Chầu Văn in South VietnamHát Chầu Văn, also called Hát Bóng, in the South follows the same pattern of Hát Chầu Văn in the North and Center. Some of the tunes are influenced by the classical music of the South. Two kinds of Hát Chầu Văn: Hát thờ and Hát Lên ÐồngHát thờ (worship singing) is the chanting accompanying an act of worship. Hát thờ is slow, grave, and dignified. Variations in the music are few and contain little contrasting pitch and stress. Hát Lên Ðồng is the cantillation accompanying psychic
dancing claiming to respond to occult powers and expressing the
will and orders of some super-natural being. It may contain many
variations depending on the number of verses sung, often coming
to a climax or slowing down to the tempo of a meditation. Musical accompaniment in Hát Chầu Văn
The main instrument used in hat van performance is the dan nguyet or moon-shaped lute, accompanied by the striking of the phách (a piece of wood or bamboo) marking the rhythm, xeng (clappers), trong chau (drum) and chieng (gong). The 16-stringed zither (dan tranh) and flute (sao) are also used in the recitation of certain poetry and sometimes the eight-sound band (dan bat am) is also used in certain ceremonies. Hát Chầu Văn has acquired over centuries both learned and folksy characteristics and has proven to be a strong attraction to musicologists at home and abroad. |
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Hát
Chầu Văn combines trance singing and dancing, a religious form
of art used for extolling the merits of beneficent deities or deified
national heroes. Its music and poetry are mingled with a variety
of rhythms, pauses, tempos, stresses and pitches.
In
the North, a ceremony always began with a mass to invite deities
to come. The master of the ceremony (cung văn) read a petition
and said some incantations to the underworld. After the invitation
to the spirits, the person, frequently a woman, who was going to
be become the speaker for the spirits sat on a mat in front of the
altar. When the spirit had not yet seized the person, the cung
văn and the orchestra played together to encourage the spirit
to distrain the person.
One
significant aspect of Hát Chầu Văn in Central Vietnam is
that people serve as distrained persons en masse, sometimes five
persons participated in the same ceremony.
The
instrumental music accompanying hat van plays a very important role,
either in emphasizing important passages or creating contrasting
effects, in any event enriching the content of the chant.