Before movies had voices, they had music. From silent films to today’s computer-generated ones, film composers use the score to help tell the story.

Music Manipulates (影响) Emotions

The most obvious role music plays in movies is in manipulating the audience’s emotions and bringing them the desired feelings. 【小题1】 Philip Ball, author of The Music Instinct, says our brain is born to respond in emotional ways. He says, “Our response to certain kinds of noise is something so strong in us that we can’t switch it off. Film composers know that and use it to shortcut the logical part of our brain and get straight to the emotional centers.”

Music Gets Us in the Mood

The first bars of music in a movie usually establish its style. The low sound of an organ communicates a different atmosphere than light electronica playing a quick tune. 【小题2】 The music telegraphs whether something is serious, adventurous, joyful or amusing.

Music Introduces People, Places and Things

Music helps viewers understand the story, a trick filmmakers picked up from operas, etc. 【小题3】 A recent example of this can be found in The Lord of the Rings trilogy, in which, quick music is played for the Hobbits, while the fellowship gets romantically heroic music.

【小题4】

Movies rely on music to help establish time period, location, cultural heritage or social standing. Using Baroque-style music sets a scene in the 18th century. Back to the Future used Huey Lewis’ The Power of Love for its “present day” scenes and such songs as Earth Angel and Johnny B. Goode for its scenes in the past. 【小题5】 For example, music that audience thinks to be Russian can set something in Moscow even if the music is actually American in origin.

A

Country music is one of the most popular music in the United States today because it is about simple but strong human feelings and events — love, sadness, good times and bad times. It tells real­ life stories and sounds the way people really talk. As life becomes more complicated (复杂), it is good to hear music about ordinary people.

Country music, sometimes called country­ western, comes from two kinds of music. One is the traditional music of the people in the Appalachian Mountains in the Eastern United States. The other is traditional cowboy music from the West. The singers usually play guitars, and in the 1920s they started using electric guitars. At first city people said country music was low class. It was popular mostly in the South. But during World War II, thousands of Southerners went to the Northeast and Mid­west to work in the factories. They took their music with them. Soldiers from the rest of the country went to army camps (军营) in the South. They learned country music. Slowly it became popular all over the country.

Today country music is also popular everywhere in the United States and Canada — in small towns and in New York City, among black and white, and among educated and uneducated people. About 1,200 radio stations broadcast country music twenty­ four hours a day. English stars sing it in British­ English, and people in other countries sing it in their own languages. The music that started with cowboys and poor southerners is now popular all over the world.

Chinese dance drama, Poetic Dance: The Journey of a Legendary Landscape Painting《只此青绿》, will stage 120 shows in 2023, according to the dance drama’s production company, China Oriental Performing Arts Group.

On March 15, the Beijing-based company announced its performing arts season in 2023, which includes dance dramas, musicals and concerts.

“Since its first performance in 2021, Poetic Dance: The Journey of a Legendary Landscape Painting has become one of the most popular dance dramas of the country and has been performed nationwide about 240 times,” says Jing Xiaoyong, head of China Oriental Performing Arts Group.

The dance drama, designed by Han Zhen and Zhou Liya, was inspired by A Panorama of Rivers and Mountains, a classic artwork exhibited at the Palace Museum in Beijing, which was created by artist Wang Ximeng during the Song Dynasty (960-1279) when the artist was 18 years old. It is widely acknowledged to be one of the most important works in the history of Chinese fine art. The 11-meter-long scroll painting is a record of people’s lives and the natural scenery of that time, mixing realism with creative imagination. There are mountains, rivers, villages, ports, temples and pavilions. The painting is housed at the museum.

One of the most recognized movements in the dance piece is the graceful but demanding backbend pose by the female dancers who symbolize the impressive scenery of the country’s mountains depicted (描绘) in the painting.

“There are many young audience members traveling along with us during the tour and they not only enjoy the dance drama but also are in love with traditional Chinese culture,” says dancer Meng Qingyang, who plays the leading role in the dance drama and receives applause from the audience with her solid techniques onstage.