The most popular ancient style songs on Douyin include: “Red Zhaoyuan”, “Kite Mistake”, “Pipa Xing”, “Qingming Shanghe Tu”, “Qu Xiangsi”, “Out of the Mountains”, “Jinli Chao”, “Red Zhaoyuan”. This song is performed by Yinqueshiting. Yinqueshiting has long been well-known in the ancient style music scene. This “Red Zhaoyuan” is very similar to their previous styles. The song's rhythm is cheerful, mixed with different musical elements, blending together to create this pleasant song. “Kite Mistake” is Liu Keyi's “Kite Mistake”. The style of this song is slightly melancholy, yet its melody is melodious, full of the charm of ancient style. Every time I hear this song, the image that comes to mind is a graceful woman feeling sorrowful by the window. Sogou Wenwen's “Pipa Xing” is performed by Qiran and Shen Miren, called “Pipa Xing”. The lyrics of this song directly borrow from the ancient poet Bai Juyi's “Pipa Xing”. This poem was once a nightmare for many students' Chinese classes, but now it sounds particularly pleasant as a melody. Sogou Wenwen's “Qingming Shanghe Tu” is also a promotion of Chinese culture, coming from Li Yugang's “Qingming Shanghe Tu”. Everyone understands Li Yugang's characteristics, switching between male and female voices at will, and he also uses this singing technique in this song. “Qu Xiangsi” is performed by Banyang. This song naturally carries a touch of freedom and heroism. Although it is a song expressing longing, there is no trace of affectation, making it pleasant to listen to. “Out of the Mountains” is produced by Huazhou. There is a section of opera-style singing in this song, which is considered the highlight of the song by everyone. Huazhou's latest single “Return to Where You Belong” is also worth everyone's careful appreciation. This song tells a touching story through its melody and beautiful lyrics, adding much color to the song. “Jinli Chao” is also a song that many friends like. It was popular on Douyin for some time. Originally sung by Yin Lin, later Goddess Shuangsheng's cover version also became extremely popular. I wonder who you prefer more? In addition, many masters of ancient style music have also covered it one after another, proving that it is indeed a good song.
“Encounter with Fireflies” is the theme song of the drama-in-drama “Encounter with the Dragon” in the text game “Reversal Star Path Glory” created by YT Jun. “Encounter with Fireflies” is a song performed by CRITTY, composed by Zhixuxi, and written by Guling Luo. The first performance version was sung by Only Shadow, while the male version was sung by Zong Shunkang. CRITTY is a well-known ancient style singer, a recommended singer on YYFC cover website, a musician on the 5sing original music base, and a certified internet singer on Sina Weibo. She entered the ancient style circle in 2000.
In addition to early game music, Japanese songs are also one of the sources of melodies that some ancient style musicians are currently keen on adapting and covering. Because Chinese and Japanese cultures are close, reflected in music, many Japanese folk music styles are also connected with Chinese folk music. Added to this, the melodies of the former are special, with many having a kind of sad sentiment, which fits well with the pursuit of melancholic beauty in the ancient style circle. Therefore, a large number of ancient style music are happy to borrow the melodies of Japanese songs.
Speaking of opera-style singing, this is the core of Chinese opera, a treasure of Chinese civilization. Observing carefully, one would find that most Chinese pop songs add an opera-style part or use guitar to sing out the feeling of opera style (of course, fast music also exists; personally, I like rock songs and do not reject soft tunes, but excessive such covers would make me feel repelled, purely personal experience). This situation can be seen everywhere. Some songs directly use famous poems as lyrics, which is indeed quite good. Some cover artists only cover the more famous opera-style parts of a certain song.
Ancient style songs cannot be said to have emerged out of nowhere, they are traceable and have a source. With thousands of years of cultural influence from ancient poetry and songs, and decades of inspiration from classic gold songs, the real rise of the ancient style circle still started from Fenbei Network, from various game songs, Pili songs, lyric rewriting, and covers, gradually forming a specific ancient style circle. Subsequently, it has had extensive interaction with circles such as Xianjian, Pili, anime, single-player games, online games, hanfu, Jianwang, Gu Jian, Jinjiang, and even COS. Based on these extensive materials, the ancient style circle has been able to further develop. It is not an exaggeration to say that the ancient style circle grew up eating food from all sides.
For example, the single “Windmill” (かざぐるま) published in 2005 by Japanese female pop music artist Hitotoyou (ひととよう), composed by Takebe Satoshi (たけべさとし). Currently, this song has been covered in at least four versions domestically, including Dong Zhen's “Green Robe Hidden”, He Tu's “Cold Clothes Tune”, and Audio Monster's “Chang'an Memory” within the ancient style circle. Of course, the cover version of Cai Chunjia's “Waiting for a Sunny Day” is also one of them. The theme song “Time Boils Rain” of “Tiny Times” is also considered an adaptation of this song.
[“00s Girls from Shanghai Theatre Academy Sing Ancient Style Songs with Peking Opera Style and Become Famous”] Recently, five 00s girls from the Peking Opera Performance Department of the Shanghai Theatre Academy have become famous with short videos of Peking opera style covers of ancient style songs. Not only did they receive over 20 million likes, but they also continuously topped the hot lists on Douyin and Weibo. On February 23rd, they even ranked first on Douyin's hot list. As most of the girls live in “Room 406”, they were called “Shanghai Theatre 406 Girls Group” by netizens. Using self-media platforms such as Douyin and Bilibili to release cover works, these young girls tried to bring traditional culture “out of the circle” in their unique way, allowing more people to rediscover Peking Opera.
Originating from Gouge's love for ancient style music, the first ancient style song she heard was He Tu's “Devoting Everything to the World”. Until 2016, she officially entered the circle to cover songs, successively covering “The Lute Player”, “Memory of Chang'an”, “Song of Eternal Regret”, “Tides”, and other songs, all of which received considerable attention! During her school days, she participated in many singing competitions in society to better pursue her dreams and achieved remarkable results! “Her voice is like a cup of tea, grand and mellow, with a youthful sense, very ancient and pure,” netizens commented on her!
“Probably 0 years ago, because of a certain online game, plus some interest in singing, I started covering game songs myself.” The network musician “Chenyan”, who has been out of the circle for many years, told reporters that ancient style covers were particularly popular back then. Some voice or music platforms provided soil for covers. People who liked ancient style and loved singing would gather together to form clubs, promoting “masters”, “such as HITA, who is now very famous in the circle, was already a big shot in the cover circle back then.”
Innovations based on the content of traditional culture. Ancient style music still has a long way to go to truly promote traditional culture, and the key element is innovation. From the perspective of melody, covering and lyric rewriting songs not only involve serious legal issues of copyright infringement but also using a large amount of Japanese music and anime accompaniment would make the songs lack original appeal; from the perspective of lyrics, a large number of using collaged classical poetic phrases and idioms result in repetitive, incomprehensible, and insincere lyrics. Therefore, how to truly create ancient style music that adapts to modern society and can dig into the core elements of traditional music tests the creative level and ability of ancient style music teams.