The Making Craftsmanship of Yuping Xiaodi Musical Instrument in Yuping County, Guizhou Province, China

Abstract

This article title the making craftsmanship of the national intangible cultural heritage Yuping Xiaodi musical instrument located in Yuping County, Guizhou Province, China. The study employed the qualitative research methodology of ethnomusicology. The research objectives were to study the process of making musical instrument of Yuping Xiaodi in Yuping county, Guizhou province, China. The data were mainly collected with observation, interview, audio and video recording from fieldwork with the key informants and presented in the descriptive analysis format. The results were as follows: The making craftsmanship of Yuping Xiaodi has a long history of more than 400 years and is a typical representative of traditional manual Xiaodi musical instrument production. The making craftsmanship of Yuping Xiaodi is based on a special kind of water bamboo and purple bamboo grown in Yuping County as the main raw material. It has undergone four processes: 1) Select material, 2) Model making, 3) Carving, 4) Finished product. There are many small processes in the four processes. The making processes are complex and are all used handmade. there are about 26 steps for making Yuping Xiaodi. From the above information, the researcher is therefore interested in studying the making process in order to conserve musical instruments and provides insights for those interested in furthering their studies in this musical instruments.