TIBETAN CULTURE
The Tibetans are a very simple folk, though not without a very definite
civilisation of their own. Art and music exist in all nations, if the
art be merely the fashioning of utensils, and the music be the crudest
of rhythms played on a tom-tom. Yet in Tibet the rudimentary music and
art associated with so many Eastern races is carried a stage farther,
and what is in wilder people merely natural instinct has become in Tibet
a definite culture. For I presume that culture is merely organised art,
and certainly on that criterion the Tibetan is to some extent cultured.
He is a fine architect, and many of his houses have a simple stateliness
which raises them in artistic value high above the average
dwelling-house of most other Oriental countries, to say nothing of our
own garden suburbs. The Monasteries of Tibet are still more imposing,
and some of them are real objects of beauty, for the dignified
simplicity of the buildings themselves is combined with an elaborate and
often beautiful decoration of windows and cornices. The Tibetans have
learned the true principles of decoration—they do not cover the surfaces
of their buildings with unnecessary ornament, but reserve the wooden
parts alone for elaboration. The cornices are often intricate in
workmanship, but throughout the great principle of design is carried to
perfection—the principle that all ornament should be founded on utility.
Thus economy in the use of scrolls is combined with the multiplication
of brackets, supports, and rafter-ends, so that the whole is satisfying
to the eye as being beautiful, rather than useless. Considerable Chinese
influence is shown in their decorative art, but the Tibetans have a
personal, or rather national, touch which distinguishes their work in
all branches of art from the Chinese. In painting, too, the influence of
China, and very occasionally of India, is felt: though through it all
the refined austerity of the better-class Tibetan shines unmistakably.
The older pictures, nearly always of sacred subjects, are drawn with
consummate skill, coloured with great taste, and in the matter of design
rank much higher than the contemporary art of India. But, alas! the
story of painting in Tibet is the same as it is everywhere in this
commercial world of ours; the modern Tibetan picture is worthless,
careless and meretricious. No doubt the demand for “native art” at the
bazaars of Darjeeling and other places around has caused this
deterioration of what was once a fine and noble art; pictures which used
to be the life-work of devoted lamas and conscientious hermits are now
“dashed off” to satisfy the capacious maw of the tasteless traveller.
Though Tibet is still in measure “The Forbidden Land,” yet the tentacles
of commercialism cannot but penetrate between its bars, and the same
thing is now happening to Tibet as happened to Europe last century and
produced oleographs and official artists. It seems almost as if man by
nature does bad work only when he is working for reward.
[Illustration:
RELIGIOUS BANNERS IN SHEKAR MONASTERY.
]
This is a mere flashlight sketch of the art of Tibet, for details of
which other books must be consulted; but the music of Tibet will be
described more fully, for two reasons—first, that no accurate record of
it has to my knowledge been obtained until now, and second, that the
writer is himself particularly fond of music, which he believes to be
the highest of the arts.
Just as in Europe to-day we have both the traditional folk-song and the
highly organised orchestral music, so in Tibet both these forms of the
art exist. The two are also more or less interdependent in Tibet, while
in Western nations each often goes its own way without the other.
The airs sung by the Tibetan people are usually simple, short, and
oft-repeated. They are nearly always in the pentatonic scale,
represented best to the general reader by the black notes of the piano.
Most isolated races evolve this scale at some time during their history,
and the tunes of the Highlands of Scotland, the Forests of Central
Africa, the Appalachians of America, and the Tibetans are all in this
scale.[8]
Footnote 8:
Sir Walford Davies has pointed out that, starting (on the black notes)
from A flat, and using only the perfect fifth, this scale is very soon
developed. From A flat one gets E flat and D flat, each a fifth away;
from D flat one obtains G flat, a fifth down, and from E flat a fifth
upwards gives us B flat. Thus we get the five notes of the scale by a
simple series of fifths, the fifth being the most perfect interval in
music, and the one which will appeal most readily to a primitive
people.
A typical well-known pentatonic tune is “Over the Sea to Skye.” Those
who know, for instance, the songs of the Western Highlands, will be able
to appreciate the cheerful and non-Oriental character of the tunes of
Tibet, which are more akin to those of Russia and Eastern Europe than to
the music of China or India. This general spirit of the music which the
Tibetans play or sing points to a common origin of the folk-tunes of
Tibet and Russia. It seems probable that in Turkestan was the real
origin of this music, which very likely spread eastwards into Tibet and
westwards into Russia; or if Turkestan is not the country of origin of
the music, it may be the musical link between Russia and Tibet. The
tunes of Nepal, as sung by our coolies, are many of them of a similar
nature to those of Tibet, though more often the whole major or minor
scale is used, giving them often a strangely European sound; some of the
Nepalese airs have a jolly lilt and swing; others in the minor key have
quite a haunting beauty; and they too are quite unlike the music of the
plains of India with its rather pointless wailing characteristics.[9]
Footnote 9:
A more technical article on the subject of Tibetan Music, with musical
quotations, will be found in the _Musical Times_ for February 1, 1923.
In Tibet, then, the folk-tunes are simple, short, and emphatically not
such “good tunes” as the airs of Nepal. But, in addition to the songs of
the peasants and beggars, there is the more highly-organised and
orchestrated music of the monasteries. This is usually played with three
groups of instruments—first and foremost the percussion; drums of all
sizes from those made of a human skull to others 3 and 4 feet in
diameter, and cymbals of great resonance and good tone, coming often
from China. The cymbals are taken very seriously, and each different way
of clashing them has a special name and a special religious
significance. The hard-worked percussion department keeps up a
continuous rhythm throughout the performance of a devil-dance or other
musical festival; and to its strenuous and often sinister efforts are
added from time to time the sounds of the two groups of wind
instruments. The first of these, playing airs which often possess great
charm, are the double-reed oboes, about twice as long as our European
oboe, and very often provided with equidistant holes, rendering them
incapable of playing save in the scale of whole tones (or a close
approximation to it). The second and larger wind instrument is the long
straight trumpet, 8 to 12 feet long, of which the fundamental note is
almost continuously blown. Most monasteries have two of these, about one
tone apart in pitch; but as the longer of the two is blown so as to play
its first overtone, while the fundamental note is played on the other, a
drone bass of a minor seventh is the resulting sound. This adds to the
sinister impressiveness of the music, and provides an effective
accompaniment to the quaint tunes of the oboe-like instruments. At a
devil-dance performance, the orchestra plays for a whole day, or perhaps
two, almost without rest either for itself or for its listeners.
In addition to these instruments, a fairly civilised violin is used in
Tibet, especially by wandering beggar minstrels. This is about
two-thirds as long as our violin, and has four strings, tuned A,D,A,D,
in that order. The bow has two hanks of hair, one of which passes
between the first and second strings, while the other goes between the
third and fourth. Thus, by pressing the bow in one direction the two A
strings are sounded, producing a reinforced note (i.e. two notes in
unison); by pressing the bow in the other direction the sound of the D
strings is obtained. The strings converge towards the top of the
instrument, so that they can all be fingered at once. The Tibetans
become very agile with their fingers, and I have heard very skilful
performances of rapid, jolly dance-tunes by wandering minstrels; these
tunes, like the songs of the peasants, are usually in the pentatonic
scale.
One more instrument must be mentioned—the trumpet made from a human
thigh-bone. This is not very commonly used in the larger monasteries,
but occasionally sounds a note in the ritual of the worship of smaller
villages.
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NATURAL HISTORY
By
T. G. LONGSTAFF, M.D.
------------------------------------------------------------------------