Works involving Chinese Instruments

Works involving Electronics

2022.10
Commissioned by Huikuan Lin and Taipei C-Camerata
Composer: Chen-Hui Jen
Pipa: Huikuan Lin
Violin: Chia-Lun Chang
Recording: Chia-Lung Huang
Mastering: Jacob David Sudol

Still mountains, still... (2022)for pipa and violin

2023.11.08 Performed by the Little Giant Chinese Chamber Orchestra
National Recital Hall, Taipei, Taiwan
Photo taken and the manuscript written at the Copland House

Program Notes

“Only a short distance have I gone astray, and I know today I am right, if yesterday was a complete mistake…” 
(Quoted from “Homeward Bound” by Tao, Yuanming, translated by Lin, Yutang)

In recent years, I have repeatedly meditated on the relationship between humans and time: What will my role and my perspective be after everything changed in time?  How do I perceive the time that has changed everything?  Following this, a number of my recent project focus on a meditation on humans and nature as well on humans’ impact on the environment with interpretations and re-interpretations of the symbols of rising water and receding nature.

towards drifting pines extends the poetic ideas of pines that I use in multiple of my previous works and re-interprets and re-orchestrates them into a new musical texture.  The title directly responds to my 2008 work, Under the Pines, reflecting a meditation in nature when time slowly passes.   Differing from the calmness and peacefulness when I composed Under the Pines, towards drifting pines reflects my resonance with Tao’s poem and conveys a spiritual state of endless drifting and internal isolation.

樂曲解說

「實迷途其未遠，覺今是而昨非……」

這幾年我常在思考人與時間的關連：在一切變遷之後，自身所處的當下是怎樣的視野與角色、在時間裡的感知又是怎樣的狀態。近來數首已完成與手上正在著筆的作品，也都陸續環繞著類似的課題，關於人與自然，以及人類對於環境的影響。因此我以「湧上的水」與「消逝的自然」，兩個與自身情感與生活經驗最位密切關連的題材，透過不同的視角來為關於時間的沉思著墨。
此曲延續多首前作關於「松樹」之樂念加以配器、整合為嶄新的音樂織體與面貌。標題《無歸之松》與自身2008年之另首絲竹樂作品《松下》相呼應，同樣在彷彿時間靜止的大自然間沉思，但今已非昔。比起當年寫作《松下》時秋意微涼、海風吹拂的愜意，《無歸之松》借用【歸去來辭】中詩人感嘆迷途之意象，以反映足跡與記憶皆漸行漸遠、飄泊無可依歸的心境。

towards drifting pines (2023) for di, sheng, pipa, daruan, zheng, erhu, and electronics

Commissioned by Li-Teng Huang and PIPAEnsemble
Pipa: Li-Teng Huang
Cello: Joe Wan

2025.05.03 Zhongshan Auditorium, Taipei City, Taiwan

群峰層浪 (Layering waves across the mountain peaks)，給琵琶、大提琴與電子音樂
(2025)

此作品受黃立騰與琵琶雅集委託，以台北的相關地景與記憶為發想創作，於二零二五年春季完稿。

在《群峰層浪》中，我所聚焦的是環山縱走，當風吹越山嶺、層疊的群草化成一片浪濤的景象。──在我的記憶中，在山嵐與磺氣氤氳間，春夏時是滿山綠草如茵，入秋之後則披上雲霧與芒草交織成的蒼茫。在除了風聲之外只剩下寂靜的峰頂，偶爾可以望見遠方的海，一片無盡湛藍、亦是一海未知的深遂。自從十多年前搬至沼澤地帶旅居之後，山逐漸於我賦予了特殊的意義：它象徵遺世獨立的境地，象徵不斷流逝的時間與無盡憧憬，也見證了天地萬物的恆常與多變。關於山嶺群峰的記憶是美麗、感慨、深刻、並且疼痛的。我在樂曲中探索琵琶、大提琴、以及電子音樂之間的，跨越時空與文化的對話，以共構一個有機的聲景空間：如同人生的波瀾，層層疊疊推向孤寂的峰頂，推向永無止盡的未來。

Layering waves across the mountain peaks (2025) for pipa, cello, and live electronics

Dream Gloaming (2025) for fixed media
*Originally for 4 channels, here is the stereo remixed version.

Music Composition: Chen-Hui Jen

Poem in Chinese is AI-generated by Chen-Hui Jen's language model. 
English Translation / Editor: Chen-Hui Jen

《暮之沉降》

在未醒與未眠之間
聲音尚未找到名字
只是一縷呼吸
隨暮色，散落為霧

有光未至
卻在眼皮下漾動
像河的暗潮
將一切牽向無岸

Dream Gloaming

In the liminal space between waking and sleeping,
A sound yet unnamed
But a breath
fades into haze with the twilight.

Light hasn’t arrived,
yet it flickers beneath the eyelids—
like a hidden river current,
drawing everything toward a shoreless drift.

Dream Gloaming (2025) for fixed media - Stereo Remix

2018.05.12 First Performance by the Little Giant Chinese Chamber Orchestra

From Fading Mountains (2017-18) for Erhu, Pipa, Zheng, and Electronics

Returning Pinewards (2018) for zheng solo

Piano/Electronics: Chen-Hui Jen

	Still in the days of my aging, I shall do so for you –
	play the piano, see you to the ship bound for
		Byzantium
	with music close to fading. Silence
	here is beyond all summits
-	Yang Mu "Propositions of Temporality"
English translation by Wen-chi Li and Colin Bramwell

The piece's title evokes Yang Mu's poem "Propositions of Temporality."  After I wrote into silence, and keep falling four years ago, this composition is another work where I seek a state of silence.  Specifically, I drew a particular interest and made an intimate connection to the concept of "silence" in the poem – the ultimate moment after all the waves of a lifetime.  I have been repeatedly thinking about this idea in the last few years to make up a specific part of myself from the past – to awaken and hear those inner voices.  To realize this goal, I created a musical texture full of many symbols such as ocean waves, distant bells, and fading traces on the water, to aurally send myself to both an initial and the final state of silence.

老去的日子裡我還為你寧馨
彈琴，送你航向拜占庭
在將盡未盡的地方中斷，靜
這裡是一切的峰頂
			─ 楊牧《時光命題》


此曲標題取自楊牧《時光命題》一詩，亦為我在繼四年前寫作的《恆墜之寂》後、另一首探討「寂靜」的作品。我特別喜愛詩中終極的「靜」的意象，在經歷人生風浪之後、凝結的那一瞬間。對我而言，這些年我總在思索，跟過去的、內在的某部分的自己和解，喚醒便聽見那些記憶深處的聲音。因此我在全曲音樂織體中大量使用如海浪、遠處的鐘、消逝的航線等象徵，企圖將自己在聽覺上送回那最初、也是最終的寂靜狀態。

Onto the Silent Peaks (2020) for piano and electronics

Chen-Hui Jen is a composer, poet, and pianist, whose music presents an imaginative, spiritual, and poetic space with subtlety and sophistication. She writes music works that reflect an angle of contemporary art music that integrates time, sound, color, and poetry.

From Fading Mountains (2017-18) for Erhu, Pipa, Zheng, and Electronics

Chen-Hui Jen, Composer