Introduction

This paper explicates why music is indispensable in Confucian moral education and illustrates a musical reconstruction project in Joseon Korea as a successful case of Confucian musical discourse. I will argue that Confucian musical ideal in early China was not adequately handed down to posterity even though state sacrificial music, allegedly Confucian product, has always been regarded as the most desirable music throughout the official histories of the different dynasties in China. Early Confucian musical discourse properly appreciated music as a significant human experience but inattentive reading and superficial reception of Confucian musical outlook in the later periods made it appear just as a conservative view of state-led musical rite which was far from musical reality. What Confucian musical discourse anticipated is not limited to adhering to state sacrificial musical form or ancient type of music but open to reflection on what music really is to us.

The reinterpretation and recomposition of Confucian ritual music in young Joseon Korea proves that Confucian value had finally crossed the cultural and political borders and could be rejuvenated as an interactive model with actual sound and music in different cultures. Being a marginalized culture by centralized East Asian world order, Joseon Korea could break through the long fossilized meaning of Confucian ritual music and propose a new framework of Confucian musical ideal. By doing so, Joseon Korea envisioned a moral society with a mature music culture which would allow the acknowledged style and the indigenous tune to be mutually prosperous and old and new music not to interfere with the development of each other by sharing their musical value.

Music in Confucian moral education

Stimulated by the advent of emerging music in pre-Qin period, wide and various debates resulted in exceptional emphasis on music, unparalleled in world history. As a matter of fact, musical discourse was not the monopoly of Confucian thinkers but rather a common concern of pre-Qin thinkers. Confucius, however, is justifiably regarded as the first thinker who extensively examined the retrospective and contemporary musical texts and promoted music as a fundamental subject of his education system. His students, Mencius, Xunzi, and the unknown authors of the Book of Music (Yueji, 樂記) Footnote 1 have developed Confucius’ suggestive ideas into more applicable claims. Although their opinions differed and sometimes came into conflict with each other, they all were inspired with music as a necessary means of moral education.

The role that music played in Confucian moral education can be divided into two directions: cultivating human nature and bringing up harmonious society. However, none of these roles count on a simplistic connection between musicality and morality. Confucian understanding of music is more comprehensive and complex than usually described. It is told that Confucius could sing all genres of poetry with string accompaniment Footnote 2 and that he devoted himself to the arrangement of Yǎ 雅 and Sòng 頌 in his last years when he returned to the homeland after a long exile. Footnote 3 The former explains that Confucius was not only familiar with a certain genre of poems and songs, and the latter explains that he endorsed Zhou 周 traditional music. His endorsement of Zhou ritual music, however, does not necessarily show his propensity to musical conservatism or his fondness to Zhou melody but rather his reasonable appreciation of the ritual character of music in Zhou culture. Just as he did recognize the need for reformation in some ritualized actions, Footnote 4 he would have been open to musical innovation if it could meet the spirit of the times. Indeed, the music that had impressed him most deeply was not wǔ 武 music which represented Zhou sacrificial music, but sháo 韶 music Footnote 5 which had been recomposed in various states such as Qi 齊 and Lu 魯. Footnote 6

Confucius was not an adherent of Zhou ritual itself but rather a believer in sustainable ritual into far distant future. He expanded the scope of ritual by retrospection of cultural tradition before the Zhou dynasty. Footnote 7 Ritual is not only the social norm and but also the window through which we view the world. Ritual as “mode of framing action” creates “subjunctive universe.” Footnote 8 In other words, ritualistic behaviors could be meaningful only when the participants maintain a shared community by performing those ritual behaviors and at the same time ritual shapes our behaviors and develops our characters. Ritual behaviors could never be fixed but only be maintained under the ever-changing process.

Confucius might have come to the idea of correlation between ritual and music from Zhou musical performance closely combined into sacrificial rites, although a compound term “ritual and music (liyue, 禮樂)” was most probably his own coinage. Footnote 9 Observing the dynamics of ritual and music which works on human behavior and emotion, Confucius never meant ritual and music as merely external practice and artifact. Footnote 10 To Confucius, music was not just musical score or musical structure but something involved in entire human experience. The separation of music from poetry was under way in Confucius’ time Footnote 11 and thus he divided a perhaps formerly integrated subject into poetry (shi, 詩) and music (yue, 樂) in his curriculum. Footnote 12 In such a situation, “music” requires a higher degree of discipline than “poetry,” which can be understood through the words, and “ritual,” which can be learned by behaviors. On the top of that, as mentioned earlier, through personal experience he learned how deeply music can move people. Therefore, he put music at the final stage of the continuous learning process. Footnote 13

When Mencius said “benevolent words do not have as profound an effect on the people as benevolent music,” Footnote 14 he precisely caught Confucius’s intention. To Mencius, music is joy of morality (rényì, 仁義) in nature. Once sparked by music, moral emotions cannot be stopped and so make “without realizing it one’s feet begin to step in time to them and one’s hands dance according to their rhythms.” Footnote 15 Music contributes to morality by enriching listener’s susceptibility, not by preaching on morality.

Although Confucian thinkers believed that music exerts a profound influence on our emotional experience, it does not necessarily mean that specific music arouses specific emotion or that the good kinds of emotions are fostered by limiting everyone’s musical experience to sage kings’ compositions. Firstly, although the author of “The Roots of Music” seemingly proposed a correspondence theory between musical sounds and emotions, Footnote 16 he merely made a fair statement that we express our different feelings in different sounds. A piece of music produced by a composer in a particular emotional state may allow a listener to sense the specific emotion but it does not follow that the listener should feel the same emotion. The reverse case can be true: Shallow people may not enjoy the music at all in which virtuous people find great delight, as Xunzi pointed out. Footnote 17 Secondly, it is also not plausible to say that Confucian thinkers tried to suppress negative emotions while promoting positive emotions by sage kings’ music. When Confucius summed up the collection of poetry to say “swerving not from the right path,” Footnote 18 he never excluded the folk songs which loaded with resentment, grief, despair and love from “the right path.” Songs are invaluable because they reflect the sentiments of the people as they are. It would be abnormal if only pleasant tunes are heard in an oppressive society.

Ritual music is a significant means for moral education since we live in ritual and learn to synchronize our emotions to others’ through music. Therefore, Confucian thinkers believed that we could get a proper channel of communication by establishing ritual and music in a proper way. In other words, if an appropriate ritual music is furnished in a newly established state, then all members of the state will be able to share its historical and cultural value. Xunzi pushed this point further to say that “when music is used to guide and regulate the desires, there is enjoyment but no disorder; when it is used for the desires with no thought of guidance, there is delusion but no enjoyment.” Footnote 19 Xunzi gave priority to music as social context over as personal indicator of morality and by doing so overburdened the leader of a community with a responsibility of guiding all entire people. Xunzian turn is to some extent inevitable in order to defend Confucian ritual and music theory against Mozi’s criticism, but brought about side effect to restrain ritual music of spontaneous expression of moral cultivation.

Pitfall of ritual music model

Looking back, ritual music in this light has been a symbol of continuity of Confucian political ideal in the dynasties of China and of other East Asian countries such as Korea, Japan, and Vietnam. While those state-led productions of music perhaps contributed to the solidarity of the communities, they often exposed discrepancies between musical theories and practices. In China, where numerous dynasties alternated between conquering and being conquered repeating division and integration, the literal meaning of ritual music was continually emphasized and eventually fortified, while in reality ritual music rarely played its anticipated role and different genres of music originated from foreign and indigenous sources were thriving outside the fortress. Footnote 20

Ironically, although Confucian ritual and music discourse was placed in a dominant position as state ideology in the early Han dynasty, it was gradually deprived of its vitality. Instead of liberal criticism, canonization of Confucian texts and careless juxtaposition of bipolar terminology were prevalent in Confucian academy. In early Confucian discourse, not all kinds of court music can be advisable; neither should all kinds of new music be rejected. However, conceptual confusion has often arisen in the later period between several pairs of opposites such as court (雅頌, yǎsòng) and folk music (風, fēng), old (古樂, gǔyuè) and new music (新樂, xīnyuè), sage kings’ (先王之樂, xiānwáng zhī yuè) and secular music (世俗之樂, shìsú zhī yuè), yǎyuè (雅樂, lit. elegant music) and zhèngshēng (鄭聲, lit. tunes of Zheng) and etc.

Dichotomy of old and new music is virtually unsustainable because what we now call old music was once new music, and today’s new music will soon be the old music. There cannot be a clear-cut boundary between old and new music. That is why Mencius said “whether it is the music of today or the music of antiquity makes no difference.” Footnote 21 Most commentators in the later Confucian camp, however, were embarrassed to interpret this passage because they firmly believed that Confucius had promoted sháo 韶 music and demoted zhèngshēng 鄭聲, and regarded sháo music as equivalent of old music or sage king’s music whereas zhèngshēng as new music or secular music. Consequently, they were quite at a loss, asking in return, “how can it be possible to say that the ancient music is the same as today’s music?” and concluded that Mencius was eager to persuade the King of Qi and stated this passage just as a temporary expedient. Footnote 22

A greater problem is that this interpretation was purely ideological on the basis of insubstantial parallels. Neither sháo nor zhèngshēng remained in any substantial form when the commentary was written. Zheng state was destroyed in 375 BCE and Shun 舜, known as the author of sháo music, was merely a prehistoric figure. Actual music which might possibly correspond to the name of sháo or zhèngshēng seemed to remain until the Qin dynasty (221–206 BCE) Footnote 23 but soon faded away. Since then, sháo and zhèngshēng have been no more than empty signs which lost their referents. Sháo was associated with the names of preferred music such as court, old, sage king’s, virtuous music, and yǎyuè, whereas zhèngshēng with harmful music such as folk, new, secular, licentious music and etc.

Then, what kind of music was zhèngshēng? Why has it become a synonym for all that bad music? Surely, Confucius said “zhèngshēng is licentious” (鄭聲淫, zhèngshēng yín) but this was mentioned just in regard to liturgical music of the state along with other state governing systems such as calendar and state vehicles, answering to Yanhui’s question: how to govern a country. Footnote 24 In the Analects, “zhèngshēng” appears three times in two places and Confucius only condemned “zhèngshēng” in relation to “yǎyuè.” Footnote 25 How do we explain this? One of reasonable accounts is that “zhèngshēng” is a kind of music which could be a threat to ritual music performed at court just as clever talkers (佞人, nìngrén or 利口, lìkǒu) were undermining both state and clan. Footnote 26 If a clever talker didn’t have any status at court, he could have no way of undermining the state. Likewise, if “zhèngshēng” were not performed at court but merely popular songs among the folks, it could have not threatened to court music. That is to say, Confucius was not rejecting all the tunes or words of Zheng music or all kinds of musical innovation but rather blaming “zhèngshēng” on disturbing the proper performance of ritual music. When one of his disciples, Zixia 子夏, attacked Zheng music, the target was nothing but court music being performed at the palace of Marquis Wen of Wei (魏文侯, r. 445–396 BCE). Footnote 27 Although Zixia turned down Zheng music on the ground of its deficiency of refinement and morality deserving to review, it was surely a form of court music which had an assortment of poetry, melody, and dance with instrumental accompaniment.

As we have seen it, zhèngshēng was at first used as a pronoun for innovative musical performance which prevailed in powerful states and so was a threat to authentic performance of ritual music at the times of Confucius. Later, it was overloaded with all sorts of decadent trend in music by being designated as a representative music contending with traditional music. Confucius was not opposed to all kinds of innovative music neither vernacular musical practice and yet he contemplated an enduring value from Zhou ritual music, not being swept away by the waves of new music. From one of major Confucian viewpoints such as Zixia’s, a new trend of music was not so much worthy as the ancient music, where one could get much more value than just entertainment if we appropriately tasted. Zhèngshēng, which had once been designated as a problematic kind of music, was solidified as a synonym of all that bad music in this major lineage.

Unfortunately, neither Zigong’s adaptable position which was more liberal to new music prevailing at the time Footnote 28 nor Mencius’s bold opinion that new tunes could also infuse people with moral sensibility was ripened into an interactive model of ritual and music. The problem was that “ritual and music” turned into almost an empty slogan. Successive emperors in China would mostly maintain the existing court music in status quo which they believed to be “ritual and music” and occasionally reinforce their ritual music with reorganization of the orchestral ensembles. To be communicated to the people and thus to be an influential means of moral education, the statewide enterprise of ritual music should be effectively combined to continuously emerging new music from all various sources and reconstructed to meet the emotional and musical sensibility of the people at the time. Yet, the ideological move in later Confucian circles only deepened the gulf between new tunes and court music. As Chinese musicologists point out, the court ritual music has become rigid since Qin and Han dynasties. The rulers kept collecting and reorganizing yǎyuè but nobody really understood it and there was no influence on their people at all. Footnote 29

In recent studies, it is observed that there were most extensive and dissonant “discrepancies between historical and modern hearing of the Southern Song musical culture.” Footnote 30 Interestingly enough, the state sacrificial music of the Southern Song China (南宋, 1127–1275) was actually based on what was called “Grand and Splendid Ceremonial Music (Dàchéng yǎyuè 大晟雅樂 or Dàchéngyuè 大晟樂)” reconstructed by Huizong of Northern Song (北宋徽宗 r. 1100–1125) in 1105. Huizong, who was a well versed musician as well as a literary artist but not an honorable statesman, painstakingly studied all the literature on ritual music and reconstructed grand court music, which is rated as the best restoration of the court music done in the entire Chinese history. Footnote 31 But this faithfully restored court music didn’t ensure its author political success. In 1126, Huizong had to abdicate the throne in favor of his son pushed by Jurchen invasion Footnote 32 and Northern Song died out in the next year. This shows the complete failure of ritual and music model in the later Confucian camp.

Musical enterprise of joseon Korea

The very “Grand and Splendid Ceremonial Music (kr. Daeseong Aak; Taesŏng Aak in MRK, hereafter “Daeseong Aak”),” however, had a profound impact on a neighboring country, Goryeo (高麗, Koryŏ in MRK), the previous dynasty of Joseon Korea. Since the court music was introduced from Song China in the early twelfth century, Goryeo seemed to have developed it quite well for a considerable period. According to the record of a literary man, Xú jīng 徐兢, Footnote 33 who had visited to Goryeo accompanying with the envoys in 1124, Footnote 34 “the dance and music in the court of Goryeo were very impressive and worth to see.” Footnote 35 He found that the first introduction of the court music into Goryeo was traced back to Shenzong of Northern Song (北宋神宗 r. 1067–1085) in his early reign (the era of xining 熙寧: 1068–1077) Footnote 36 and Daeseong Aak was introduced to Goryeo by an official request in 1116. Footnote 37 It is said that not only the set of musical instruments but musicians and musical scores also were introduced, and that not only a type of sacrificial music, yǎyuè, but a kind of banquet music, yànyuè 燕樂, also arrived. Footnote 38

When King Sejong of Joseon (世宗: 李祹 r. 1418–1450) embarked on the enterprise of reconstructing ritual music, Daeseong Aak (大晟雅樂), loosely remained in existence as court music inheriting from the Goryeo dynasty. Along with this, there were another genres handed down such as dangak (唐樂, Chinese music) and sogak (俗樂, folk music) and/or hyangak (鄉樂, indigenous music) in the court of Joseon. Differently from the case of the extremely stretched term “yǎyuè” in China, “aak (雅樂)” in Korea, both Goryeo and Joseon, solely denoted “Daeseong Aak.” Footnote 39 “Aak” was not all kinds of court music or ancient sage king’s music but a specific genre name for the music imported from Song, developed in Goryeo, and handed down to the early Joseon. Footnote 40 It is most likely because Daeseong Aak was introduced through a very special route as aforementioned. All other music imported from China before the introduction of Daeseong Aak was instead called dangak 唐樂 in a sense of “Chinese or foreign music” and was merged into sogak (俗樂, folk music) together with hyangak (鄉樂, indigenous music) in the reign of Sejo (世祖: 李瑈 r. 1455–1468).

In many aspects, the reconstruction of ritual music in the early Joseon which Sejong initiated and Sejo propelled was different from the restoration of ritual music which many rulers of China had attempted. Firstly, folk music and indigenous tunes were transformed into the style of advanced music and included in the scope of court music and thereby aak was relativized. They respected aak as the most advanced music in the world of those days and at the same time legitimated their own indigenous tunes and made efficient use of foreign music that had long been accommodated. Secondly, the misplaced juxtaposition between new music and undesirable music was soberly questioned. Although the kings of Joseon and their musicians considered the music of the ancient three dynasties Footnote 41 as an ideal model, Footnote 42 they didn’t think they could realize their ideal only by restoring the ancient music intact. Instead of adhering to an elusive model of ancient sage kings’ music, they made every possible effort to produce their own ritual music, comprehensive in theory and effective in practice. They were clearly aware that the newly composed court music on the basis of native tune should be called “new music (新樂, kr. sinak ch. xīnyuè)” Footnote 43 rather than aak, old music or sage king’s music. Thirdly, the revival of ritual music in Joseon Korea contributed to the awareness of cultural identity and the development of cultural diversity. The more matured their musical understanding, the more they felt keenly the difference between their own musical tastes and those of Chinese aak. This awareness motivated the creation of native court music and the new notation system in order to record the native. Footnote 44 The newly composed sinak, the reconstructed aak and the accommodated dangak coexisted in the Joseon courtyard and each had a proper usage.

It is right to say that the Joseon Dynasty envisioned its national ideal on the foundation of Neo-Confucianism Footnote 45 and accordingly Sejong, whose reign is often called Korean Renaissance, Footnote 46 can be regarded as a Confucian king. However, he was not a mere adherent of Confucianism but a mature thinker who reflected on how to adapt Confucian value for the new born Korea which had a different language and musical structure. What he had achieved in music was never cast “in the Chinese mold,” Footnote 47 unlike commonly misunderstood. The restoration of “aak” was quite successfully done to the extent of “embodying certain ancient characteristics” and “in the course of their work, the Korean scholar made copies of the original sources for a set of Chinese ritual melodies which have since been neglected in China herself.” Footnote 48 Nevertheless, Sejong’s enterprise was heading in a different direction from the preservation of traditional aak. As aforementioned, he ventured to Koreanize ritual music or, conversely, to ritualize the indigenous tunes and this project embroiled in a long lasting dispute. Footnote 49

The idea of Koreanized ritual music might not have been conceived from the beginning but became gradually ripe in the course of researching Chinese musical scholarship and applying it to Joseon musical landscape. In 1420, the second year of his reign, Sejong regarded the words of indigenous music as vulgar and tried to change them Footnote 50 but after a while he began to doubt why we should abruptly play a foreign music at the ancestral sacrifices instead of native music which was the usual favorites in their lifetime. Footnote 51 Joseon elites educated in Confucianism presented a memorial to Sejong that indigenous musical performance should be expelled not only from the ancestral sacrifices but also from all other sacrifices and he accepted it. Footnote 52 To musicians such as Bak Yeon (朴堧: 1378–1458), who was well versed in early Chinese musical scholarship, the aim of Joseon ritual music project was nothing but the complete restoration of what Chinese classics said through the rigorous investigation. Footnote 53 However, the discordance between Chinese and Korean music were repeatedly reported such as different scales, standard pitches (宮, gung), tonal structures, and performance style. Footnote 54 Sejong was awakened to a new significance that the indigenous music and Chinese-originated music aak were surely different and therefore it would be impossible and unnecessary to use aak in all types of court activities. Footnote 55 After long trials and tribulations, in the 29th year of his reign (1447), Sejong finally released new ritual music. Although he wanted to widely use the new ritual music and also to perform at the royal ancestors’ shrine, Footnote 56 his wishes were not carried out until his son Sejo, who was deeply versed in music, Footnote 57 took a decisive step towards a new phase. Footnote 58 The debates between Sino-centrism and the indigenous move continued even after but the basic conception and structure of Joseon musical enterprise Footnote 59 has remained through the entire history of Joseon Korea (Tables 1, 2).

Table 1 Juxtaposition of bipolar terminology in early Confucian musical discourse
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Table 2 Different genres of the court music in the early Joseon Korea
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Concluding remarks

Confucian musical discourse is useful even today as a valuable resource for mapping out contemporary culture. A successful case of Korean reconstruction shows continual significance in the following points. Firstly, the sources of ancient music were thoroughly reviewed and the revival of Confucian musical ideal was accordingly experimented. Secondly, the problematic phenomenon of theory overriding musical reality came into question and brought about heated controversy over the qualification for Joseon court music between Sino-Korean music and indigenous music. Thirdly, Joseon Confucian thinkers reexamined the following questions which had been taken for granted: Why can music be regarded as a necessary means of moral education? And which music is such music? These are perennial questions which should be continuously asked if one would keep Confucian musical discourse alive.

The retrieval of Confucian ritual music in Joseon Korea is a worthwhile case of Confucian musical discourse. On one hand, it shared the same orientation as early Confucian ideal in that it tried to promote moral edification and social cohesion through the reconstruction of court music. The concept of music closely combined with state rituals bloomed into reality and produced substantial content. On the other hand, it broke through the fossilized Confucian value system of those days such as dichotomy of old and new music. In this light, Koreanization of ritual music was an indispensible step for the rejuvenation of Confucian culture. Joseon Korea could achieve a musical and cultural independence only by realizing its marginalized position and actively responding to it. The awareness of its own musical culture based on the recognition of musical susceptibility motivated Sejong to make new ritual music for everyone in Joseon, which even uneducated people could enjoy and expressed the harmony between ruler and subject. Footnote 60 It reminds us of Mencius’s claim that new music and old music make no difference as long as the enjoyment of the music can be shared with the people. It may not a coincidence that the list of new ritual music (sinak 新樂) included Yeomillak (與民樂), the term closely associated with Mencius’s ideal.