| Hakka Mountain Songs |  |
“Hakka mountain songs heard from far away, showing feelings on this live long day. Words do reveal the thinking of the guy, and melodies bring the girl’s coy reply.”
During the early days, many Hakka people were faced with barren mountainous areas that they gradually cleared and settled in. As they went about such hard work, they would sing to relieve stress or to converse with fellow workers whom they could not see on the other side of the mountain. This form of expression eventually formed the Hakka traditional music termed “Hakka mountain songs”. These songs could be sung anywhere despite its name and unlike songs from other cultures, there are no specific lyrics or tune to these songs. Instead, the singer would create their own tunes and improvise new lyrics, usually as 7-words phrases, mostly based on their feelings or purpose, for example questions and answers, seeking companionship or expressing their love and admiration to the opposite party.
The songs inherited the styles of ancient classical poetry, dating back thousands of years ago in the same vein as “Shi Jing, the Book of Songs”, that music and poetry was born from nature and the wild, while Hakka mountain songs also embodied their own characteristics and were sung in its own dialect. Inherited by generation after another, the mountain songs are an essence of Hakka culture and a valuable folk art.
