“Capriccio” for piano by Sang Tong: specificity and transformation of the genre

Statement of the problem. The specifics of the genre transformation of the piano capriccio in Chinese music are studied using the example of the work of the outstanding composer Sang Tong. In the piano “Capriccio”《随想曲》(1959), the musician was one of the first to carry out a bold synthesis of Western European atonal technique with traditional Chinese elements, “encrypting” his intellectual philosophical message to the listeners. However, in modern musicology this work either remains in the shadow of the artist’s fundamental theoretical heritage, or is considered fragmentarily, mainly through the prism of folklore stylization. So, there is an urgent need for a comprehensive study of the transformation of the capriccio genre in the piano work of Sang Tong.Objectives, methods, and novelty of the research. Objectives, methods, and novelty of the research. The purpose of the article is to reveal the specifics of genre transformation in “Capriccio” for piano Sang Tong. Given the goal, a comprehensive approach was applied, which includes the following methods: historical-contextual – to understand the socio-cultural prerequisites of the work’s emergence; philosophical-aesthetic – to understand the composer’s worldview; genre-stylistic – to reproduce the individual interpretation of the genre in San Tong’s work; comparative – to compare the Western genre paradigm with its Chinese reception; holistic musicological analysis – to identify the inextricable connection between technical means and artistic content; interpretative – to clarify the performance specificity of the work.T he true scale of “Capriccio”, the author’s artistic idea embedded in it remain insufficiently revealed, which determines the scientific novelty of this article. Research results. The transformation of the capriccio genre in the piano work of Sang Tong took place at all levels of musical language. Turning to the sonata form, the composer abandons conflict dramaturgy, replacing it with the Taoist dialectic of Yin-Yang and offering a free cyclic form with a spatial logic of the material’s development. European functional harmony, metric symmetry give way to polytonal colorism and irregular rhythm of san-ban, which embody the national traditional category of “jizan” (naturalness, spontaneity). At the timbre-textural level, the piano loses its European identity, turning into a multidimensional acoustic medium of the East. Through the imitation of traditional instruments and the use of the “shu-shi” technique (emptiness and fullness), the composer creates a deep artistic space, akin to Chinese ink painting and calligraphy. Conclusion. Sang Tong’s “Capriccio” brilliantly demonstrates cross-cultural synthesis, where Western modernist writing techniques serve to adapt and modernize the Chinese aesthetic paradigm. This piano work became an example of the transformation of the capriccio genre from a European virtuoso form into a form of inner personal freedom and national self-affirmation.