Music & vocals by Farya Faraji, guzheng by Yiang Ling, erhu by Amanda Toh, artwork by J.F Oliveras: jfoliveras.artstation.com/projects/NGd80J This is me having some fun mixing together the modern Iranian and Chinese musical traditions as a thematic way to represent Peroz III, the son of the last Sasanian Emperor who went to exile in China. Promoted as a high ranking military officer of the Tang-era Chinese realm, he would, alongside his son Narsieh, try to reconquer Iran with the military aid of China from the hands of the Arab Muslims, but would ultimately fail to do so. Despite this, a Zoroastrian, Iranian diaspora would continue to exist in China for many centuries afterwards as refugees from the Islamic invasion of Iran. The main melody at the beginning was created from first writing a typical Iranian melody in the mode of Shur, and then subtracting notes from it in order to create a pentatonic effect; the principal melodic form of Chinese music. I also added my Sasanian leitmotif, played in the manner of modern Persian Classical music using the setar, tar and oud, with the tombak as the drum accompaniment. The Iranian daf provides the main percussions throughout most of the piece, and they're accompanied by the guzheng, erhu, yangqin, a Chinese dulcimer, the santour, a closely related Iranian dulcimer, and the Iranian ney flute. More interestingly, the melody that starts at 02:48 is a historical melody from circa the period of Peroz III, played on modern Chinese instruments. Called Jiu Huzi, or the Wine Puppet, this melody comes to us from Tang-era China, and was transcribed in the 70's by Laurence Picken, who found it surviving in 12th century Japanese manuscripts, where it was called Shukoshi. The reason I featured this melody goes beyond its era-appropriate nature, as it's a piece of music that is inherently linked to the Iranian world. The piece of music seems to be in reference to a tradition of puppetry that portrayed Sogdians, an Iranic people related to the Persians, whose wine seemed to have been prized by the local Chinese. An important Sogdian diaspora seemed to exist there, and these puppets would portray the exotically dressed, red-haired and blue eyed Sogdian character getting drunk and falling over. In The Golden Peaches of Samarkand: A Study of T'ang Exotics (1963), Edward H. Schafer, paraphrasing the Japanese scholar Ishida Mikinosuke, writes: "The same young poets who languished over the pretty Iranian waitresses in the metropolitan wineshops laughed at the little puppets representing drunken Sogdians, with their peaked caps, blue eyes, and high noses, with which they played in houses of prostitution--when the ridiculous puppet fell over, the guest at whom it pointed had to empty his cup... These puppets were called chiu hu-tzu [i.e., jiu huzi, 酒胡子] or pu tsui hsien [i.e., bu zui xian, 捕醉仙]." The lyrics come from the Ballad of King Vahram, part of which I sang in my song of the same name from 2021. A piece of Middle-Persian Zoroastrian text from after the Islamic invasion (some scholars argue very soon after the invasion), it represent the hopes of the Zoroastrian Iranians for the return of a messianic figure from India who will drive away the Muslims and restore the native religion to the land. Middle-Persian lyrics: Be niger ka čand wad abgand ān druz pad ēn gēhān ka nēst wattar az ōy andar gēhān. Mazgitīhā frōd hilēm, be nišānēm ātaxšān uzdēszārīhā be kanēm ud pāk kunēm az gēhān, tā wany šawēnd druz-wišūdagān az ēn gēhān. Frazaft pad drōd šādīh English translation: Behold how much evil that demon has cast upon the world, There is no more evil than they in the world, We will destroy the mosques, establish fires, We will raze the idol temples and blot them from the world, Til' evil gets destroyed, the daevic creature from the world, Finished with salutations and happiness.
Man your descriptions always manage to be both informative and extremely interesting - a Chinese drinking game making fun of sogdians for being alcoholics was not something I expected to learn today lmao
in my hometown in china, until today you can still find the tomb of the last prince of Sasanian Emperor, it's in xi-an , welcome if any of you wanna pay a visit
I'm Iranian and honestly, I've been obsessed with China for the past few months. I still don't know much, there's a lot to learn, but I really adore Chinese history and nature. Thinking about ancient China and its people back then makes me feel weird in a good way. I'd love to visit China one day!
Not arab, "islamic". It was the islamic invasion of Muslim arabs. Among their victims were non-muslim arabs, including Zoroastrian arabs who'se Fravashi is venerated to this day
Sino-Iranian is a blend I would've never expected to be possible musically, yet the funny canadian man proves it a wrong assumption. I had once read of what befell Peroz III, but never I assume something so beautiful could be composed from it. ¡Kudos!
Not solely Persian, Tang music and arts were heavily influenced by various iranic cultures due to extensive trades. Iirc a few of the sassanid Shahs sent dancers to perform at the Tang court.
Another certified Silk Road classic !! I remember reading an archived news article about some worshippers in the fire temple in Karachi pre independence trying to stop a “chinaman” from entering and then being surprised when he prayed in Avestan, and then chastised them for smoking, perhaps the fires still burn in China
There are also some areas in China that believe in the god of fire, a Chinese version of Ahura Mazda, and a very small number of people believe in Manichaeism, i am Going to join them
It's pretty incredible how the son of the last sassanid emperor escaped and lived in China after the collapse of the persian empire with it's millenial history. I think i love Iranian history
Wow, this is truly amazing! I'm so fascinated with what happened to the Sasanids and other Iranians who fled to parts of eastern central Asia and China after the Arab conquest of Iran. This is truly an EPIC piece! Thanks for sharing it with us!
That I can agree with, but those Arabs did give your Empire a pretty good beating and considering how your reconquest & its consequences were what left your empire vulnerable in the first place, you shouldn't be too surprised about it. 😂😂@@justinianthegreat1444
@@SirBoggins we had the last laugh. Leo III, Nikephoros II Phokas, John I Tzimiskes, and Basil II had a lot of fun trolling the Arabs and the Arabs were never able to recover ever since the Turks came. Even if the Arabs took some of my provinces, it still doesn't change the fact that my empire is better than the caliphate.
I can't express how much this means. The Wine Puppet has been a sentimental song to me for a long time, and I often wondered what a "sogdian rendition" might sound like. If anyone could figure out how to produce an ancient Chinese melody with an ancient Iranian flair, it would be Farya Faraji. It was a niche dream I never expected you to try. So thank you, Farya Faraji, Yiang Ling, and Amanda Toh for your work.
As proud member of the Chinese community and an avid listener of Farya Faraji, this has truly made my day. Although is seems monolithic at times, China has had a diverse and multicultural history. I can’t wait for Farya to explore the wonderful musical culture of China!
China had a history of Zoroastrianism and (especially) Manichaeism, and developed its own strain of manichaeism due to isolation, and one of their sects was instrumental in overthrowing the Yuan and stopping the oppression of China.
Last year I was watching videos of the prince of Persia series, and out curiosity I searched Persian empire, at first I wasn’t interested in Iranian history, and I heard a lot about Cyrus the great and I thought “meh he was just an ancient king that conquered some land and that’s it” I was dumb as shit until I listened to “I am Cyrus” and it was your first song I listened to, I was blown away by how good it was, and it made me obsessed with Iranian history, and to this day I question myself: “ what would I be obsessed with if I didn’t listen to that song?” I am grateful for it, thank you farya for everything❤
As a Chinese I respect the ancient civilizations with long and rich history, Persia/Iran definitely belongs to this category. Also very catchy music(or I should say banger?), great work!👍
The story of the Sasanians fleeing to China is probably one of my favourite episodes of world history and I'm so happy to see it represented here! Honestly your channel has gotten me more interested in learning about history and on some topics taught me more than I learned in school. Keep up the amazing work!!
I. Love. This. Song. That is all. My new favorite. I am unashamed to admit I play it at least 10 times a day. And dance! I especially love dulcimers and Farya did an excellent job on this piece! ❤❤❤
Clicked here very confused by how an "Epic Chinese Iranian Music" would sound like, and left with a lot a newfound knowledge. Only someone with such talent and knowledge as you can make a title like this work. Really putting that idea of infiltrating the "epic" youtube music scene to the test!
If people are intrigued by the cultural presence of Iranian/Turkic communities in historical China, there's a Chinese TV show called "The longest day in Chang'an" that shows the cultural diversity of the capital of the Tang dynasty, Chang'an, at its peak, and I'm not sure if they show Iranic cultures or depict them well, they do a lot of work to show a lot of the cultural diversity in the city! Chinese + Turkic musical traditions would make sense too 👀 Anyways, I'm really happy you've finally delved into Chinese musical traditions after a lot of research and finding collaborators!!
I imagined that sooner or later Farya would arrive in this part of the world, since he has already been to China a few times... We can always expect at least good songs from him, but usually they are more than excellent. Great work, brother Faraji!
What an unexpected but refreshing piece of art! As a historian, this process it's not something is spoken enough of. Thank you for this amazing work, Farya, to you and the great people you worked with on this.
It was certainly an unexpected delight to hear this as a Chinese-Iranian, seeing as these two are somewhat of an unusual mix, especially musically. Thank you Farya!
I will never get tired of saying it. Your channel provides an excellent gateway to Iranian history and everytime you post a history-thematic Iranian song I learn the most interesting things! You also finally steeped into Far Eastern melodies after studying so much about it, and what a song it is!
Hearing Chinese instruments and scales together with those of Persia is a unique auditory experience. Thank you. Always a pleasure to hear the interesting music on your channel.
This is literally Iranian-Chinese music... and I would never have thought that the combination of these two cultures would sound SO FUCKING AWESOME!!!!
1:00 This definitely sounds a lot like a Southeast Asian melody, specifically Khmer. The blend of Iranian and Chinese in this song gives that feeling too.
What an interesting fusion of music styles, did not expect it but definitely a welcome addition. Sassanids and Tang? 2 of my favorite historical polities. Love the rich history, achievements, and aesthetics. What a beautiful golden age both once reached. Cheers
I love how each new song is also a history or cultural lesson. It's always a joy to read the descriptions while listening to these songs. Learned so many cool and some obscure pieces of history from these videos.
I love this! Someday you gotta experiment with the Guanzi and Suona, two Chinese instruments of Iranian origin! Also Uyghur music mixes together a lot of Chinese and Persianate influences in cool ways. Could be cool to bring all 3 together in a song. In fact, the Uyghurs have their own versions of the Guanzi/Balaban and Suona/Sorna
brooo absolutely love your content, is definitely more than just a music but is richly filled with the history depicting culture, religion, politics, & civilization that complementing one another.
Not many people know that there is a much larger influence of Iranian culture in China than just material goods. Zoroastrianism, Church of the East and Manicheanism have played a role in shaping the histories of Chinese sects and Mingjiao is present in the 1961 martial arts novel The Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber [倚天屠龙记] by Jin Yong [金庸].
This is a beauty of a piece Farya, the fall of Sasanid Iran is such a sad story full of amazing twists like this, I learned something new today, thank you
4:18 they didn't forget who they were, great moment from Nineveh 627: If Caesar is Sun, and Kaghan is Moon My Shah is like a cloud, pregnant of rain If he wants he closes the Sun, If he wants, he closes the Moon
Absolutely gorgeous - another masterpiece by Farya! Would really love to hear more Silk Road-themed music, particularly from this most cosmopolitan and fascinating of historical periods.
In the 8th-9th century stone carvings at Weibao Mountain in Dali, Yunnan Province. there is a statue called ‘Persian Monk’, also wearing a peaked cap, which may be a statue of a Sogdian.
This is incredible! Who are you?!! I was checking your videos...what a range! Iranian, Romanian, Turkish, Greek...etc. Is that all you?! Hats off. Thanks for the detailed introduction. Of course we know of The Silk Road but I did not know much about the Sassanian flight. Tho' the Sogdians are more familiar. And the Central Asian contribution to early Buddhist translations in China. I am glad someone mentioned Gandhara. Ive heard a fair bit of "Xingjiang music," the crossover. Your stuff is amazing! Keep it up! Kudos from India.
Check the pinned comment. He's the main composer, and he sings some of his songs, but he also gives credit whenever anyone else contributes to his projects.
The boy is back to spoiling us rotten. The musical stylings of each really compliment the other very well, you married them seamlessly together in your Farya tier execution as you always do. And the fact you still carry the Sasanian leitmotif into this piece, cherry on top.
It is as much fascinating combination as unexpected!! The best part of discovering your chanel is that I learn completely new things of which I never thought about! I know almost nothing about history of Iran, though I’m ethnic azerbaijani, and your music inspires me to learn more about this subject🩵 Thank you!
eyooo I've just been into Peroz and his story recently, perfect timing. If you ever see this, could you perhaps make a symphony or theme for Nader Shah? I think his life story would be amazing to hear, thanks for the wonderful music
My very basic musical education had been on Chinese instruments so it's very interesting to hear them arranged in this way. Their familiar sounds accompanying unfamiliar sounds and played in a way that is different from both purely historical Chinese pieces as well as modern interpretations is such a unique experience.
So damn good. And being a french who knows almost nothing about iranian history, I'm always very glad and curious to learn a little bit more about this part of the world through your beautiful music. You have such a great talent to tell stories. Very surprised to see how much this blend between iranian/chinese music works sooo well. It's so great.
This is a very interesting and new approach to music I see from you, very creative. I read the guzheng came to be due to Iranian influence. It's funny to see this not so many days after you posting a song in Portuguese because you were all like "idk when it will happen" and here we are haha
This country, Iran, has so much influence that you can't even imagine. This is the reason why I love this nation. Such a cultural influence. Love from Bangladesh ❤️.
I had no idea there were Parsis in China at some point too! Such a far-spreading and rich culture! Seriously, I learn something new every time I listen to your music (which is beautiful, as always)
