The gaohu (高胡) is a Chinese bowed string instrument used in playing traditional Guangdong Cantonese music and operas. It belongs to the huqin family of instruments, together with the zhonghu, erhu, banhu, jinghu, and sihu. It has two strings and its soundbox is covered on one end with snakeskin. In music, a bow is a device pulled across the strings of a string instrument in order to make them vibrate and emit sound. ... A string instrument (or stringed instrument) is a musical instrument that produces sound by means of vibrating strings. ... Guangdong (Simplified Chinese: 广东; Traditional Chinese: 廣東; pinyin: ; Wade-Giles: Kuang-tung; Postal System Pinyin: Kwangtung or Canton Province, Jyutping: gwong2 dung1), is a province on the south coast of the Peoples Republic of China. ... Cantonese (Traditional Chinese: 粵語; Simplified Chinese: 粤语, Cantonese: Yuet6yue5; Mandarin pinyin: Yueyu, Yụet (Guangdong) language) is one of the major dialect groups or languages of the Chinese language or language family. ... Cantonese opera (粵劇, pinyin: Yuèjù, yuet kek or 神功戲) is one of the major Chinese opera categories, originating in southern Chinas Cantonese culture. ... Huqin are a family of instruments used in Chinese music. ... The Zhonghu is a low-pitched Chinese string instrument. ... The erhu (二胡, Pinyin èrhú), commonly known in the West as the Chinese violin, is a two-stringed bowed instrument, capable of producing sad, mysterious, joyful or voice-like melodies. ... Banhu is a huqin family instrument in China. ... A jinghu (Pinyin: JÄ«ng Hú) is a bowed Chinese instrument used in Beijing Opera. ... The sihu is a Chinese bowed string instrument with four strings. ...

The gaohu was developed in the 1920s by the musician and composer Lu Wencheng(1898-1981). It is generally similar to the erhu but is tuned a fourth higher and is played with the body held between the knees. Well known pieces for the gaohu include Bu Bu Gao (步步高, Higher Step By Step) and Ping Hu Qiu Yue (平湖秋月, Autumn Moon On Calm Lake). Sometimes referred to as the Jazz Age or primarily in North America and in Australia as the Roaring Twenties . In Europe it is sometimes refered to as the Golden Twenties. ... A musician is a person who plays or composes music. ... A composer is a person who writes music. ... Lu Wencheng is considered a master of Guangdong folk music. ... The perfect fourth or diatessaron, abbreviated P4, is one of two musical intervals that span four diatonic scale degrees; the other being the augmented fourth, which is one semitone larger. ...

Notable gaohu players include:

• Lu Wencheng (吕文成, pinyin: Lǚ Wénchéng) (1898-1981) [1] in Chinese
• Liu Tianyi (刘天一) (1910-1990) [2] in Chinese
• Gan Shangshi (甘尚时) (1931- )
• Yu Qiwei (余其伟) (1953- )[3]in Chinese

Pinyin (Chinese: 拼音, pīnyīn) literally means join (together) sounds (a less literal translation being phoneticize, spell or transcription) in Chinese and usually refers to Hànyǔ Pīnyīn (汉语拼音, literal meaning: Han language pinyin), which is a system of romanization (phonemic notation and transcription to Roman script) for Standard...

See also

• Music of China