Tone, feel, sound stability, and craftsmanship are the four major elements to evaluate the quality of a guzheng. For many businesses, the appearance and craftsmanship is the soul; for the performer, the sound is always the soul. A guzheng without sound is just a combination of painted wood and wood!

There are the following factors to determine the sound quality of Guzheng:

1. The thickness of each sound area of the panel

First follow my description to check how many "wood sounds" your guzheng has ("wood sounds" are also called "empty sounds" and "broken sounds", the sound is insensitive and the sustain is short, like a string hitting the surface of a paper, the sound is very hindered Go away.) From the 13th string to the 1st string, do not draw together, but pick one by one. If there are only 1-2, congratulations, good piano! 5 or so is ok. Because the average number of domestic famous brand kites is no less than 5. If it is about 8, 90% of the general phenomenon. If there are 13 full hair woods, it's time to smash! In fact, most of the kites in the market are at the level of smashing. "Wood sound" is caused by the unreasonable thickness of the panel, and the vibration of the strings cannot stimulate the vibration of the panel through the transmission of the bridge. The level of guzheng makers is mainly reflected in the grasp of the thickness of the panel. The texture size of the panel is based on the difference between the root, middle and tip of the tree, whether it is facing the shade or facing the sun. Different sound areas and panel thicknesses are different. There is no standard data, only empirical data. Experienced data also depends on the size of the error of woodworking execution, and the execution of unreasonable data tone will be finished. Therefore, no matter how big or small the guzheng industry factory is and whether its reputation is high or low, there are only two kinds of zithers - the professional zheng and the lay zheng. Even the most popular sound of the koto is good, but even the sound of red sandalwood is bad for the layman. By the way: the precious materials such as red sandalwood, nanmu, and mahogany on the surface of the guzheng have no decisive effect on the sound, but only a small effect of improving the resonance. Heavy material and light tone are a big misunderstanding when buying a guzheng (I haven't seen a zheng without wood tone).

2. The moisture content of the panel

If the moisture content of the panel is too high, the sound will be dull; if it is reasonable, the sound will be clear (based on a reasonable panel thickness). The panel of the guzheng is preferably made of paulownia wood that has been naturally air-dried for more than one year. Dunhuang panels are baked with a fire to reduce the moisture content to less than 10%. In fact, in the early stage of Dunhuang, natural air-dried panels were also used. Due to the continuous expansion of production, there was no way to ensure that there was enough panel inventory to be air-dried naturally. The only way to replace it was to use fire-baked panels, but there was definitely no natural air-dried panels. The output and quality of musical instrument companies are inversely proportional. The reason why Steinway pianos maintain a long-term reputation is that they do not pursue quality at the expense of output. High-quality musical instruments often come from small but very professional Xiaoqin workshops.

3. Resonance

The reasonable radian and camber of the zither body and the size of the sound hole of the bottom plate will affect the resonance effect of the guzheng (the veneer material also has some influence).

4. Strings

Good strings can improve the tone of the guzheng, but don't expect to save the tone of the guzheng.

Summary: A guzheng is like a singer. The overall timbre is like the singer's voice, and the sound of wood is like the articulation of singing and articulation. If the singer's voice is good, the resonance is good, and the articulation is not clear, it will definitely make the singing less attractive. Guzheng as well!