On September 25, 1949, leaders of the Communist Party and representatives from all walks of life gathered in Fengze Garden, Zhongnanhai, Beiping, to hold a symposium on the national flag, national emblem, national anthem, chronicle, and national capital.
Seeing that New China was about to be founded, the atmosphere that should have been full of a celebratory atmosphere was shrouded in heavy thinking and a tense atmosphere. The reason for this is that none of the hundreds of manuscripts submitted for the national anthem was satisfactory after the music was composed and performed.
At an impasse at the meeting, Massulen suddenly made a bold suggestion: "Why don't we use the March of the Volunteers as the national anthem?" Hearing this proposal, Liu Liangmo, a representative of religious circles, immediately agreed.
He believes that the "March of the Volunteers" has been widely praised by people at home and abroad, and should become our national anthem. Others chimed in. However, after the national anthem was decided, some details were debated.
It has been argued that some of the lyrics are no longer appropriate in the current situation and need to be revised. Even Tian Han, the author of the original lyrics, believes that there is a need for revision. However, some people, such as the famous architect Liang Sicheng, insisted that the integrity of the song should be maintained, and did not approve of changing the lyrics.
The controversy escalated. At this moment, ** took the initiative to express his opinion in favor of retaining the original lyrics. **After listening to ***'s arguments, he also expressed his approval.
In the end, the meeting decided to retain the original lyrics of the "March of the Volunteers" as the national anthem. So, why is the original lyrics of "March of the Volunteers" controversial, and why should we support the retention of the original lyrics?
After the "28 January Incident," in the face of the ravages of Japanese aggression and the compromise policy of the Kuomintang, countless patriots who cared about their homeland and country felt extremely indignant. Tian Han, the lyricist of "March of the Volunteers", is one of them.
As unable to go into battle to kill the enemy, he decided to use his pen as the first to arouse the hearts of countless enthusiastic young people and ordinary people to resist Japan and save the country with his works, and stimulate their fighting spirit.
In the fall of Northeast China after the 918 Incident, Tian Han's actions showed that two men from a company stood up for their family and country and used their own strength to awaken people's patriotism.
Tian Han is"Left-wing theatrical movement"He advocates development"Popular drama", and lead"Left link"The creation is full of characteristics of the times"Square Drama"。
Their goal is to spread the seeds of anti-Japanese salvation to the land of China through drama. In order to better promote the idea of resisting Japan and saving the country, Tian Han created the anti-Japanese movie "Children of the Storm", but unfortunately **.
However, he did not give up, and while in prison he wrote the lyrics alone for the interlude of the movie "Children of the Storm": "Get up! People who don't want to be slaves! Build our flesh and blood into our new Great Wall!
The Chinese nation has reached the most dangerous time....This lyric later became part of the "March of the Volunteers", and the composer of the "March of the Volunteers" was none other than Nie Er, who after hearing the news, offered to compose the music for this song.
Nie Er, who got the script of "Children of the Storm", took a fancy to the song "March of the Volunteers" at a glance. He excitedly shook Xia Yan's hand and expressed his willingness to take over the composition work.
In order to avoid arrest, Nie Er pretended to be his brother and successfully arrived in Japan with the score to compose. After composing the music, he sent the score back to Shanghai, where it was produced and distributed by Oriental EMI Records.
In May of the same year, "Children of the Storm" was released at the Huangpu Theater, and the episode "March of the Volunteers" was also known by more people with the screening of the movie.
In order to promote the film, Dentsu launched a campaign to give away free song scores, which attracted widespread attention from the community. After the advertisement was published on the "Declaration", people flocked to ask for the song score, which made the "March of the Volunteers" quickly popular all over the country.
2. The Salvation Singing Movement in Full Swing "From the front line to the big city, from the big city to the farthest countryside, every Chinese knows this song and can sing it. ”
In 1939, the Chinese nation's War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression reached a critical juncture. International journalist Israel Epstein also paid close attention to China's war of resistance as a journalist.
He was surprised to find that although the March of the Volunteers had only been released for four years at this time, it had already crossed the river and taken deep roots in the land of China. Whether it is a worker, a farmer, a young student, or even a child or an old man, they can sing a few words.
And the wide spread of this song is inseparable from the development of the anti-Japanese singing movement. One day in March 1937, in a gymnasium in Tianjin, Liu Liangmo was leading more than 400 people to sing the "March of the Volunteers".
The small gymnasium has a complex number of members, including not only college students, small businesses, but also small newsboys and rickshaw drivers. Their expressions were serious and determined, and even though many of them could not remember the full lyrics, they repeated them over and over again.
Liu Liangmo was one of the advocates of the anti-Japanese singing movement, and in order to spread the concept of anti-Japanese salvation to the whole country, he personally visited Tianjin and Guangzhou, and taught the local people to learn to sing revolutionary songs.
Two months later, Liu Liangmo left Tianjin and went to Suiyuan with the YMCA War Zone Service Corps to do ideological work and teach the front-line army to sing the "March of the Volunteers". Fu Zuoyi, chairman of Suiyuan Province, was very supportive of the singing of the "March of the Volunteers" and ordered that all cadres of all units should receive singing training.
Under the vigorous propaganda of Liu Liangmo and others, "March of the Volunteers" was sung all over the country, bringing a wave of anti-Japanese salvation singing movement. At the same time, the base areas also set the line of "not relaxing their efforts for a moment and giving them an opportunity to propagate the masses", and the revolutionary base areas also began to organize the masses to launch a singing movement.
In 1938, the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningbo Border Region established the ** Salvation Association, and many literary and artistic workers such as Xian Xinghai, Mai Xin, Lu Ji, etc., joined the anti-Japanese base area and carried out the singing movement.
Subsequently, various cultural service troupes, propaganda teams, and art troupes sprung up, whose main responsibility was to appear in dramas, but they must sing salvation songs before performances.
Among the anti-Japanese base areas, "March of the Volunteers" is the most commonly sung song, and its passionate "Forward! Advance! Go ahead! "The melody always reverberates in my ears.
Even the local people sighed: "When the Eighth Route Army arrives, the song of salvation will reach **!" In the course of the Anti-Japanese War, all kinds of anti-Japanese salvation songs emerged one after another. According to statistics, we have been able to find more than 3,000 songs of the Anti-Japanese War.
However, "March of the Volunteers" has always been the most widely sung one, as Mr. Mao Dun said, no song can be more deeply rooted in the hearts of the people than "March of the Volunteers", and can stimulate the public's anti-Japanese enthusiasm more.
In the early days of the Liberation War, both the Kuomintang and the Communist Party hoped to mobilize the masses and expand their political influence by singing the "March of the Volunteers." However, an unexpected event upset this balance.
On Christmas Eve on December 24, 1946, Shen Chong, a girl in the North ** Seminary Class, was dragged away by two American ** officials when she passed through Dongdan. At that time, a worker named Meng Zhaojie tried twice to rescue her, but ultimately failed.
He hurried to the military police office to report the incident, and the police arrived at the scene and arrested one of the American officers and soldiers, while the other had already fled. The incident caused an uproar. In order to deal with the problem in a low-key manner and solve it quickly, the Kuomintang authorities ordered a ban on the reporting of "**" and banned the singing of "March of the Volunteers".
The far-reaching historical impact of this incident has made the balance of history begin to tilt in the direction of our party, which has also become an important reason why the "March of the Volunteers" was "banned".
In Beiping, a group of students are closely watching a case. After five days of waiting, they still could not learn whether the two American soldiers had been punished.
The angry students decided to take action, and they established the Peking University Students' Justice Federation, which publicly stated that the incident of the female students in the US military was serious, and demanded that it must be severely punished and compensated.
This action received a positive response from the students, who united for a massive demonstration in Beijing. The news spread quickly, and students and people from all walks of life in more than a dozen big cities, including Beiping, Shanghai, and Nanjing, also began to organize large-scale demonstrations demanding that the US military must withdraw from China.
This joint march reached its climax in Nanjing, and the Kuomintang**, in order to consolidate its rule, sent a large number of police to suppress ***, resulting in 28 people**, 19 seriously injured, and about 500 people were severely beaten.
This incident made the people in the Kuomintang began to realize how corrupt and cowardly the Kuomintang's high-pressure rule was, and as a result, more and more people in the Kuomintang began to participate in the anti-Chiang and anti-** democratic movement.
On the eve of the founding of the People's Republic of China, people began to spontaneously sing revolutionary songs such as "March of the Volunteers" and "The Internationale." These songs reflect people's opposition to the rule of the Kuomintang and their expectations for the new China.
However, with the change in the policy of the Kuomintang authorities, these revolutionary songs were banned in the Kuomintang area, including the "March of the Volunteers". On the military battlefield, the People's Liberation Army continued to sing the "March of the Volunteers", while the Kuomintang troops no longer sang the song.
When the People's Republic of China was about to be established, the National Lyrics Score Committee was established, and Guo Moruo and others were responsible for collecting matters such as the national flag and the lyrics of the national anthem. In order to get more people involved, they also published a call for papers in major newspapers.
This call for papers lasted for 8 days, which aroused strong enthusiasm among Chinese people around the world. As of September 21, 632 anthems and 694 lyrics have been received.
However, despite the large number of manuscripts received, the results of the review and performance were disappointing, and none of the works achieved the desired results. The national anthem is one of the symbols of a country, representing the dignity of the country and must be treated with seriousness.
As a result, the censorship of the national anthem is very strict. Until a few days before the founding of the People's Republic of China, the national anthem was still undecided, considering that the founding ceremony may not be able to match the national anthem, everyone was very anxious, and had to hold frequent meetings to solve this problem.
At the meeting four days later, ** gathered again for related issues such as the group song. The participants learned that none of the drafts of the national anthem could meet the requirements, and at this time, Ma Xulun and other committee members put forward a proposal to temporarily use the "March of the Volunteers" as the national anthem.
Although there was agreement on the choice of the national anthem, there were disagreements on the revision and retention of the lyrics. Guo Moruo, Tian Han and others believe that the historical elements in the original lyrics, such as "the Chinese nation has reached the most dangerous time", are inconsistent with reality and need to be revised, while Liang Sicheng and others believe that the integrity of the song should be maintained and do not support the revision of the lyrics.
Just when the atmosphere became tense, ** gave his opinion: "The French national anthem 'La Marseillaise' has a line 'pour the blood of the enemy on our fields', although this is the old lyrics, they have not been modified.
We also have to use the old lyrics, so that we can have feelings at all, and if we change them, we will not have that feeling when we sing them. ”
Born in the war between France and Austria, with its passionate melody and inspiring lyrics, it injected endless fighting power into the French soldiers, and was warmly sought after by the people and officially recognized.
As the French ** Puancarré said, this is the French people's rebellion and roar against foreign bullying. Similarly, the "March of the Volunteers" was born at a critical juncture for the survival of the Chinese nation, inspiring the people of later generations with the cry of battle and resolute faith, and unswervingly committed to the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.
After listening to the proposition, he firmly supported the retention of the original lyrics, he stressed: "Although our people have stood up, they are still facing the encirclement and pressure of imperialism, we must not forget the humiliation of the past, and we must resolutely fight for a completely independent and liberated China, and continue to carry out an arduous struggle." ”
After some deliberation and discussion, the participants unanimously agreed to the recommendations of *** and ***. At the end of the meeting, ** emphasized: "The phrase 'the Chinese nation has reached the most dangerous time' is not only applicable to the present, it will always be our warning, and we must always be vigilant." ”
At the subsequent meeting of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, everyone unanimously decided to temporarily adopt "March of the Volunteers" as the national anthem until the national anthem of the People's Republic of China was officially determined.
On October 1, 1949, the birth of the People's Republic of China was proclaimed on the tower of Tiananmen Square, and the "March of the Volunteers" became the national anthem and was played for the first time on this day.
The national anthem is a symbol of the spirit of the country and the nation, and every time the "March of the Volunteers" sounds, every descendant of Yan and Huang will surge out of endless fighting spirit. It carries the historical memory of the Chinese people's arduous war of resistance and leads the Chinese nation to a new era journey.