top board materials

Just as there is a difference in seasons and climates, there is also a difference in the quality of the woods and a craftsman’s skills. A good qin is possible only when all these four factors work in unison, i.e. when we have the right season, the right climate, the right material, and the right skill. In olden times, a qin made with wutong (Chinese parasol) as the top board and Chinese catalpa as the bottom board was considered the best; an instrument made entirely with wutong was considered second best; what came next was an instrument made of wutong as the top board and Chinese fir as the bottom board. By the Tang Dynasty, qins were made mostly with pine and Chinese fir, as hundred-year old pine and Chinese fir were known for being able to produce sounds with a resonating clarity in the overtone. As far as fine wood materials are concerned, wutong (Chinese parasol), Chinese fir, pine, yinchen wood (coal blackwood) are top choices, while paotong (paulownia tomentosa), cypress, nantong, cottonwood and lauan are less desirable. In the hands of a good craftsman, it is still possible to make fine qins even out of less desirable woods.

bottom board materials

1. Chinese catalpa: From the very earliest days, it has been said “tong (wood) for top board and Chinese catalpa for bottom board”, meaning Chinese catalpa has always been considered the selected wood for making bottom boards. For qin tops or sound boards, the wood selected is known for being light, soft, resonant and smooth. For bottom or back boards, strong, solid and heavy woods are preferred. The top board needs to produce the sound and melody while the bottom board needs to absorb and vibrate the sound. According to traditional criteria, the softness of the tong wood pairs nicely with the solidness of Chinese catalpa to create a harmony between yin and yang. Therefore, top boards are made with yang xu (soft and resonant) woods while bottom boards are made with ying shi (hard and dense) woods. The Chinese catalpa is softer than mahogany but harder than other hardwoods. It is strong and moisture- and erosion-resistant; it has nice grain and figuring; it doesn’t deform or crack easily; and it is fragrant and is worm- and fungi-resistant, lasting a thousand years without rotting. When it is used to make bottom boards, we get the right color of tone. It is recorded in Piya, the Chinese dictionary compiled by the Song Dynasty scholar Lu Dian, “While peony is respected as the king of flowers today, Chinese catalpa is considered the king of woods as no other woods are better than catalpa.” It also compliments that “the sound is clear and harmonious when it is used to make instruments.”

Raw lacquer (or Pure raw lacquer)

Raw lacquer, aka urushi or simply lacquer, comes from the filtered and heat-treated sap of the lacquer tree. It can be applied to materials as a finish; its leaves are used to treat internal parasites, and its liquid can be used as an herb in Chinese medicine once dried. Lacquer trees grow well in cold climates, found widely in southwestern China. It is a tree species of genus Toxicodendron native to China. That is why raw lacquer is also named as a national lacquer finish.

Lacquer has a wide range of uses. It was already being used as a finish as long ago as when bamboo strips were used for writing. In Shangshu (The Book of History), one of the Chinese classics, it is recorded that Emperor Shun’s culinary utensils were finished with black lacquer; and Emperor Yu’s ritual vessels were finished with black lacquer on the outside and color paintings on the inside. He also used lacquer and silk as tributes. The chariots manufactured in the Zhou Dynasty were also finished with lacquer and paintings. By the time of the Han, Tang, Song and Yuan dynasties, lacquer-ware became even more popular, when there were lacquered musical instruments, daily utensils, weapons, stationery, court items and coffins. But it was the Ming and Qing dynasties that saw lacquer products reaching their peak. People of all trades made lacquer products then, but mostly for the court and the bureaucrats, who collected the best lacquer products over the centuries. It was also during this period that gong qi (tributary lacquer-ware) became popular, which was exported to Southeast Asia and countries in Europe and the rest of Asia.

Lujiao shuang (deer horn powder)

Lujiao shuang (deer horn/antler powder), originally a Chinese medicine, is the remains of deer antler after the glue has been extracted. The calcified remains are crispy and crumbly and can be easily broken into fragments by hands. They are often ground into powder by qin-makers from antiquity to be mixed with lacquer and then applied on the surface of the qin body. Pure lacquer cast can be hard. Adding lujiao shuang into the lacquer paste not only softens the roughcast, it also helps protect the qin surface from impact and wear. And because the mixed coating is less dense and loose, it has better acoustic transmission and therefore has a certain damping effect for the sound, which can penetrate through the coating without being diffused. Besides, qins coated with lacquer paste made with deer horn powder can produce more penetrating sound with the passage of time. Therefore, it has always been qin-makers’ favorite material.

Eight treasured powder

Eight treasured powder refers to a number of precious metals and stones that have been ground to powder, ranging from gold, silver, pearls, agates, corals, jade, ruby in zoisite and malachite. They are mixed with deer horn powder and raw lacquer to make lacquer paste (cement). Eight treasured powder is very precious and therefore considered by many as the best for lacquering. I don’t agree that this is always the case, because I think the top priority for a qin is its sound quality and the touch and feel while its look is secondary. Therefore, whether or not eight treasured powder should be used depends on the wood quality. As the density of the top board wood varies, only woods that are too soft and loose are suitable for using eight treasured powder to enhance their metallic sound so that the qins can produce a resonant bell-like sound or a clear and resounding sound like qings (also known as chime stones, an old percussion musical instrument). If the top board wood is dense enough and the sound it produces already has the resonance of bells and chime stones, then there is no need to insist on using eight treasured powder because it is precious. If one insists on using it for its own sake and as a result the sound becomes too dull and heavy to open in time, it is missing the whole point.

Red sandalwood

◆AccessoriesTo produce a completed qin, it will need, in addition to top and bottom boards, such accessories as guanjiao (ceremonial cap), longyin (dragon’s gums), yueshan (bridge), chenglu (bridge accessory), qinzhen (tuning pegs) and yanzu (goose feet). With qins that have been passed on from generation to generation, wooden accessories are the most common, though other materials are also used, such as ivory and jade stones. I prefer wooden materials, among which my favorite is red sandalwood, mainly because wooden materials have better sound transmitting (acoustic) effects than non wooden materials like ivory and jade. Even with wooden materials, there are different sound transmitting effects. Red sandalwood may not be the best. Whatever wood that is the most appropriate for the vibration frequency of a certain top and bottom boards is the best choice. It is only wise for qin makers to experiment with different kinds of wood to find the one that has the best acoustic effect for making yueshan (bridge) or longyin (dragon’s gums). Qin is a musical instrument and, as such, it produces music. Therefore, sound quality, rather than the precious value of the wood, is the most important when we make qin accessories. I love red sandalwood because its acoustic effect best suits the sound characteristics of the qins I make. That is why I use it in spite of the cost, not because of its precious value.

Red sandalwood, a slow growing evergreen tree that takes 800 years to grow into usable timber, is considered a sacred wood in Southeast Asia. Strong and durable, it is one of the most prized hardwoods due to its high density and is considered the king of all woods in the old days. It has a rich red color, dense grains and fine texture. Due to its somber glory, it has always been favored by the imperial families in China.

The Chinese character for red sandalwood, tan, means “giving of alms” in Sanskrit. I love red sandalwood for its deep rich color, which is elegantly noble and reservedly humble, and for its extraordinary look. In the qins I make, I use red sandalwood as my top choice for making yueshan and other accessories firstly because it guarantees the tone quality, the dense wood grain and hardness are a good complement to the old Chinese fir and Phoboe nanmu, its sound particles have high sensitivity transmission which is the most appropriate for the vibration frequency of the strings and body, and its sound transmission effect is better than other woods; and secondly because it maintains its character of high antiquity and elegance and upholds the true essence of the Lore of the qin.