By Bell Yung Kwan Fong Chair of Chinese Music, University of Hong Kong Professor of Music, University of Pittsburgh A large and important catagory of (Chinese) music is called quyi, literally "song-art," which is also referred to as shuochang, literally "speaking-singing." Often translated in English as Narrative Songs, the quyi consists of songs which tell stories in poetic verse, often half-sung and half-spoken in performance, and for centuries served two major social functions: as popular entertainment in the pre-technological age and as a form of mass education. Until this century, the vast majority of the Chinese people were illiterate or semi-literate; quyi offers them a view of the wider world, and plays a major role in giving the Chinese people a shared sense of history, myths, and mores to forge a cultural identity. One distinctive feature -- muk'yu songs are generally sung by ordinary people for their self-enjoyment: men and women, at work or at leisure, singing mainly to and for himself or herself. These songs are enjoyed for their own sake, and may be truly called grassroot voices of the people... Uncle Ng comes from the county of Toisan, which has a long history of sending young men to work in North America--the Gold Mountain. Naturally there developed a repertory of muk'yu songs with that subject matter. In poetic text and simple tunes, they express the anxiety, longing, and hardship of both the sojourners and their family back in China. In particular, "Story of Gold Mountain" ... In vivid details, ... is a valuable record of the trials and tribulations of several generations of overseas Chinese laborers in the United States...