FROM a hidden fruit store in a chaotic vegetable market in Shanghai’s Xuhui District floats the melodic sound of guqin, a traditional seven-stringed zither, blending with the sound of cutting lumber.

Hong Chongyan, a guqin maker, has been working here for more than 20 years. His friend, Jason Shen, a guqin player, is testing the sound quality of his work.

Shen puts the guqin, which looks like soft foliage with curled edge, on the table and gently strokes along its curve.

“Liu Bowen (a politician and refined scholar) created this style of guqin in the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) and gave it a name, ‘banana leaf’,” Shen says. “He perfected the format, but the sound is barely satisfactory. Since then, hardly anyone can produce a guqin in the format of a leaf with fine sound.

“But Hong is an exception,” he’s quick to add.

He plucks the string and out comes a sound like the chime of an antique clock in a temple. “The sound can linger for 26 seconds,” Shen says.

From selecting wood to carving small parts of the musical instrument, Hong does everything manually. He spares no detail; for the lacquering alone, he takes about 160 steps.

Every year he can only make about 10 pieces, and they come at very steep prices. His cheapest guqin sells for over 100,000 yuan (US$16,400), and some go for more than 1 million yuan. His works don’t appear on the open market. The only way to find them is by word of mouth.

Born in a family known for lacquer wood craftsmanship, Hong’s ancestors were also guqin practitioners. He once worked in a shipbuilding factory and learned lacquer technique and producing guqin when he was young.

During the “cultural revolution” (1966-76), guqin and traditional lacquer techniques were denounced as “old, decadent culture.” The only way for Hong to practice his craft was to make coffins — top-quality coffins are made with traditional lacquer craftsmanship. But the hiatus stagnated Hong’s pursuit in making guqin.

About 30 years ago, Hong’s wife bought a guqin and showed it to him. “I was a bit upset to see the instrument, which from its quality to its timber was full of flaws. So I decided to make her the greatest guqin in the world,” Hong tells Shanghai Daily.

With renewed and simple motivation, Hong started to make guqin with inherited skills from his family.

His devotion knows no limits. Every day at about 8:30am, Hong arrives at his small workshop and works until night.

“For the past decades, I haven’t taken a single day of rest even for holidays like Chinese New Year. I work here day and night,” says Hong, sitting amid various shapes of guqin he is working on.

Some are hanging on the wall, others are neatly leaning against the wall as their lacquer dries.

“Gradually, the deeper I become devoted, the more I feel that the cultural importance of guqin is profound and my mission is endless,” Hong says.

Selecting the right lumber for guqin is the first step. Ancient Chinese philosophers found that the wood from cheap Chinese firs, commonly used for doors and windows, created a beautiful sound.

Nonetheless, not all firs are qualified to make a fine guqin. “The lumber I use is at least 300 years old,” says Hong.

The lumber should come from Anhui or Hubei province or areas of the same latitude. Each year, Hong travels in quest of the ancient firs to find the perfect lumber.

“The older the lumber is, the more stable the fiber tissue in the wood is,” Hong says. “Also, the water content should remain at 7 to 12 percent. Then the sound and resonance of the wood will be played with more power.”

Sometimes in order to get just the right ancient timber in towns and villages, Hong has to purchase an entire house just for a few crossbeams.

“For me, the vitally important point of making guqin is its style standards,” Hong says.

He says in ancient times, just as there were both royal and civil kilns in making porcelain, guqin also had royal and civil standards. Hong stringently adheres to the royal standards.

The intricate construction of guqin represents harmony in nature, and can be traced back 4,000 years. The surface board is curved to represent heaven and the bottom board is flat, representing earth. It is 3 chi and 6.5 cun (120cm to 125cm) in length — representing 365 days in ancient Chinese measurements.

Along the outside are 13 dots, or hui, made in mica, each sporting a harmonic position producing a different note.

The instrument has parts with names like pillar of heaven, mountain, dragon pond, pillar of earth and phoenix pool. The strings represent flowing water.

In ancient times, the best craftsmen worked only for the imperial family.

Hong turns to his piles of reference materials in guqin production. “Look at the neck part of this guqin. It is so elegant and nicely curved,” he says, pointing at a photo of a finely crafted guqin from the Song Dynasty made in a royal workshop.

Viewing a picture of a lesser-quality instrument, he notes that “you can see it’s made from civil workshops, it’s like a woman with a double chin.”

The 70-year-old guqin maker wears a blue jacket liberally stained with black lacquer. His fingernails are immersed with black lacquer, betraying his years of work.

“I don’t wear gloves,” he says, so that he can feel the critical connection of lumber and the lines of guqin, making sure it is all smooth.

Organic lacquer is poisonous to most people and can be fatal. “Maybe it’s because I was born in a family doing lacquer handicrafts, so I won’t get an allergy at all,” Hong says. “I can even eat it.”

The lacquer Hong uses to paint the guqin contains more than 30 secret ingredients, including antler powder. Sometimes there is even jade powder and gold.

The craftsman has to do the lacquering over and over again — polishing and sanding — so that the guqin will be smooth and natural.

“But most importantly, the player should know to appreciate guqin and keep practicing, so the guqin will have the perfect glow and send out its best sound,” Hong says.