'Jie Zi Shu': To Go Far, First Learn to Be Still
Grandevity Studio presents Jie Zi Shu, a musical setting using 100% of the classical text attributed to Zhuge Liang, with no newly written modern lyrics. Melancholic Mandopop R&B, a dynamic 90s urban groove, acoustic guitar, guzheng, sweeping strings and restrained male vocals give new musical life to one of China’s enduring texts on discipline, learning and aspiration.
Some words are memorised when we are young.
Only much later do we discover that they were describing a life we had not yet lived.
非淡泊無以明志，非寧靜無以致遠。
Without detachment, one cannot make one’s aspirations clear; without tranquility, one cannot reach far.
Jie Zi Shu — Admonitions to My Son is a Mandarin male-vocal work composed entirely from the classical text attributed to Zhuge Liang of Shu Han during the Three Kingdoms period.
The song contains no newly written modern lyrics, no contemporary paraphrase and no lyrical expansion.
Every sung word comes from the original text. The final sentence:
悲守窮廬，將復何及！
is repeated once in the outro solely as part of the musical structure.
Rather than rewriting the ancient work for a modern audience, this production takes a different approach:
the original words themselves become the song.
The text moves with extraordinary economy.
First comes stillness and restraint.
Then learning and aspiration.
Then self-discipline.
And finally, with startling suddenness, time itself enters the argument:
年與時馳，意與日去。
The years race with time; aspiration fades with each passing day.
The lesson is no longer only about how a young person should study.
It becomes a warning about an entire life.
That is why a brief message from a father to his son can still feel uncomfortably contemporary centuries later.
Watch the MV: 🎬 Jie Zi Shu | Official Music Video
Headphones recommended. Enter a late-autumn Shu Han military study during the final hours of night. Follow a quiet exchange between father and son through brush, manuscript, bamboo shadow and oil-lamp glow, until darkness gives way to dawn and the young Zhuge Zhan carries his father’s words toward the horizon.
“Through Tranquility, Cultivate the Self; Through Frugality, Nurture Virtue”
夫君子之行，靜以修身，儉以養德。
The text does not begin with fame.
It does not begin with talent, office or achievement.
It begins with stillness.
Here, stillness is not inactivity.
It is the ability to prevent external noise, appetite and agitation from governing the inner life.
Frugality similarly means more than spending less.
It suggests restraint: the refusal to let excess consume attention and character.
The first principle of the text is therefore strikingly simple:
before attempting to master the world, learn to govern yourself.
The MV translates this idea into a deliberately restrained visual environment.
There is no luxurious palace and no spectacle of military power.
The central space is a modest study.
A wooden desk.
Brush and ink.
Manuscripts.
A feather fan.
Bamboo shadows.
Historically inspired bronze and pottery oil lamps.
And two people:
a father nearing the end of a demanding life,
and a son still preparing to begin his own.
“Without Detachment, Aspiration Cannot Become Clear”
非淡泊無以明志，非寧靜無以致遠。
These are the best-known words in Jie Zi Shu.
Yet detachment here does not mean the absence of ambition.
It makes ambition possible.
When a person is continually pulled by immediate reward, public judgement and restless comparison, purpose becomes difficult to see clearly.
Tranquility is not stagnation either.
It is the mental condition required for a long journey.
The most meaningful work is rarely completed overnight.
Scholarship requires time.
Character requires time.
Any serious aspiration requires the ability to continue after novelty has disappeared.
To go far, one must first stop changing direction every time the world becomes noisy.
“Learning Requires Stillness; Talent Requires Learning”
夫學須靜也，才須學也。 非學無以廣才，非志無以成學。
Talent is not treated as a magical gift.
Talent requires learning.
Learning requires stillness.
And learning without aspiration easily becomes scattered accumulation without direction.
The logic is remarkably compact:
Stillness makes learning possible.
Learning enlarges ability.
Aspiration allows learning to become a life’s work.
The MV reflects this progression through Zhuge Zhan.
He first waits and listens.
Then he reads.
He practises with brush and manuscript.
He begins to reflect alone.
Meanwhile, Zhuge Liang gradually recedes from the immediate foreground.
A father cannot walk the road for his son.
He can only leave a direction.
“Indulgence Cannot Sharpen the Spirit; Impatience Cannot Govern Character”
淫慢則不能勵精，險躁則不能治性。
One danger is excessive ease and slackness.
The other is rashness and agitation.
One is too loose.
The other too uncontrolled.
Both ultimately produce the same failure:
the loss of self-command.
Jie Zi Shu therefore asks for more than academic achievement.
It asks whether a person can remain ordered without supervision.
Whether frustration can be endured without becoming rage.
Whether comfort can be enjoyed without becoming surrender.
Whether one can govern temperament before attempting to govern circumstances.
“The Years Race with Time”
年與時馳，意與日去。
This is where the text changes.
Until this point, Zhuge Liang has explained principles.
Now he introduces something that cannot be negotiated with:
time.
The years are already moving.
Aspiration can weaken a little every day.
A person may postpone beginning today.
And tomorrow.
And next year.
There will always appear to be another opportunity.
But time does not slow down because we have not decided what to do with it.
This passage becomes the emotional centre of the song.
The 90s-inspired R&B atmosphere grows heavier.
Strings widen.
The lamp burns lower.
The night deepens.
Conversation gives way to silence.
Time becomes the invisible third character in the room.
“What Then Can Be Done?”
遂成枯落，多不接世， 悲守窮廬，將復何及！
The deepest fear in these final words is not poverty.
It is lateness.
What can still be done then?
The tragedy may not be that one failed to obtain the greatest wealth, the highest title or the widest recognition.
It may simply be that:
there was time to learn, but learning was postponed;
there was time to establish a purpose, but purpose remained vague;
there was time to discipline temperament, but habit was allowed to decide instead.
The song therefore does not add a newly written modern chorus after Zhuge Liang’s conclusion.
It simply returns once more to his own final sentence:
悲守窮廬，將復何及！
Nothing newly written could sharpen the ending more effectively.
Melancholic Mandopop R&B Without Rewriting the Classical Text
Jie Zi Shu was not written as a modern song.
It has no conventional recurring chorus and no contemporary lyrical hook.
This arrangement creates musical form through melody, silence, instrumental passages, dynamic development and one deliberate repetition of the original final sentence.
The sound is built around Melancholic Mandopop R&B / Dynamic 90s Urban Groove / Chinese Fusion, combining:
- Prominent acoustic guitar, providing an intimate and nostalgic Mandopop foundation.
- Guzheng melody, bringing a recognisable Chinese tonal identity without turning the song into theatrical historical pastiche.
- Sweeping strings, expanding the emotional scale as the text approaches time, decline and regret.
- Subtle vinyl crackle, giving the recording a sense of memory and inherited words.
- Layered vocal harmonies, creating space without adding new lyrics.
- Smooth, clear Mandarin male vocals with restrained falsetto runs, preserving intelligibility and emotional control.
The production is nostalgic but contemporary.
It does not attempt to make the text sound like reconstructed ancient music.
Instead, it asks what these same words might feel like inside the emotional vocabulary of modern Mandopop R&B.
The MV: From a Father’s Nighttime Instruction to a Son Facing Dawn
The visual world is rooted in the late Shu Han period of the Three Kingdoms, using a northern-campaign military study as the cinematic setting for the father-and-son narrative.
War remains distant.
The encampment is visible only as scattered lights and silhouettes beyond the study.
The true drama happens at a desk.
Zhuge Liang is portrayed in his early fifties: slender, composed and dignified, carrying the visible weight of long political and military responsibility.
Zhuge Zhan remains a young student.
The film begins in a deep late-autumn night.
Bamboo casts moving shadows.
Manuscripts and writing tools rest beneath restrained oil-lamp light.
The father writes.
The son listens.
Gradually, the son begins to read, write and reflect on his own.
As the final movement approaches, the father recedes deeper into the frame.
The lamp weakens.
Cold predawn light enters the courtyard.
In the closing images, Zhuge Zhan carries the manuscript of Jie Zi Shu outside and faces the brightening horizon.
His father has not given him a completed road.
He has given him principles for walking one.
📜 Complete Original Lyrics and English Translation
[Zhuge Liang, “Jie Zi Shu — Admonitions to My Son” | Shu Han, Three Kingdoms Period]
夫君子之行，靜以修身，儉以養德。
The conduct of a gentleman is to cultivate the self through tranquility and nurture virtue through frugality.
非淡泊無以明志，非寧靜無以致遠。
Without detachment, one cannot make one’s aspirations clear; without tranquility, one cannot reach far.
夫學須靜也，才須學也。
Learning requires stillness; talent requires learning.
非學無以廣才，非志無以成學。
Without learning, one cannot broaden ability; without aspiration, one cannot bring learning to fulfilment.
淫慢則不能勵精，險躁則不能治性。
Indulgence and slackness prevent one from sharpening the spirit; rashness and impatience prevent one from governing one’s character.
年與時馳，意與日去，
The years race with time, and aspiration fades with each passing day;
遂成枯落，多不接世，
until one withers away, increasingly unable to take one’s place in the world,
悲守窮廬，將復何及！
left sorrowfully within a poor dwelling: what then can still be done?
[The original final sentence is repeated in the outro]
悲守窮廬，將復何及！
Left sorrowfully within a poor dwelling: what then can still be done?
A Family Instruction That Became a Map of Inner Order
Jie Zi Shu is extremely brief.
It does not describe Zhuge Liang’s military campaigns.
It does not celebrate political power.
It does not tell his son that he must become a famous man.
Instead, it leaves several fundamental ideas:
stillness,
frugality,
learning,
aspiration,
self-command,
and respect for time.
The modern world is radically different from Shu Han.
Yet attention still fragments.
Desire still expands.
Temperament still becomes impatient.
Purpose can still disappear beneath the accumulation of ordinary days.
And time still does not wait.
That is why the text remains alive.
💿 Credits
- Song Title: Jie Zi Shu / 《誡子書》
- English Title: Admonitions to My Son
- Classical Source: Zhuge Liang, Jie Zi Shu
- Era: Three Kingdoms Period / Shu Han
- Genre of Original Text: Family instruction / admonitory letter
- Original Text / Lyrics: ZHUGE Liang (Three Kingdoms Period, Shu Han, China)
- Lyric Format: 100% original classical text; no modern lyrical expansion or newly written lyrics; the original final sentence is repeated in the outro
- Duration: 2:48
- Music Composition & Arrangement: Suno AI / Grandevity Studio
- Vocal: Suno AI Mandarin male vocal
- Music Production: Grandevity Studio
- AI-Assisted Visuals: ChatGPT Images
- Video Editing / Art Direction / Creative Production: Grandevity Studio
- Released by: Grandevity Limited
- Production Year: 2026
Music Style and Mood:
Melancholic Mandopop R&B / Dynamic 90s Urban Groove / Chinese Fusion, combining smooth and clear Mandarin male vocals, restrained falsetto runs, prominent acoustic guitar, guzheng melody, sweeping strings, vinyl crackle, layered vocal harmonies and rhythmic R&B production. Nostalgic yet modern, the arrangement moves from quiet paternal instruction toward the growing weight of time in “年與時馳，意與日去,” while avoiding operatic delivery, theatrical shouting and exaggerated historical pastiche.
⚖️ Copyright Notice
The classical text of Jie Zi Shu, attributed to Zhuge Liang, is a public-domain literary work.
All sung words in this musical setting are drawn from the original classical text. No modern lyrical expansion, paraphrased verse or newly written lyric has been added. The original final sentence is repeated in the outro solely for musical structure.
The music production, recording, arrangement, mix, master, MV visuals, cover artwork, video editing, copywriting, subtitles, storyboard design, art direction and overall creative production of this edition are produced by Grandevity Limited / Grandevity Studio or used under applicable authorisation, and are protected to the extent provided by applicable law.
Unauthorised re-uploading, redistribution, reproduction, editing, sampling, commercial use, public broadcasting, platform distribution, AI training, dataset use, remixing, or use in any other audiovisual work is strictly prohibited.
Licensing Contact:
About This Project
Jie Zi Shu is part of Grandevity Studio’s Classical Literature Reimagined in Music project.
The aim is not to replace classical literature with simplified modern retellings.
Some texts do not need to be rewritten.
Their ideas, rhythm and emotional structure are already complete.
What may change is the way we encounter them.
Centuries after these words were written, we still live with distraction.
We still struggle between purpose and immediate desire.
We still postpone what matters.
And time still moves forward.
So when we hear once again:
非淡泊無以明志，非寧靜無以致遠。
the sentence is no longer merely something to memorise.
It becomes a question addressed to the present:
In a world louder and more distracting than ever, can we still become quiet enough to know where we are going?