Both Southern Music and Northern Music were popular during the Song (960-1279) and Yuan Dynasties (1279-1368). They were named according to regional partitions.

Southern Music, with flutes as accompanying instruments, was the collective name for all forms of music in the south; and Northern Music, with strings as accompanying instruments, of all the music in the north. And the two groups of music were greatly influenced by Daqu of the Tang and Song Dynasties as well as folk music.

Southern Music is the musical genre of the Southern Drama, and Northern Music, of the Yuan Zaju.