The earthy singing of 13 young Zhuang female singers, accompanied by tianqin, a traditional Zhuang plucked instrument, enchanted the audience at the 2003 Nanning International Folk Song Festival in the south China city Nanning.

"Their singing arouses my yearning for the harmony between humans and nature, which is something new for urban people like me," said Rong Yanqi, a young man working in Nanning, capital of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.

The band, from a small village on the border between China and Vietnam, is just one of the many folk groups participating in the five-day folk song festival, which closed over the weekend.

The annual festival, the only one that highlights folk songs, has become a stage not only for foreign folk artists but also Chinese folk songs secreted in remote mountainous areas mysterious even for Chinese people.

"Globalization challenges the survival of folk songs, treasures of an ethnic culture, not only in China but also in the United States, which has become a global problem," said Jack Sielaff, who is from the United States and has taught art education in Nanning for four years.

"But the festival presents an occasion for ancient Chinese folksongs to survive and develop. For example, the famous Guangxi folksong Third Sister Liu, the best I have heard at the festival, is still being widely sung in China," he said.

Peng Wenting, a 16-year-old middle school girl, said "Like many young people, I prefer popular songs. But as more and more folk songs are popularized by activities like the folk song festival, I have begun to enjoy them."

While Third Sister Liu is gathering warm applause at the festival, a large-scale project to protect Chinese ethnic folk culture has started.

As a major part of the project, Guangxi culture officials have started work in the Hongshui River valley to survey, collect and protect bronze drums, the oldest percussion instrument in southwest China known as Tonggu.

Last year, the cultural department of Guangxi cooperated with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization in a folk song protection program. They searched and recorded old folk songs in the remote mountainous areas in Guangxi, with the aid of digital equipment.

Tian Liantao, vice president of the Society for Music of Minority Nationalities in China, was encouraged by the government's efforts to protect minority nationality music in recent years.

The holding of a national minority nationality theatrical festival and the Nanning International Folk Song Festival, and the publishing of a collection of Chinese folk songs, among other activities of the sort, are "effective measures" to protect the cultural heritage, said Tian, who is also a professor with China’s Central Conservatory of Music.

Mauro Seatocco, an Italian singer participating in the festival, sees folk songs as "sources of all music." Deeply impressed by folk songs presented at singing festival, he said "I believe that China's moves in protecting and developing folk music such as the festival will give a new life to ancient Chinese folk songs in the digital age."

(Xinhua News Agency November 18, 2003)