The coolest reggae concert in a school from a Chinese mountain village, vibe's strong!

Greeting& love, Like all reggae stories have their roots, this story I am sharing with you is about the roots of Yunnan Reggae: After 10 years of the Cultural Revolution, China was relieved from the tribulation time. While most places still remain in blindness, only a few big cities reconnected to the outside world. However, this story is not from those developed Chinese cities but from one of the most left behind places: Wa district, Yunnan province, Southwest China. Wa people, indigenous residents of the Wa area, didn’t even move into civilization until the 20thcentury. One day in 1984, Wei Hong, the first female crucialBabylon officer selected from Wa district, called her son before the end of her tenure at the capital (Beijing), asked what kind of gifts he wanted. The answer surprised his mother: Music instruments and cassettes! Regardless of the very limited sources of outside cultures, a reggae seed was planted quietly, because one reggae album was created with those gifts! (All the foreign cassettes in China during that time were inferior products imported as junk) Who knows? Rather than other genres, the reggae tree rooted so well in Yunnan province. There are reggae scenes in other bigger cities too, such as Beijing and Shanghai, most are smart and fashionable cool people, who search for some exotic taste. When the reggae picture comes to Yunnan, you will see farmerswho celebrate their harvest with local reggae music and homebrewed “Zi Kao” (a type of rice wine), you will see village women who dance with their barely walking kids, you will see mountain village weddings with big sound-systems, spreading reggae sounds over ridges. Why, has reggae become popular? A British percussionist, we call him as Summer, searched ten years for the answer. He travelled to Yunnan, a place that shares the same latitude with Jamaica, he crossed jungles, mountains, learned local dialects, got drunk countless times with “Zi Kao”. Here is what he found: many styles of local music, not only Wa music but Dai, Hani and Yi music adopting “off beats” in their traditional music, and locals playing “elephant foot drums” with sticky rice as a hitter to create a “Yunnan version of Nyabhinghi chant”. Lyrics often relate to local religion and folk tales, such as “Si Gan Li”, the Wa version of Noah's ark but a huge gourd instead of a boat. Locals love reggae vibes instantly when they heard it even though they have no idea about what reggae is, they never feel it as outside music but their own culture, just like the papaya tree that grows outside their bamboo yard. Nowadays, Yunnan is referred as the hometown of Chinese reggae and some local reggae bands, such as Kawa, Puman and Three steps gained some popularity, especially in mountain areas where indigenous people live. More and more people consider Yunnan reggae as a reggae sub-genre, due to it’s unique tuning and using of unique instruments. More importantly, the strong message they try to express: “Our hometown is the promised land we never left, we are the faithful guardian and the generous host”. However, Babylon too rough you know,many thing is banned and cities are swallowing mountains, leaving the reggae music alone, healing the nation continually. Thanks to people like Summer, who started a company to help Yunnan reggae go further, Yunnan reggae has now become the only way to escape from the concrete Jungle for many city residents to the remote mountain utopia. But still, doing music in China is not easy, getting big is the only way to survive. After many years, Yunnan reggae is ready to present itself to the world, but they don’t know how to do it. So, PLEASE GUIDE US, don’t let us fight alone. ‪@reggaeville‬ ‪@GreensleevesRecords‬ ‪@1xtra‬ ‪@ReggaeRoots‬ ‪@RealGhettoYouthsIntl‬