An upcoming festival will feature over 20 Chinese and international performers, covering a variety of genres, including pop and folk

A 35-meter-tall dome bathed in light, which is less than 1 kilometer away from the Qingdao West Coast New Area in East China's Shandong province, will serve as the main venue for a two-day music festival called Dome International Music Festival, on Aug 17 and 18.

The festival at the Qingdao Cosmopolitan Exposition International Convention Center, a landmark in Qingdao, will feature over 20 Chinese and international musicians, covering a variety of music genres, including pop, folk and world music.

"This is the first time we are having this kind of music festival in the Qingdao West Coast New Area, which was established in 2014," says Xiao Bo, the deputy general manager of the Qingdao Cosmopolitan Exposition International Convention Center.

"For a whole year, we will hold cultural events like music festivals and classical music master classes to entertain local audiences."

Xiao adds that the Dome International Music Festival is expected to attract over 20,000 visitors.

One of the acts at the music festival is Huun-Huur-Tu, a band from Tuva, a part of the Russian Federation, which will make its debut in Qingdao.

Among the others are Kerman and his flamenco guitar band from the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, and vocalist Sainkho Namtchylak from Tuva.

Huun-Huur-Tu, formed in 1992, will play songs inspired by their ancestors and the stories of the ancient Silk Road, the network of ancient trade routes that stretches from China to Europe.

Huun-Huur-Tu, which means "sunshine" in Tuvinian, released its first album 60 Horses in My Herd in 1993 and made its debut in the United States the same year.

They first performed in China in 2014 and have been frequent visitors to the country ever since.

Speaking about Huun-Huur-Tu's music, Sayan Bapa, 56, one of the founding members of the band, says: "Our compositions are mostly based on traditional Tuvan folk songs, which are about our ancestors, love, nature, Tuva's people, folk stories and the beautiful land.

"Tuva is our inspiration and we have many songs passed down by our elders, and we sing them to our children too. We hope everyone can see the nomadic spirit in the songs."

Bapa adds that one of the band's songs, Camel Caravan Drivers, is about a horseback rider's journey to Beijing from Tuva along the Silk Road.

"We also have special songs about the ancient Silk Road, which is culturally rich and diverse, and about traveling back and forth to China. Even now there are some routes that are the same in Russia. We are all traveling the same way our ancestors did."

Bapa, who was born to a Tuvan father and Russian mother, learned traditional Tuvan songs and khoomei (throat-singing) from his family and friends, who are not professional singers, but sing very well.

He also plays a three-stringed doshpuluur (Tuvan lute).

Huun-Huur-Tu's three other musicians are all masters of different styles of khoomei and Tuvan traditional musical instruments.

Radik Tulush plays the four-stringed byzaanchi and flute-like shoor; Kaigal-ool Khovalyg plays his bowed two-stringed igil and Alexei Saryglar plays the shaman drum.

Meanwhile, to mark the 25th anniversary of Chinese "campus folk music", a music genre popular in the 1990s, which won a large fan base in China then with lyrics about youth, romance and friendship, accompanied by guitar, Chinese singers like Lao Lang and Pu Shu who represent the golden era of "campus folk music" will also be part of the music festival.

Separately, the festival will also feature Spanish circus troupe Voala, which will bring a show called Muare Experience, blending a rock concert with aerial choreography.

"It's our first time in China and we will introduce a concept that we have been performing around the world since 1999," says composer and producer of the company Gaston Lungman.

"It is a compilation of aerial choreography, a psychedelic mobile structure inspired by French artist Marcel Duchamp's Rotoreliefs (a manifestation of the artist's interest in optical illusions and mechanical art in 1935) and rock music."

"This mixture resembles a ritual experience in the way of live music videos where the audience can enjoy a visual concert with the sky being the main scenery," says Lungman, adding that the team consists of 24 people including acrobats, technicians and musicians.

With a live four-piece band playing at the show, Muare Experience, which premiered in 2010, has been performed in several cities around the world.

In Qingdao, the team will introduce a new improved version they have performed in London, Paris and Buenos Aires.

Other highlights of the event will include pop star Tan Weiwei and Taiwan singer-songwriter Joanna Wong Ruo-lin.

chennan@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily Global 07/22/2019 page14)