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WELSH MUSIC At RAINFOREST FESTIVAL

WELSH MUSIC At RAINFOREST FESTIVAL

KUCHING, Thursday – Audience at the Rainforest World Music Festival will be able to sample Welsh music which will be staged on the weekend on July 14 to 16.

Welsh musician and legend, Huw Williams, as well as ‘Cool Cymru’ ambassadors Calan will be performing alongside popular international musicians at the festival.

Huw Williams, a veteran in the Welsh music scene, is a champion Eisteddfod clog-dancer, songwriter, guitarist, story-teller, Welsh bagpiper, half of Welsh legendary duo with Tony Williams and former front man of Welsh indie pop stars, The Pooh Sticks.

Some of his well-known songs include ‘The Summer Before the War’, ‘Rosemary’s Sister’ and ‘I can Jump Puddles’, while his newer songs include ‘Giggly’, recorded and performed by Calan.

Huw had ‘retired’ from the folk-club scene for a long time, but his contributions to the heritage of Welsh music continued as a member of the group Crasdant and his position as tutor and teacher of clog-dancing at trac workshops.

Huw was the co-founder of the Welsh Music Foundation established in 2000 with the intention of promoting Welsh music to the younger generation of musicians, and nurtured the careers of bands such as the 60ft Dolls, Catatonia as well as another band performing at the Festival, Calan.

Calan has been performing since 2008, the five band members perform their vibrant renditions of traditional Welsh music and are the new ambassadors of Cool Cymru.

Originally a tongue-in-cheek response by the ‘Cool Britannia’ musical movement to the aspiring cultural musicians in Wales, ‘Cool Cymru’ symbolised a time of desperation where Welsh culture was slipping away or ridiculed. Now, the term has been redeemed, or even reborn, into a powerful movement of cultural restoration and international recognition.

Calan has performed throughout major festivals in the UK and the rest of Europe, such as the Cambridge Festival, at Celtic Connections in Glasgow, Shrewsbury Folk Festival, Mosely Folk Festival, Derby Folk Festival, Bromyard Folk Festival as well as the Whitby Folk Festival and the concert tour of Italy, Austria and Belgium.

They have since become the only band from Wales to win the international folk group trophy at Lorent in Brittany, France.

They have released five albums with Sain Records including their debut album, Bling (2008), Jonah (2012), Giggly (2013), Dinas (2015) and Solomon (2017).

Welsh music is energetic and spritely, and with both Huw Williams of the ‘old school’ and Calan with their modernised traditional songs, their performances at the Festival are assuredly going to be foot tapping at the very least.

The Festival will be held at the Sarawak Cultural Village which also features  wellness programmes, informative talks, interactive ‘mini sessions’ in the afternoon as well as night concerts throughout the three-day festival.

Some 20 international bands will be performing, while many local bands such as At Adau will be taking centre stage with their cultural performances of Sarawak.

Rainforest World Music Festival is organised by Sarawak Tourism, endorsed by Tourism Malaysia and is jointly supported by the Ministry of Tourism, Arts and Culture, Youth Sports Sarawak and partnering with Malaysia Airlines as the presenting sponsor with Zurich Insurance Malaysia Berhad (ZIMB) and Zurich Takaful Malaysia Berhad (ZTMB) (Zurich Malaysia) as Corporate Social Responsibility Partner.

RWMF2017 CALAN

Issued by:

Communications Unit
SARAWAK TOURISM
T: +6 082-423600  F: +6 082-416700
E: [email protected]

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Malaysia Travel Guide

Rainforest World Music Festival 20th Anniversary Special Promotion

Rainforest World Music Festival 20th Anniversary Special Promotion

KUCHING, Monday – In celebration of the Rainforest World Music Festival’s 20th anniversary, Festival tickets will be sold at 20% off early bird prices, with the promotion starting on January 20.

The promotion is for a limited time only while stocks last, with 1,500 daily tickets up for grabs.

The discount is provided by the Festival organizer, the Sarawak Tourism Board, as a ‘thank you’ to the Festival’s ardent followers who come back every year.

“This year heralds 20 great years of world music in the rainforests of Sarawak and a collaboration between us, the organizers, and the audience who support us and make this festival possible”, says the Board’s Director of Events Corporate Relations, Madam Angelina Bateman.

The Festival will be held on July 14-16 at the Sarawak Cultural Village in Kuching, and will feature music from around the world on three stages, two outdoor and one indoor, mini sessions in the afternoon, workshops for children, drum circles, as well as a variety of food and a craft bazaar.

For the 20th edition, plans are in place to have more activities including holistic and wellness programmes which will begin as early as 11 in the morning.

“The 20th anniversary celebrations is going to be a HUGE EXPERIENCE and we are planning more activities around the music,” added Angelina.

Starting with only a few hundred people in the audience in 1998, the Festival has grown to an internationally recognized music festival, receiving awards among them as one of the Top 25 Best International Festivals awarded by Songlines Magazine for six consecutive years.

Festival tickets and updates are available online at www.rwmf.net.

The event is supported by the Ministry of Tourism and Culture Malaysia and Ministry of Tourism, Arts Tourism Sarawak and endorsed by Tourism Malaysia with Malaysia Airlines as partners.

RWMF2016 Finale

Image shows the finale of the 2016 Rainforest World Music Festival.

Issued by:
Communications Unit
SARAWAK TOURISM BOARD
T: +6 082-423 600  F: +6 082-416 700 M: +6019-818 8946
E: [email protected]

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Tourism Malaysia

A festival like no other

SINGING IN THE RAIN..FOREST WORLD MUSIC FESTIVAL

Let’s just say that there was absolutely no way we were going into our Taming Borneo adventure and miss the highly anticipated Rainforest World Music Festival (RWMF). If you’re a music enthusiast there’s no doubt you’ve heard about it. But if you haven’t, trust us, you’re going to want to read the rest of this entry, seriously.

Truth be told, we really didn’t know what to expect. Okay, we kinda did, but only from second hand experiences; reading travel blogs or hearing stories from our friends.

The only 3 things we were sure of were;

  • It’s an annual 3-day music festival, hosted by the Sarawak Tourism Board, at the Sarawak Cultural Village in Kuching.
  • It brings international acts together with local indigenous acts to celebrate the diversity of music in the heart of the Bornean jungle.
  • It’s a totally awesome festival you have to go to #YOLO

To sum it up in a nutshell, RWMF, gives you a perfect blend of cultural and contemporary musical performances, chilled festival vibes, good local food, an all-around great crowd and ambiance to party away the weekend. But we’ll delve further into the details below.

Putting the full extent of our experience into words is just not possible, you’ll have to watch our video series to find out how lit this festival really is!

THE DEETS OF THE BEATS

The RWMF is usually held annually in the mid months of June, July or August (this year August) in the Sarawak Cultural Village, at the base of Mount Santubong, Kuching, Sarawak.

At its’ inception, RWMF was established in 1998 and drew a crowd of only 300 people. But now, it draws an annual crowd of about 20,000 a year, making RWMF a front runner in local and international music calendars!

The festival usually features approximately 20 local and international bands over the course of the weekend. The performances range from traditional, world fusion and contemporary music. Invited performers are specially curated by organizers to give audiences the musical ambiance in accordance to the creative direction of the festival.

RWMF has a format of afternoon workshops; promoting engagement between performers and attendees, while the main concerts are held at night, under the star speckled sky of the Bornean Rainforest.

Go crazy, no one will judge you!

Go crazy, no one will judge you!

Lastly, fun fact, if you’re an environmentalist, the RWMF also has a record for raising environmental awareness with its recycling initiatives, tree planting campaigns, and providing shuttle buses for festival goers to reduce carbon emission in the air. #winning

TRACES OF THE TRANCE

The festival runs on a world class level of operation, operating on tight scheduling and strict regulations, it still manages to hold energetic performances and engaging afternoon workshops. It was really easy for us to warm up to the energy of the music and the crowd.

picture3

The afternoon workshops have got to be the highlight of our experience. We participated in a drum circle and enjoyed a workshop called “The Breath of Life” showcasing delicate sounds of wind instruments in music. When the festival promises a “smashing weekend in the Bornean rainforest”, they deliver.

Besides the eargasmic performances, we had the pleasure to explore the village with vendors scattered around selling local dishes, art and traditional handicrafts. Of course, being the foodies we are, we treated ourselves to a variety of food and beverages sold at the festival grounds.

You won’t believe who we met at the Sapeh booth!

You won’t believe who we met at the Sapeh booth!

Overall, the festival definitely lives up to the hype and definitely sets the bar high for other festivals around!

A night to remember

A night to remember

THE OTHER FESTIVALS AROUND

If your schedule prohibits you from attending RWMF, don’t worry there are plenty of other great events that travellers look out for throughout the year in Sarawak. Here’s a few we find interesting:

The Borneo International Kite Festival

Borneo International Kite Festival is held in the town of Bintulu.  The huge windy open space of the Old Bintulu Airport that faces the South China Sea provides ideal conditions for consistent flight of a vast selection of colourful kites. The sky would be colourfully lit as thousands of colourful kites are flown at the festival, with the latest number being 2,500 diamond kites. The festival also holds a record in the Malaysia Book of Records for forming the longest arch kite tunnel of 500 metres.

You can expect 400 kiters from 25 countries participating in this festival with cultural and artiste performances being held in the evening.

Sarawak International Dragon Boat Regatta

This event is participated by nearly 70 countries around the world with over 50 million participants in Asia alone, particularly from China and Southeast Asia.  It was also adopted as part of the ASEAN Games 2010 in Guangzhou, China.

The Dragon Boat Race continues to be an important event in the tourism calendar of countries involved in dragon boat races around the world.  The event in Sarawak attracts global participation and promotes local tourism, thereby increasing tourist arrivals.

Borneo Jazz

Another highly anticipated music festival, the Borneo Jazz Festival is one of the longest running Jazz festivals in the region. There will be two nights of four performances each by regionally and internationally recognised jazz musicians.


If you have more questions regarding our Taming Borneo adventure, please do leave a comment in the comment section below, or start a discussion; tell us your personal Taming Borneo experience!

Also do follow along our adventure on our social media platforms:

Instagram: @MyTourismChannel or #tamingborneo  

Catch up on the latest episodes by clicking on the thumbnails below:

Sarawak : EP1

Sarawak : EP1

Episode

Sarawak : EP2

Episode 3

Sarawak : EP3

Sarawak : EP4

Sarawak : EP4

Sarawak : EP5

Sarawak : EP5

Sarawak : EP6

Sarawak : EP6

Categories
Malaysia Travel Guide

20th Rainforest World Music Festival Comes To WOMEX 2016

20th Rainforest World Music Festival Comes To WOMEX 2016

SANTIAGO DE COMPOSTELA, SPAIN, Thursday – Sarawak Tourism Board (STB) is presenting the 20th installment of its annual event, the Rainforest World Music Festival (RWMF) in World Music Expo (WOMEX) in Santiago de Compostela, Spain from October 20-23.

The RWMF will be celebrating its 20th edition next year at the Sarawak Cultural Village in Damai, on the 14-16 July, with plans on making the Festival celebration bigger than ever.

With the interactive afternoon workshops, the audience has the opportunity to learn, understand and play the indigenous musical instruments from the performers during the day and later on witness and appreciate its beauty during the nightly performances.

As a supporter of all ethnic arts, including the culinary arts, festival-goers are able to taste a variety of local and fusion cuisine from the Village Food Mart.

They will also be able to buy local beaded, woven, painted or carved handicrafts or witness their creation, or even get a traditional hand-tap tattoo at the nearby Tattoo Expo.

The festival, one of its kind in the region, has attracted over 20,000 returning foreign and domestic attendees and has been awarded Songlines’ Top 25 Best International Festivals award six years in a row since 2010.

Datuk Haji Abdul Wahab Bin Aziz, Chairman of Sarawak Tourism Board (STB) said, “We want to stage the uniqueness of world music by bringing in performers from other parts of the world and also to showcase our own ethnic music and to provide them with an opportunity to perform amidst international bands.”

“More innovative ideas are already in the works for our coming 20th Rainforest World Music Festival next year.” said Angelina Bateman, Director of Events Corporate Relations of Sarawak Tourism Board (STB).

While the performance plans remain a surprise, the Board’s efforts in publicizing the Festival are not, with promotions happening at various tourism and travel trade fairs around the world such as ITB Asia in Singapore, World Travel Mart in London, Taipei International Travel Fair in Taiwan and the Asian MICE Forum in Taiwan.

The Festival encourages the appreciation of ethnic art and music from around the world, as well as new interpretations and integration of those arts within modern expression, and it is now brining these values to the world stage.

Updates on the Festival as well as tickets can be found online at the Rainforest World Music Festival official website, www.rwmf.net.

This event is supported by the Ministry of Tourism and Culture Malaysia, Ministry of Tourism, Arts and Culture Sarawak (MTAC) and endorsed by Tourism Malaysia with Malaysia Airlines Berhad as the presenting sponsor.

rwmf2017-womex

Picture shows Barbara Benjamin Atan of Sarawak Tourism Board (left) with Jo Frost, the Editor of Songlines Magazine UK and Jun Lin (right), Artistic Director of RWMF.

Issued by:

Communications Unit
SARAWAK TOURISM BOARD
T: +6 082-423600  F: +6 082-416700 M: +6019-8188946
E: [email protected]

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Tourism Malaysia

Experiencing Borneo’s tribal cultures

Experiencing Borneo’s tribal cultures

Borneo, the third largest island in the world and 4th most populous, is divided up between Indonesia, Malaysia and the tiny nation of Brunei. Malaysian Borneo occupies around 26% of the island, containing the states of Sabah and Sarawak.

Of Sabah’s 3 million plus inhabitants, divided officially into 32 ethnicities, the largest indigenous groups are the Kadazan-Dusun, Murut and Baja. The first two are hill tribes, which are comprised of many sub tribes, while the Bajau are a nomadic sea-faring people who live throughout the Maritime (island) region of Southeast Asia.

“The largest indigenous tribes are the hill tribes, the Kadazan and Dusun tribes and their sub-tribes, often referred to the Kadazandusun, and the Murut. The Kadazandusun live mostly in the interior of Sabah, they are mountain people who believe the mountain is a resting place for the spirits of their departed, and thus it is sacred to them. The Rungus are arguably the most traditional of the indigenous tribes, a sub-tribe of the Kadazandusun the Rungus live mostly in the north near Kudat, many still live in longhouses. The Murut a group of several related tribes once lived in the longhouses like the Rungus, now they have mostly moved into single-family houses in the Tenom area and make a subsistence living from small-scale agriculture.”

Cultural Village, Kuching. Pic: Peter Gronemann, Flickr, Creative Commons.

Cultural Village, Kuching. Pic: Peter Gronemann, Flickr, Creative Commons.

The state of Sarawak is geographically larger than Sabah, but has a smaller population, giving it the lowest population density in all of Malaysia. Sarawak is home to 40 ethnicities, each with its own language and customs. Major ethnic groups include the Iban – the state’s largest group who were formerly known as headhunters. Iban are a longhouse-dwelling people with an impressive knowledge of the flora and fauna of Sarawak. Other groups include the Melanau – fishers and farmers believed to be one of the original settlers of Sarawak and who still practice many traditional animist customs; the Bidayu – land-dwellers mainly concentrated in the west of the island; and the Orang Ulu – a group including many river and plateau-dwelling tribes. The majority members of most tribes have adopted either Muslim (Melanau) or Christian (Iban, Bidayu and Orang Ulu) beliefs, though some still practice traditional tribal religions.

Sarawak – and Malaysian Borneo as a whole – is often referred to as “Asia’s best kept secret” due to its wide variety of cultures and rich biodiversity.

Thankfully there are several ways visitors can experience the traditional lifestyles of the inhabitants of both Sabah and Sarawak. One method is to visit Sarawak Cultural Village, located just 35km from Kuching in the foothills of Mount Santubong. This center showcases and supports the ethnic traditions of Sarawak, including dance, music, arts and crafts. It is also the venue for the World Harvest Festival and the Rainforest World Music Festival.

Dancers, Sarawak. Pic: Ben Sutherland, Flickr, Creative Commons.

Dancers, Sarawak. Pic: Ben Sutherland, Flickr, Creative Commons.

“This living museum depicts the heritage of the major racial groups in Sarawak and conveniently portrays the respective lifestyle amidst 14 acres of equatorial vegetation. It is possible to see Sarawak’s ethnic diversity at a glance. The handicraft is both bewildering and tempting, including the Kain Songket (Malay cloth with gold inlay), Pua Kumbu (Iban housewives textiles), Melanau Terendak (sunhat), Bidayuh tambok (basket), Iban parang (swords), Orang Ulu wood carving and Chinese ceramic.”

There are many other places to witness the customs and lives of Malaysian Borneo’s various tribes. Cultural tourists can visit Lun Bawang settlements and farms, and Bidayuh longhouses in the Borneo highlands, as well as Iban longhouses in Bawang Assan near Sibu, where they can even spend the night.See the Sarawak tourism website for more.

Sabah also has its share of cultural villages, such as Monsopiad Cultural Village on the Penampang River, and the beautiful Mari Mari Cultural Village, located just 25 minutes from the state capital of Kota Kinabalu, where one can see the making of blowpipes, observe traditional tribal tattooing and sample customary tribal cuisine.

From the Sabah tourism website “Be prepared to teleport back to the times of ancient Borneo through the display of unique ingenious architecture, simulated lives and ritualistic ceremonies. Also, get acquainted with each village tribe as you enter their homes and experience their rich culture.”

Those in search of a genuine cultural holiday or those who wish to combine a bit of culture with various types of adventures in Borneo will not be disappointed by what Sabah and Sarawak have to offer. Though the occasional “headhunt” did occur in the past, tribes are now more interested in hospitality as well as preserving and sharing their cultures. This means farming, festivals, weekly open air markets (tamu), maintaining (and adapting) traditional longhouses and continuing a variety of fascinating customs, arts and crafts.

Longhouse, Sabah. Pic: Paul Mannix, Flickr, Creative Commons.

Longhouse, Sabah. Pic: Paul Mannix, Flickr, Creative Commons.