The 2nd Annual SZLM Blues and Folk Festival is underway after a huge opening last night. This year’s festival is aptly named “The Pearl River Delta Sessions” in homage to the Mississippi River Delta area where the Blues music and culture were born. Though miles away from the United States, this five night, four venue and 20 band music festival shares a similar tone with those muddy-bottom Blues.
Shenzhen is a 21st century melting pot with a variety of races and nationalities all finding a way to make it. Like early 20th century America, Shenzhen residents are learning to live together, work together and grow together, and from this a music culture has taken root.
Many venues in Shenzhen are now taking a chance on local artists and opening their doors to talented Shenzhen musicians. The Shenzhen Local Music Blues and Folk Festival, which is set to run until June 9, is the culmination of this community effort to provide a platform for musical expression and connection.
Last night the festival kicked off with well-traveled and seasoned folk music veteran Gary Hurlstone at Brown Sugar Jar. Hurlstone presented the history of folk music through short films, pictures, stories of his travels around the world and within China, and also performed a few original songs. Following his lead, tonight at Frankie’s American Bar, Chicago born and raised Blues man Corey D. Abrams is presenting the history of Blues music and performing a few original songs. Phoning in on Skype around 9:45pm will be Bobby Taylor, the man responsible for finding and promoting many world-famous acts, such as the Jackson 5 and Whitney Houston. This is definitely a Skype call you don’t want to miss.
This weekend, Coco Park venues Rapscallions Café Bar and La Casa will host more than 15 bands including one Guangzhou solo artist, one Zhuhai Blues veteran and Hong Kong French gypsy folk band, Les Gromechkos.
For full listings of the festival events, check out Shenzhen’s #1 source for live music, shenzhenlocalmusic.com.
Chances are that if you live in Shenzhen and you are an expat, you will have come across someone from CTLC. Perhaps it was the over-enthusiastic crowd of youthful-looking Americans in Coco Park or maybe it was that earnest backpack-wearing laowai conversing seriously, phrasebook in hand, with a corner store attendant in the outer districts of the city.
CTLC stands for the Center for Teaching and Learning in China. It is a teaching program that places foreign teachers in Shenzhen public schools. It began in 1998 with a group of 13 teachers who came out to Shenzhen as part of a work/study semester abroad trip with the University of Memphis. A bit later, it expanded to 50 teachers and a coordinator to look after them. Not long after that, it absolutely exploded.
There was a time (accounts vary, but let’s say about 2008/2009 to be sweepingly general) that if you stumbled across a foreigner in Shenzhen there was almost a 50/50 chance they were from CTLC. They were everywhere. Now that there are more foreigners in Shenzhen, CTLC doesn’t have quite the monopoly on foreigners it once did; but even in its current incarnation it still has a very big footprint. Aside from teaching, the one area CTLC has had a massive impact is the local music scene. Venues like Rapscallions, McCawley’s, La Casa and Frankie’s all owe a great debt to CTLC and continue to feel the program’s presence when it comes to acts playing and audiences coming to see them. La Casa was one of the first places to start up with open mics, closely followed by Rapscallions when it opened in 2011.
To my mind at least, 2011/2012 was something of a breakthrough year for local music in Shenzhen, largely due to timing, the talent, and availability of artists. CTLC was definitely a vanguard of that sea change, mostly due to the sheer size of the program and the kind of talent that comes along with it.
Not long after the program relocates to Shenzhen (August each year) you start finding more and more of the program’s members turning up both on and off stage at open-mic nights. Moreover, CTLC acts as one big social network, so the sheer amount of bodies the program can pack into a room iis a welcome boost to any venue. To be honest, it’s probably a key factor in why so many venues started doing things in such a short space of time. Musicians + alcohol + large audience support, will always = happy venues.
Essentially, CTLC works because it has a wide-range of talent ripe for cherry-picking by Shenzhen musicians already on the scene. In 2011, a certain threshold was reached, and the scene has never looked back. Current local bands like BRUE, The Friendly Cannons and InFuze each have their fair share of CTLC members, and there are other bands who’ve already come and gone.
At the heart of this is the familiar rhythms of expat life that many expats will recognise. CTLC is a year-long program. Many teachers stay for more, but most do not. In terms of the musical scene in Shenzhen, CTLC’s best feature is also its worst. Year after year incredibly talented musicians turn up, but year after year they also leave. It’s the nature of the beast, and there is something almost heartbreakingly profound in it. As someone who has lived in Shenzhen both within and without CTLC I can say the only thing to do is make the most of it while it lasts, whilst simultaneously holding fast to the knowledge that something else equally unique – though very different – is just coming into view over the horizon.
In short, the local music scene in Shenzhen, aided in no small part by the CTLC program, has never been in better health. You should go enjoy it in its current incarnation while it lasts, as this time next year it will be a very different creature altogether.
A performer on Zhonghua Square, which Zhu Desong frequently visits.
A nationally respected musician has told Southern Metropolis Daily that Guangzhou is the best city in China in which to be a musician. Zhu Desong, who helped launch the careers of such megastars as Jay Chou and Luo Dayou, pointed to the talent and diversity of Guangzhou’s street performers as an example of the quality of the city’s music scene. However, he lamented that the city had lost its status as the capital of original music to Beijing over the past decade or so.
Zhu, a descendant of Song Dynasty scholar and poet Zhu Xi, is a singer, songwriter, producer and manager who came to Guangzhou in 1988 after being offered a job by the Pacific Audio and Visual Company.
When Zhu came to Guangzhou, the influx of migrant workers was at its most rapid and his career as a producer rode the wave of vibrancy of Guangzhou in the 90s. Stars whose music he has produced include Song Zuying and Na Ying.
During what Zhu calls the Golden Age of the Guangzhou music scene, there were monthly Original Music Appreciation Gatherings, and there would be awards for best original song of the month, season, and year. Local television and radio would help musicians promote their original songs, but Zhu thinks these media have since bowed to commercial pressure.
However, Zhu still uses his considerable influence to support the city’s street performers. He co-organized the concert “游唱侠英雄会” which roughly translates as Heroic Traveling Artists which was held in Wuhan and Lijiang as well as Guangzhou. The concert brought in a total revenue of 100,000 RMB.
A performer on the subway. Many of the city’s street performers rely on it as a livelihood.
He often stops and listens to performers on footbridges, street corners and in underpasses. Their music varies in quality, he says. Some do it just for recreational purposes, others do it for a living. The ones who do it for a living may struggle initially, but Zhu insists that if they work hard they can have a good life in Guangzhou. All of Zhu’s musician friends own houses and cars.
Zhu attributes Guangzhou’s loss of its status as the country’s original music capital to complacency and lack of investment. One particularly telling moment was the city’s failure to use the Asia Games to promote a song that could be as famous as “Beijing, Beijing.”
Despite Beijing having more opportunities for musicians, Zhu still thinks that Guangzhou is the friendliest, most pleasant and most open-minded city in China. He mentions with particular keenness the wide variety of restaurants that appear unremarkable from the outside but offer very special food.
Here is a video of probably the best known of Zhu’s songs: September 9.
Intrepid expats trying to make the Middle Kingdom rock are not a new phenomenon. In recent years, British man Archie Hamilton has been organizing rock concerts in China, with both local and foreign talent. Russian woman Liu Ba sings rock songs in Chinese. As The Nanfang has said before, Shenzhen is slowly developing a music scene of its own. At the forefront of this is rock band The Smiling Knives, fronted by Briton Gary Hurlstone.
When The Nanfang spoke to Gary, he expressed optimism about the future of rock music in the PRD, but stressed that Shenzhen was still far behind Guangzhou, where there were more venues and more bands, and Shenzhen suffered from lack of demand for live original music. The band also includes Liang Ying, a Shenzhen-born singer and percussionist who is more influenced by Jimmy Page than Jimmy Lin. So he is confident that there is a hungry rock audience out there somewhere. He also pointed to The Nanfang’s own Rue Moyer, who is covering the most interesting music in Shenzhen on his blog.
Because the line-up includes members from Britain, Mexico and China, and has collaborated with musicians from all over, its influences are eclectic. As well as rock, their sound includes funkadelica, British folk and Balkan and Arabic fusion. Their new album is called The Zen Kick, but they also play covers when they perform live.
Rock music in China has a short but colourful history. It began to emerge in the early 1980s after Deng Xiaoping introduced reform and opening up policies. Its birthplace was in Beijing, and much of it remains underground due to censorship of lyrical content and lack of mainstream demand.
The Nanfang is pleased that Rue Moyer, the founder of Shenzhen Local Music, has joined as a weekly contributor. Each Thursday, Rue will look at the local music scene in the Pearl River Delta. You can read more on his website at Shenzhen Local Music.
Music is ingrained in us. It’s as intricate as the DNA that makes up our being and as rhythmic as a heartbeat. It was always a matter of time until the need for music in Shenzhen was backed by an obvious enough demand. The time is now. How do I know? We have 3 regular open mic night’s happening throughout the city.
In nearly every city, in every country around the world you can find at least one open mic night. These vehicles for expressing creative freedom, either for showing off your goods or merely conquering some stage fright, are a staple to music communities worldwide. They offer a welcoming stage to any level of musician for presenting well-tuned pieces or rough drafts to an audience which, at most times, will listen. At the very least they’ll refrain from booing!
In countries like America, an open mic is a neutral stage upon which musicians can test their newest riffs and producers, agents, and pro musicians can scope out undiscovered talent. From a venue owner’s side of the bar, they can pack the joint with free live music, minus the free booze musicians usually get. Unfortunately, Shenzhen isn’t Nashville and isn’t sought out for its musical prowess, so local music and open mic nights have barely even existed. As anyone that’s lived here for more than a minute can attest to, the only real rhythm you feel comes from the thousands of construction workers hammering away all day. However, most of the red clay has been replaced with foundations; the sea reclaimed for city building projects and now, after more than 30 years, people have taken root. Now, as Shenzhen approaches its 40th birthday, a community for music is starting to bud.
Sunday Nights at 10pm
The first to start looking for live local music, a place that has been doing it long before it was practical and remains by far the most interesting, is La Casa in Coco Park. Need proof? Check out this video:
This is David Seymour, owner and active participant in open mic, singing his own song, “Old Joe Hammer”. It was 2am and we’d gone through 8 musicians by this point. Notic, everyone huddled around the stage, each person pounding away on some form of percussive instrument; djembe, Cajon, washboard, chairs, tambourine. Jordan’s even wailing on a water jug! It’s tribal, it’s simple and it’s intimate. It’s authentic. Ask most customers why they’re singing along on a Sunday night until 2am and they’d tell you it’s because they want to experience raw music backed by travelling talent. La Casa offers a small stage with a minimal setup, and most people play a mix of covers and originals.
Mondays, 9:30pm-Midnight
The second venue to offer an open stage was McCawley’s in Sea World, Shekou. It’s been on about a year or so now and fills an otherwise empty 2nd floor and generates revenue on Monday night. This stage is completely different from La Casa’s. Here, musicians get access to a fully equipped stage setup; instruments, amps, band space and an atmosphere which epitomizes the Rock & Roll scene. And, Rock is likely what you’ll hear if you pop in. Shekou is the hub for long-term expats in Shenzhen. Many of the residents are middle-aged and raising their families here. Incidentally, most of the musicians relive glory days by jamming away on Hendrix, The Beatles, and Clapton tunes. Shekou is also where most of the live music in Shenzhen happens, so more often than not musos from the local venues stop in to help the open micers feel like real rockers. On occasion, you’ll even find local Chinese busker musicians strumming away.
Thursday Nights
As of 2 weeks ago, the third open mic is on Thursday night at Rapscallions Café Bar, just around the corner from La Casa in Coco Park. When you walk into Raps you won’t find a stage, just some mic stands and an amp. Why? It wasn’t designed with music in mind. But alas, the owner is himself a musician. After little deliberation and keen enthusiasm, Darragh made music a priority for Raps.
Brian Wegener singing at the 2nd Rapscallions Open Mic Night
Music started about 2 months ago with John Hutton, a local teacher and old school tunes player. I’m talking 60+ year old music – sweet, huh? Within a week, he added fiddle extraordinaire Graham to his show. Shortly after, I met Darragh and introduced my entourage of players and a Xinjiang, flamenco style trio to the mix and now music is on all weekend. Audience support and crowd turnout blew our expectations out of the water, so we’ve added a Thursday night open mic night. In the two weeks we’ve run it, we’ve had more than twenty musicians peel out of the woodwork to pick away on the guitar.
Raps is quickly becoming a house of music and gaining a reputation for a venue to hear tunes you may have long ago forgotten.
Shenzhen isn’t known for its music scene. It’s only ever been a transient business city, as it remains in its infancy. But the infant loves music the same as the old man. And, the infant has the advantage of being introduced to the best music from its grandfather’s generation. This international city has the advantage of drawing a highly talented, culturally diverse populace from which to build its music foundations from. Believe me when I say, it’s only a matter of time.
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