During one of the “Songs of Struggle” discussion sessions at the 2014 Smithsonian Folklife Festival’s Kenya program, musicians Peter Akwabi and John Nzenze performed a song that Nzenze originally wrote in 1963
“I have to go show the flip-flop guys! They’re going to be so proud, right?” It was day five of the Festival, and an eight-year-old boy, beaming and sweaty, was proudly presenting to me the result of his labors in the Kenya Family Activities tent
China program coordinator Jing Li visited Songpan County in Sichuan Province to talk with Zewang Renqing and Geluo Zhaxi, the artists and brothers who performed Qiang polyphonic singing at this year’s Folklife Festival
If you visited the 2014 Folklife Festival, you may have noticed a wacky construction in the Kenya program area with beer bottles and other odds and ends sticking out of the sides.
The Kenya: Mambo Poa program at the 2014 Smithsonian Folklife Festival invited two bead artists from Kenya: Susana Daniel Chemakwany and Susan Naserian Nketoria.
You only have to take a few bites of soda bread to see how it could have sustained a family of nine
The Inner Mongolian ensemble Ih Tsetsn won over crowds at the 2014 Smithsonian Folklife Festival with their complex harmonies and high-energy music. Here, they perform a traditional song of worship, or song ge, praising the land and nature.
Three and a half weeks after the Folklife Festival, there are still a few pieces to pick up. Participants settled back home in Kenya and China are starting to send in their feedback
It used to all depend on individual effort to promote Qiang embroidery, which was very difficult, but after the earthquake the government funded “help centers” for us to help teach women to embroider in order to make a living.
Amid the bustling crowds, impromptu Maasai dances, and rhythmic benga tunes that filled the Kenya: Mambo Poa site on the National Mall during the 2014 Smithsonian Folklife Festival