National Geographic Music (National Geographic)

Standing on the surf where the South China Sea hits Malaysian Borneo's largest state of Sarawak, you see the mystical Mount Santubong, and tucked away just below - an isolated resort paradise. It is also the destination point for an annual festival known as the Rainforest World Music Festival, celebrating its 13th year of music this weekend. The venue is the Sarawak Cultural Village, a 17-acre showcase of the 28 ethnic groups that live in Sarawak.

"Here we are standing at the grand entrance of the Sarawak Cultural Village. It's like a gateway to a Sarawakian experience," explains Jane Lian Labang, the General Manager of the village. Labang has been working here since its doors opened to the public in 1990. Walking between two intricately carved columns, she explains how "each of the ethnic groups have their designs incorporated in this grand entrance. It faces the South China Sea." Labang continues, pointing out towards the water, "we have the car park over there, so it is like people are coming from the sea."

As you enter, the village comes to life with music and sounds echoing, and Mount Santubong rises up steeply behind and the man-made lake in the center. Around it are various styles of buildings, with exhibits that open you to the world of Borneo in a sort of "living museum." People from the various ethnic groups in Sarawak make traditional musical instruments and demonstrate fabric weaving, hunting and cooking methods.

Next stop is a longhouse - a long wooden structure where families live in a communal setting - where elderly musician Dungan Gagon from the Bidayuh ethnic group plays on the Orang Ulu stringed lute known as the sape. As he strums, tourists from America make their way along the bamboo deck, snapping away on their point-and-shoots. It takes more than an hour's drive from the Sarawak Cultural Village to find a genuine longhouse like this one.

This mock village, though, has kept traditions alive in many ways. One of three musicians from the Sarawak Cultural Village in the group Bakih that took part in this weekend's Rainforest World Music Festival is 49-year-old percussionist Johari Morshidi. He and his son, who joined him on stage 11 years ago, have launched their musical careers at the Sarawak Cultural Village. " Yes, there has been a lot of change in my career. I have been able to take my music to other countries. The festival also lets us learn from other music traditions so we can try new sounds," says Morshidi.

One of the founders and current Artistic Director of the Rainforest World Music Festival, Randy Raine-Reusch took his own personal journey into the heart of Borneo on a quest to learn to play and document instruments on the verge of passing into antiquity. "So I thought how do I preserve this and keep it going?" says Raine-Reusch. "I thought the only way was to figure out how to recontextualize the music. Head hunting and wedding rituals that were no longer practiced after Christian missionaries came centuries ago. So there was no context for this music anymore. So I thought, why not recontextualize it as performance and start a festival." It is also a way to revive local pride in the rich ethnic diversity of the region. "I wanted the musicians from the longhouse to realize what treasures they were keepers of by putting them on stage with international musicians who were from other countries who were doing the same thing," emphasizes Raine-Reusch.

SEE 2010 RAINFOREST WORLD MUSIC FESTIVAL PHOTO GALLERY HERE

Stage and construction crews worked round the clock, days before the festival preparing the venue. The festival has grown from an audience of a few hundred in its first year, to over 20,000 people. Spanning three days, music fans descend on the village for the musician workshops and evening music performances. The audience is a mixture of people from the nearby city of Kuching, tourists and those from Kuala Lumpur who want to be in a place where anything goes. The backdrop of the stage is the Satubong Mountain covered in lush rainforest foliage. "It is like everyone is coming out of the jungle for this," jokes Theo Van Eenbergen, who has been Stage Manager for the festival for the last 10 years.

It is not just a festival, but a way to create enthusiasm about traditional music. "It takes one single person to take an instrument and carry it on to the next generation," says Randy Raine-Reusch. "If this festival can inspire one person to carry on for another generation, hopefully we can keep this rare music going."

The concert also brings musicians from the wider world to perform. This year the festival features 20 groups, amongst them bands hailing from Italy,Russia,Iran,France, Burkina Faso, Indonesia, Peru, and the Czech Republic. For the four member 20-something-year-olds in the Monster Ceilidh Band from the United Kingdom, this has been a year of discovery, for music and travel. This is the first year we have been off the leash," enthuses Kieran Szifris, the mandocello player in the group. "I had to ask someone where Borneo was first of all," laughs Amy Thatcher. We're still not quite sure where we are!" On stage, in front of thousands, their music inspired dancing as the crowd kicked it up in the rain soaked mud of the arena.

The festival has become a gathering of old and new friends for many of the regular concertgoers. "I see people here every year that I don't see any other time. Not only foreigners, but even people locally", says Cynthia Lobato from Kuching, an avid festival-goer who has been coming to the Rainforest World Music festival since it started 13 years ago. "I remember the first year I came, people here didn't know how to dance to Cuban music, but they do now."

For most of the musicians, festival days begin with a plunge into the hotel's massive infinity pool. Islands on the horizon of the sparkling sea are home to turtle reservations. Over the weekend, if you want to find Grimaldo del Solar and Ramon Perez Prieto from the Peruvian group, Novalima, just look poolside. Novalima's music is Afro-Peruvian, rooted in the rhythms brought by black slaves shipped over from West Africa as early as the 16th century to labor in the fields. "The traditional Peruvian instruments have been played in the original way for so long, you know, young people are not interested in it anymore. The more sounds we mix with it, it's appealing to younger audiences and this has become a way of bringing back the roots to younger audiences. "When we started mixing the traditional and modern sounds, a lot of the young people were really into it and unconsciously listening to their own traditional music.," says Prieto.

Novalima was founded by four friends who met when they were only 13. Even when some moved abroad and worked, they kept sharing music ideas. "The internet was slow those days so we used DHL a lot and would burn tracks to disc and send them to each other," says Grimaldo del Solar."We'd get each other on the phone even," Prieto adds, "and hold the phone up to the stereo speaker and say, hey listen to this!"

The electronic part of Novalima's musical equation is international and modern, paired with more traditional vocals and percussion. The slaves bought in by the Spanish rulers were not allowed to play music, according to the Church. They had to get creative and find rhythm in everyday objects around them, such as the popular cajon, originally a box they used to carry cotton and sugar cane from the fields, or the cajita, a box used by the Catholic priests for Sunday collections. The most bizarre, though, would be the donkey's jaw that is either struck or scraped to make a rhythm.

The members of Novalima were concerned about stepping on traditional music ground in fear that people would condemn them. "We were worried when we started to play that they wouldn't take it so well, but we were surprised," says Grimaldo del Solar. "Maybe the Afro-Peruvian musicians would think we are destroying their music. Now we have invited a lot of these people to the studio they are really open to working with us. I understand it is a way for them to go outside of Peru." Ramon Perez Prieto interjects to clarify they didn't let everything slide by, though. "They make sure we respect the rhythms the way they should be. If we do it wrong, they will correct us."

In the hotel lobby, Prieto connects to the wi-fi and works on a track for their upcoming release in early 2011. It is a common theme. Late at night, the lobby is full of musicians tapping away on their laptops, quickly uploading videos and messages on their Facebook and MySpace pages. Even in the middle of nowhere, the outside world is kept up to date with the artists' musical experiences in the jungle.

Léila Negrau is on her laptop most days, white ear buds in, chatting and laughing away. She tells me she is talking to her family. Negrau is from French Reunion Island, located east of Madagascar. On stage, Negrau straddles the top of a giant rouler drum, with her lioness hair and fiery eyes. It isn't an instrument meant for women, though. "The big drum is for the men and they would tell me that I am rough, that I am bad girl," she says to me. "Because you have to jump on the rouler and it is not elegant for a woman. And you have to shout. It is not elegant for a woman. And you have your hair like a lion, and it is not elegant for a woman. It is rough. I had some problems at the beginning. It has changed and I am quite an example to the women." She isn't only breaking gender barriers with he choice of instruments, but also her choice of song styles. Most of her music is the music of the slaves. The music was banned on the island because of it's association with Creole culture. It went underground and didn't resurface until the 1960's.

The Sarawak Tourism Board, the organizers of the Rainforest World Music Festival, want to represent broad styles of music this year in a three day festival with hands-on workshops where musicians share techniques with common threads - with flutes from Japan, India or Portugal; lutes of all shapes and sizes from the United Kingdom, Canada and China; and traditional folk dances from Russia and the Balkans.

One of the highlights of the weekend was the band Farafina, a name which means the "land of the black skin." The group has been touring for over 30 years and has made a solid name for itself on the world music scene. Though many of the members have died or left the group, Souleymane Sanou, aka Mani, has kept it going, recruiting talent from back home in Burkina Faso. Even though many African groups have long used electric instrumentation in their music, Sanou says with deep conviction, "It is our culture, we don't want to throw this away. We want to continue to keep this with us. The youth has to keep the tradition going."

People are listening to music from all over the world. The best part of this event is when you come across a sound or a genre of music that blows you away, something you've never heard before. The Kimura-Ono Duo from Japan was one of these moments. Players of the Tsugaru Shamisen, an instrument used by blind musicians who traveled through snow storms house-to-house for food. The only way people would come out of their homes is if the musicians were good. This created a highly technical, fast music. The speed and power behind the music makes one think of Megadeth or Metallica. "I was shocked and impressed and it sounded like rock music to me, like Van Halen, who I love," says Eisuro Ono.

The music has become a trend of sorts in Japan with contests to test player's skill and speed throughout the country. Shunsuke Kimura, who is also an accomplished flute player, explains why musicians are able to go on such incredible improvisational tangents, "you look and hear other people, the music is not noted. That way you can improvise."

With all of the musicians staying in one hotel with no other restaurant or bar in comfortable walking distance, the theme of every night was improvisations. Into the morning hours, jam sessions continue with some of the strangest combinations of instruments and voices you could gather in one place - two stringed lutes from China, bagpipes made from the belly of a goat from Portugal, or an accordion adapted in so many countries. Over the three days, the musical trip was unpredictable in the best way possible. Even though two out of the three nights were hit by epic downpours only a real rainforest can produce, the audience remained committed to enjoying themselves. One concertgoer covered head-to-toe in mud shouts out while she swings her hips to the infectious boom of Portugal's Galandum Galundaina. "I have no idea what I am dancing to, but I like it."