Sound investment as indie label turns up volume on folk music

Teaming up with Art China, a Beijing-based art organization centering on protecting and promoting traditional Chinese music, the label launched a project in Beijing on Nov 26 to record music played on traditional Chinese instruments, which will be released digitally online.

"These ancient musical instruments are facing challenges from the contemporary music scene. They are priceless and ageless. We want to protect these musical instruments and give them a modern twist to enable the younger generations to enjoy them," says Shen Lihui, founder of Modern Sky, in Beijing.

A group of young musicians, including Qin Siyuan, Huang Jin and Deng Boyu, have been collecting traditional Chinese musical instruments such as the rattle drum, gong and huantou (a flat iron-bar that hums smoothly when rubbed with a metal stick). They combined electronic music with the sounds of these old instruments in a short performance to mark the launch of the project.