On the night of 6 August, nearly a hundred distinguished guests from home and abroad gathered at Beijing Language and Cultural Center for Diplomatic Missions (LCC), to appreciate the LCC ICH choral concert featuring the Poya Songbook dedicatedly presented by the Poya Songbook Choir of Funing County, Wenshan Zhuang and Miao Autonomous Prefecture, Yunnan Province.

The Poya Songbook was found in the Poya Village. It is a rural community of Zhuang people in Funing County, Wenshan Prefecture, on the eastern tip of Yunnan Province. The songbook contains 81 primitive pictographic characters representing 81 folk songs of the local Zhuang people, which was printed on a piece of home-woven cloth. The songbook records a love story of a young man and a young woman of the local Zhuang people, from the moment when they meet at the first time, and the moment when they fall in love, to the moment when they take an oath of lifelong companionship. In 2011, the Poya Songbook was inscribed onto the national Intangible Cultural Heritage List.

The Poya Songbook Choir extended their warm welcome to all guests by singing the song “Where Are Guests from” at the entrance to LCC and help guests wear scented sachets embroidering one of the 81 picture-like icons with auspicious meanings. The choir then performed ten songs that are full of charm unique to the Zhuang ethnic group including Today Is a Good Day. Their performance vividly depicted the picturesque scenery of their hometown and the romantic life of the local Zhuang people. Their choral performance has won rapturous applause from the audience. Apart from the performance, a display of creative cultural products and farm produce from Wenshan Prefecture has added extraordinary charm to the concert.