Rainforest World Music Festival in Borneo

For the past fifteen years, thousands of people have travelled to the island of Borneo for the Rainforest World Music Festival. This year from the 13th to the 15th of July people will flock to Santubong, a mountain in Borneo, a 45 minute drive from Kuching to experience the wonders this festival has to offer.

The days start at 2PM with workshops that allow the festival-goers and performers to come together and share their knowledge. In these workshops people will be able to experience the music and dance of the different cultures close up. Then at night, on a stage built by the lake and held under the open sky there are five hour concerts on a main stage and the smaller stage Tree Life goes on well into the night.

Throughout it’s duration the mountains of people attending this festival hope to capture it’s free spirt in the midst of thousand-year old trees that has been promised to them by anyone who’s ever attended. As well as taking part in the afternoon workshops that consist of ethno-musical lectures, jamming sessions and mini concerts that can only be experienced first hand.

This year’s line up includes performers from Burkina Faso, Mongolia, Brazil and other exotic places, as well as being joined by some native Malaysian performers. One of these being the Diplomats of Drums, a 13 piece band that consider themselves to be ‘Music Without Borders’. They’ve won Best Live Act by MTV Asia as well as Asian Musician Magazine three times because of their showmanship, tight choreography as well as the close rapport they have with their audiences.

But there’s not just music to enjoy, Sarawak is so rich with natural treasures and it has been said that it is a place for history, mystery, romance and exotic adventures and you can enjoy tales of how the first Europeans trekked there with stories of princes and pirates, of headhunters and explorers.