Zhabai Song Festival

The festival grows from a Buyei legend: long ago the devoted young couple Zha Lang and Bai Mei were separated when Zha Lang died fighting a tiger to save his village and Bai Mei followed him in death, becoming rhododendrons on the hill. To honour their faithful love the Buyei gather each year on the 23rd of the sixth lunar month at Zhabai village in Xingyi to sing, a tradition of centuries that became the Zhabai Song Festival.

During the festival tens of thousands of Buyei in festive dress gather at Zhabai village, making friends and exchanging feelings through song, with antiphonal mountain singing, langshao courtship, lion dance, embroidered-ball tossing and trade, the singing often running through the night.

One of the most solemn Buyei song festivals, the Zhabai festival carries Buyei oral literature, courtship custom and festive culture, an important vehicle for studying southwest minority folklore and oral tradition; it is listed among the folklore items on the national ICH register.