page_title: Rainforest World Music Festival
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Rainforest World Music Festival / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Sarawak Sape performers who came from Belaga to perform at the World Music Exhibition at Marseilles, France.
context_page_description: The Rainforest World Music Festival is an annual three-day music festival celebrating the diversity of world music, held in Kuching, Sarawak, Malaysia, with daytime music workshops, cultural displays, craft displays, food stalls, and main-stage evening concerts. The festival has been awarded 25 of the best International Festivals by Songlines for six consecutive years; from 2010 to 2015.
  The festival features a wide range of performances from traditional music, to world fusion and contemporary world music. The festival emphasizes the use of traditional acoustic world instruments, although electric accompaniment instruments are common.
context_section_description: Back in 1997, a Canadian musicologist named Randy Raine-Reusch visited Robert Basiuk, who was Deputy Chief Executive Officer of the Sarawak Tourism Board then. Randy was researching ethnic music and was particularly interested in the Sape, played mainly by the Kayan and Kenyah people of Sarawak. During their meetings, they discussed a possibility of Sarawak having an annual music festival along the lines other festivals in the world.
  At a dinner one night in 1997 at the home of Edgar Ong, together with Edric his brother who was the President of Society Atelier, suggestions for a catchy name to call the music festival arose. It was Edgar who finally proposed the Rainforest World Music Festival, and thus it was agreed to by all present. 
  
  To test the idea, a group of local musicians were formed to take Sarawak music to the world stage at the World Music Expo (WOMEX) festival in Marseilles, France. 
  "I had an invitation from WOMEX in Marseilles to bring some traditional musicians, so I suggested to Bob, and the Tourism Board, that we should send some musicians there to promote Sarawak." - Randy Raine-Reusch
  With the help of Jayl Langub from Majlis Adat Istiadat (Native Customary Laws Authority), two sape players, Asang Lawai and Tegit Usat were brought to Kuching from upper stretches of Balui River in Belaga and was join by Erang Lahang and Uchau Bilong. They rehearsed with Randy for a week in Kuching and left for Marseilles to perform at the WOMEX festival. Hardened European agents, managers and festival directors were brought to tears at the beauty and purity of their performance on the sape.
  Upon returning to Sarawak after WOMEX, Randy and Robert attended a meeting with Datin Julia Chong, representatives of Sarawak Music Society and committee members of a cultural association called Society Atelier Sarawak. The Sarawak Music Society was approached to run the show, but found it beyond their scope. The members of Society Atelier Sarawak, and particularly its president Edric Ong, gave a lot of logistic support to the undertaking. But it was the Sarawak Tourism Board who undertook the task of consolidating and financing the event.
  In March 1998, the Tourism Board approved the funding for the festival, but with the provision that the organiser be the Sarawak Tourism Board. The Society Atelier Sarawak was to take the role of technical support in terms of the music and Randy was appointed as the main consultant for the event. By this time, the rest of Sarawak Tourism Board staff were being conscripted in to assist with the organization and running of the festival; behind-the-scenes roles they took on and have continued to fill until the present day.
  The crowd in the first year was small with an audience of only 300, but soon escalated to become one of the most awaited musical fiestas that Sarawak proudly hosts each year.
caption: Sape Performers at WOMEX 1997 in Marseilles, France.
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