This summer, the streets of Fuzhou and Beijing overflowed with song as over 1,000 Chinese and American performers gathered together for the Bond with Kuliang: China-U.S. Youth Choir Festival. For the BYU Choir students, it was a once-in-a-lifetime experience to perform for the people of China and be beacons of light to the world. 

The theme of the festival was “singing for peace,” an especially meaningful theme for our students. While each of the performing groups came from a different part of the world, they were able to become united through the power of music.  

When the choirs weren’t singing on stage in formal concerts, they were participating in exchange performances with local schools and staging flash mob performances for people on the street. Amelia Davis wrote about the collegiate exchange performances, “Connecting with people in that way is something I’ll never get somewhere else.” In Sanfangqixiang, a thousand-year-old neighborhood in Fuzhou, BYU students enchanted passersby with a surprise performance in front of a heart-shaped tree, the perfect symbol of the love that BYU strives to share with the world in every performance.   

From flashmobs and festivals to impromptu sing-alongs, the Bond with Kuliang festival proved to be an unforgettable adventure for everyone involved. For many students, China was somewhere they had only seen in textbooks and photos. Now, it has become a living, breathing place that they will remember for the rest of their lives. Singer Amelia Davis wrote, “I hope audiences took away that we love them & that we love music! We felt so much love from them, so I just hope they felt that in return” Director Sonja Poulter echoed, “In a world that is so divided about many things, love can bring us together, and culture can bring us together.”