Thanks to Mike Weis for turning me on to this NPR spot on the Dong People of China. Of note is the track Sound Imitation: ‘Cicadas Are Crying’. Awesome a capella vocal madness.
All the clips can be streamed via the NPR media player on the left hand side of the window. From the site:
“Southwest China village of Dimen, song takes the place of the written word. People in Dimen learn to read and write in the official national language — Mandarin Chinese — but they speak in their own tongue: the language of the Dong people. Their voices imitate cicadas in the fields above the village. Dimen is isolated, but like most places in modern China, it’s learning the greater world is not so far away. With the recently released collection, Dong Folk Songs: People and Nature in Harmony,  people everywhere can now hear this unique song style”