Report: The Rise and Implementation of Intangible Cultural Heritage Protection for Music in China

Since the beginning of this century, China has engaged with the preservation and development of its intangible cultural heritage with an intensity unlikely to be matched by any other country in the world. To this end, it has rolled out a large number of initiatives across all levels of government. This has led to a national intangible heritage list containing 1,828 items as of 2014, hundreds of millions of yuan invested in preservation, and visitor numbers of up to 20 million for major events on intangible cultural heritage. At the same time, this enormous effort raises myriad questions in its relationship to recognizing diversity, identity, empowering communities, nation-building, urbanization, and other contemporary realities. Loosely following the five domains outlined in the introduction, this paper describes the first fifteen years of intangible heritage protection as it relates to music in China, and some of the key issues for its future.