Gong Festival of Kon Tum City Education Sector

NADS - On March 1, at KonKlor communal house, Thang Loi ward, the Department of Education and Training of Kon Tum city, Kon Tum province organized the 7th Gong Festival, Xoang dance, and Brocade costume competition for ethnic minority students in 2025. The festival was attended by 16 teams with 1,080 students from primary and secondary schools in the city. The purpose was to create a useful cultural playground for students to exchange, share, learn, unite, and learn more about gong culture.

Each team participating in the festival must perform two contents, which are gong performances, xoang dances and brocade costumes of the Ba Na and Ja Rai ethnic groups. Mr. A DJung, in Kon Jodri village, Dak Dak Ro Wa commune, a member of the jury, said: “The participants are very young, performing gongs and ancient songs very fluently, xoang dances are beautiful, with the rhythm of gongs and drums; the performances recreate the grave-leaving, new rice celebration, and victory celebrations in accordance with customs and practices; performing beautiful brocade costumes and delicate patterns of each ethnic group, it carries the dreams, soul, and spirituality associated with festival life”.

Confiding to reporters of Photography and Life Magazine, Mr. Thai Khac Hoa, head of the organizing committee, said: “Through the Festival, we help the younger generation to be aware of the role of gongs and xoang in traditional cultural activities, especially folk festivals, so that students will love and appreciate their values more and always be aware of preserving, maintaining and promoting the cultural values of their nation”. Through the Gong Festival, xoang dance and national costume performance, we have created a strong impression, bringing about effectiveness in educating students to see the value of gong culture in the lives of ethnic groups in the Central Highlands”.

The Central Highlands Gong Cultural Space was recognized by UNESCO as an oral and intangible masterpiece of humanity on November 15, 2005. In the vast space of the Central Highlands in general, and Kon Tum City in particular, the owners of the gong cultural space are the ethnic minorities of the Central Highlands and have their origins in a very long-standing cultural and historical tradition. The sound of gongs, sometimes deep and melodious, sometimes majestic and urgent, blends with the sound of streams and winds, living forever with the land and people of the Central Highlands. Gongs play a role as a means to affirm the community and common cultural identity of the Central Highlands ethnic groups as well as of each ethnic group on the colorful land of the mountains and forests on the majestic Truong Son mountain range.

Some pictures at the festival