Members of the choral group Dong Singers, clad in traditional attire, host an interactive session with students of Shanghai Conservatory of Music. Photo provided to China Daily

An old Dong saying goes, "singing nurtures the heart just as rice nourishes the body".

So it's no surprise the ethnic group from Southwest China's Guizhou province has always been notable for its traditional choir.

Dong Singers, a six-member vocal group from Guizhou, took part in the International Festival of Vocal Music－a cappella, held from May 7-16 in Leipzig, Germany.

During the festival, the singers－all farmers from Liping county－performed to a full house at the Evangelisch Reformierte Church.

The musical tradition is called kgal laox in the Dong language and known in English as "grand song of the Dong people".

"There was no amplification, and the natural reverberation in the church sounded very much like that in the mountains where the singers come from," Mu Qian, a performing art curator who organized the group's participation in the festival, tells China Daily over e-mail.

"The audience enjoyed the music so much that the singers had to give two encores."