Music and Nationalism: Exile Tibetan Pop Music and the Social Life of Cholsum Droshey

Learning Goals

After you have studied this chapter, you should be able to:

1. Discuss some possible relationships between nationalism and music.
2. Describe and recognize characteristics of musical style that are typically present in exile-produced Tibetan pop music.
3. Identify in what ways Cholsum Droshey conveys a nationalist message, including through musical and visual elements.
4. Discuss some other meanings that Cholsum Droshey has for diverse Tibetan listeners, with examples.

Introduction: Music and Nationalism

Before you start reading, let’s begin with a short writing activity.

1. Take a few moments to free-write about the concept of nationalism. Some questions to get you started: what is nationalism? If you’re not sure, what do you think the word might mean? What does the term imply? What comes to mind when you see this word, and why? Are there any aspects of your understanding of the term that are fuzzy or unclear? How does this term relate to your own life? Does it conjure positive, negative, or neutral feelings in you? Why might that be?
2. Now, brainstorm some potential connections between nationalism and music. What are some ways music might relate to nationalism, or vice versa? What might be one nationalist function of music? Can you think of any specific examples, in your personal life or in the world at large? What else comes to mind when you think of nationalism and music?
3. If possible, discuss your answers with someone else who has also done this activity. In what ways are your answers similar to or different from each other? Why do you think this might be?

“Nationalism” is one of those words that we see, hear, and use fairly often, yet we rarely stop to think about what it means. The term can mean several things in different contexts, taking on a positive sense for some groups and a negative sense for others. Usually, when we use this word, we’re talking about something related to what defines a particular nation and who gets to belong to that nation. It is common to assume that nations are rather simple, obvious things. We understand our world to be made up of a bunch of nation-states, which have certain territories, populations, and governing systems. You’re probably sitting in a nation-state right now. Think for a moment about that nation-state: Is it something that exists on its own, objectively, independently of you and the other people in it? If all of humanity was wiped out, would that or any other nation-state still exist?

Ethnomusicology answers each of these questions with a resounding “no.” Ethnomusicologists, and other social scientists, argue that nation-states are a social construct, invented by humans as a way to organize land masses and groups of people. If so, then nationalism is the system of ideas that organizes land and people into the current system of nation-states, by drawing certain kinds of boundaries around them, determining who and what belongs to a particular nation-state at any given time (Turino 2000). Nationalism claims that people of a certain nation share certain fundamental similarities, and that therefore they should feel camaraderie towards one another.

When we understand nations and nationalism this way, we can get some insight into music’s power, as an active social force, regarding nationalism. Music can create nationalist feelings by conveying patriotic messages, designating who and what should belong to a certain nation. Music can spread existing nationalist ideas and stories, and can create new ones. Music can also dispute prevailing ideas about nationalism among a group of people, by calling attention to the incoherencies or flaws in those ideas, or by communicating a different message about what a certain nation could or should be.

In all of these cases, music’s relationship to nationalism comes down to music’s meaning: what kind of message about the nation is the music conveying? Importantly, music’s meaning is not decided only by the music-makers. A composer or performer can intend to convey a certain message in a song, yet the song’s listener may interpret the song in such a way as to hear a different message. So we can understand musical performance as a conversation, in which music’s meaning is determined through active interactions between performers and audiences (Askew 2002). (Have you ever interpreted a song one way, only to find out later that the singer actually meant something else by it? Turns out you were both right!) This means that a song’s meaning is always in flux, depends on who you ask, and can change over time and in different settings.

In this chapter, we will discuss nationalism among some Tibetans who are exiled from Tibet and live in South Asia, and we will look at relationships between Tibetan nationalism in exile and one Tibetan pop song, Cholsum Droshey. Because meaning is produced through interactions between songs and listeners, and can change in different times and places, we will discuss multiple possible meanings of the song. First, we will listen to the song itself and analyze how the song and its video convey a specific nationalist message. Then, we will briefly look at three “listening moments” and discuss what meanings, nationalist or otherwise, are produced for the song’s listeners. Before all this, though, let’s get some background on Tibetan exile society and pop music.

Background: Tibetans in Exile and Pop Music

Tibet’s recent history is complex and disputed. Depending on whom you ask, you will hear different, contrasting stories, especially regarding the relationship between Tibet and China. The brief history here is informed by the Tibetan migrants with whom I work and existing historical texts, chiefly in English, that have analyzed historical facts.

Tibet is located on China’s southwestern border. In the first half of the twentieth century, a large section of Tibet operated as an independent nation-state, while other areas were ruled by small kingdoms loosely tied to the Chinese Qing Empire. In the 1950s, Mao Zedong and the government of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) worked hard to claim all of these Tibetan areas as a part of China. First, the PRC tried diplomatic meetings and written agreements with Tibet’s theocratic Buddhist government and its head, His Holiness the Fourteenth Dalai Lama. When that didn’t work, Mao sent his army to forcefully invade Tibet, initiating years of warfare and uprisings. On March 17, 1959, after a week of protests and violence in Tibet’s capital city of Lhasa, the Dalai Lama and his family and officials fled Tibet in disguise, secretly making their way to India as refugees (Schaik 2011). Tens of thousands of Tibetans from all regions and walks of life soon followed, building and residing in settlements in India, Nepal, and other South Asian countries. Thus began the Tibetan diaspora. Many more Tibetans have since left, fleeing a political climate in which critiquing China is severely punished and many Tibetan religious and cultural practices are suppressed. In recent decades, the Tibetan diaspora has spread throughout the world, beyond South Asia.

Map of Tibet’s Three Provinces

Today, Tibet remains occupied by China, as an “autonomous region." Meanwhile, the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) governs the Tibetan diaspora from the refugee settlement of Dharamsala in Himachal Pradesh, north India. So, there are effectively two Tibets: one located in China on what was once Tibetan territory, and one scattered across the world but centered on the South Asian settlements, and especially Dharamsala. The government of each Tibet tells a different story about the Tibetan nation and its cultural practices. According to the PRC’s story, Tibet was always a part of China and shares many cultural practices with them, and thus is a rightful part of the Chinese nation. According to the CTA’s story, called the chö kha sum (ཆོལ་ཁ་གསུམ། “three provinces of Tibet”) narrative, Tibet was its own nation before the 1950s, comprised of three major provinces: Ü-Tsang, Amdo, and Kham (see Figure 1). Though each province and its people were distinct in certain minor ways, for example in the kinds of music they made, they were basically similar and constituted one Tibetan nation (Morcom 2010).

Today, each Tibet produces its own Tibetan pop music (གཞས་གསར་པ། pronounced shey sarpa, “new songs”), with its own style, aesthetic, and messages. Shey sarpa made in exile began in the 1980s with folk rock songs, and blossomed in 1996, when one exiled Tibetan musician named Tsering Gyurmey, based in Nepal, released a popular cassette of new Tibetan-language songs in India. With this cassette, Gyurmey introduced a “peppy, synth-based” style (Morcom 2015, 282) that became immensely popular in the Tibetan diaspora. As Gyurmey released more albums and gained popularity, he developed an influential stylistic formula that mixes poetic Tibetan lyrics, traditional Tibetan instruments, Tibetan and Nepali vocal ornamentation styles, and Euro-American harmonic progressions and sound synthesizers that are commonly used in many kinds of pop songs around the world (e.g. Dhondup 2008).

Today, the vast majority of Tibetan pop musicians in exile follow in Gyurmey’s footsteps, using this stylistic formula in the bulk of their songs. Like Gyurmey, most of these musicians studied at the Tibetan Institute of Performing Arts (TIPA) in Dharamsala, the diaspora’s premiere institution for preserving and promoting traditional Tibetan folk music in exile. Many of these musicians record new songs and accompanying music videos in Kathmandu, often with the production company Alfa A/V Studio. These videos are released for free over various social media platforms, most commonly YouTube. Pop musicians rarely make money from these recordings; indeed, earning a livable income from any music-related labor is extremely difficult and rare for Tibetans in exile. Few musicians intend to do so, instead making music for other purposes, such as helping the Tibetan exile community or for personal enjoyment (Morcom 2015). While YouTube is blocked in China, Tibetans inside and outside Tibet commonly share locally produced pop songs with each other through Chinese social media platforms such as WeChat, and musicians in Tibet and in exile sometimes even collaborate via these platforms. Thus, though Tibetans in Tibet and in exile each produce their own pop music, this music often reaches listeners in the other Tibet, and may inspire musicians there as well. Indeed, exchanging pop music is one way that Tibetans inside and outside Tibet communicate and relate to each other.

Cholsum Droshey

Now, watch and listen to Cholsum Droshey (pronounced "chö-soom droh-shay") while following along with the listening guide.

Listening Guide

Cholsum Droshey("Three Provinces Dance Song")

What to listen for:

• instrumentation, especially three traditional Tibetan instruments: dranyen (six-string lute), yangqin (hammered dulcimer), and piwang (two-string fiddle); note when they play in the song
• predominance of vocal line, featured in homophonic texture consisting of vocal line supported by instrumental melody and bassline
• different kinds of vocal ornaments

What to watch for:

• costume changes by Donsel and dancers
• changes in choreography
• dranyen and piwang
• video editing choices, especially at 3:47-end

Musically, this song is a typical example of exile-produced shey sarpa. The upbeat tempo and clear duple meter create a strong and steady rhythmic background that is easy to dance to. The strophic form ensures that the catchy tune will stick in the listener’s head by repeating it many times, and the texture, which features the merest suggestion of homophonic chordal progressions in the bassline, highlights the vocalist’s melody and draws attention to the lyrics. The instrumentation features a solo singer singing a pentatonic melody, one or more traditional Tibetan instruments doubling the melody and playing brief interludes, and a sound synthesizer filling in the harmonic and rhythmic sections. Donsel’s vocal style is also characteristic of shey sarpa made in exile, which often features vocal styles influenced by traditional Tibetan folk music as taught at TIPA. For example, in the first two sung lines, you can hear vocal ornaments influenced by traditional Tibetan singing styles, which sound like the pitch momentarily rises or falls before returning to the original pitch, or like pushes or accents in the middle of a sustained pitch. You can also hear Donsel use a style of vocal inflection that is often used in Nepali pop songs, most clearly in the third line of Verse 3-B (3:24), on the word “Karmapa.” Finally, the song’s lyrics are also in keeping with common themes of shey sarpa lyrics, which are often written by a highly educated Buddhist teacher (geshe) and typically praise Tibet, its beautiful landscape, or the wisdom of Buddhist teachers.

Cholsum Droshey tells a clear tale of Tibetan national pride and unity through its lyrics, video, and instrumentation. The lyrics of Cholsum Droshey claim certain territory as Tibetan and celebrate the kinds of people born in this territory. Each of the first three verses celebrates one of the three Tibetan provinces as the birthplace of a highly esteemed Tibetan Buddhist leader. The final verse celebrates the three provinces together as a single entity (chö kha sum), praising them collectively as the birthplace of these leaders. The song’s accompanying music video underscores the lyrics’ message. During each verse, Donsel and a group of dancers wear vibrantly colored traditional clothes and dance traditional dance steps associated with each of the three provinces. During the last verse, a triple split-screen shows three iterations of Donsel and dancers wearing the clothes of each province and dancing a simple new dance together, visually representing and celebrating the cheerful union of the three provinces. This same message is told by two of the three traditional Tibetan instruments: the dranyen and piwang each play during the verse celebrating the province with which that instrument is often associated, and both instruments play in unison during the last verse. In these ways, the song and video communicate a message of national unity in line with the chö kha sum nationalist narrative. Each region may be different in certain ways, this song says, but ultimately they are all part of one united Tibet.

Now that we have learned a bit about what’s going on aurally and visually in this song, let’s turn our focus to the song’s social life. In the summers of 2018 and 2019 in Dharamsala and other South Asian Tibetan settlements, I couldn’t escape this song. It seemed like everywhere I turned, someone was playing it, whether on their phones for their own enjoyment as they hummed along, or blasting through loudspeakers at schools or festivals as children danced to it. My interest piqued, I started asking my acquaintances about it, and paid closer attention to when and where the song was being played, who was listening to it, and what the song was doing for its listeners in the moment. The following section discusses three such moments.

Dharamsala, 2018

Dharamsala Main Square, 2018

Three Listening Moments

1: Celebrating National Unity

It’s mid-afternoon on July 6th. Today is the Dalai Lama’s birthday, and here in Dharamsala, everybody knows it. I’ve spent the morning with just about everyone who lives here, at the massive official ceremony being held at Tsuglhakhang, the Dalai Lama’s temple complex, which was full of music, dancing, speeches, and cheering. Now, I’m returning from my lunch break, to find a courtyard still full of decorations but somewhat emptier of people. The official program has ended and some folks have left, but the continuing informal celebration is just as energetic. Audience members take turns onstage singing or dancing in honor of the Dalai Lama. Eventually, this transforms into a gorshey, or circle dance: nearly everyone in the crowd gathers in the central clearing and forms a circle, while someone hooks up their phone to the speakers and finds a suitable playlist of songs. The music begins, and so does the gorshey, as dancers slowly rotate clockwise, sway their arms, tap their feet rhythmically, and sing along. One of the first songs to play is Cholsum Droshey. Dancers and onlookers cheer as the dranyen’s first notes emanate from the surrounding speakers, and joyful voices join together to sing the chorus.

Circle dance to Cholsum Droshey, at Dalai Lama’s birthday celebration, Dharamsala, 2019.

The setting of this moment influences the song’s meaning for the dancers and onlookers. July 6th is a nationally significant day for exiled Tibetans. The Dalai Lama was the last religious and political leader of Tibet before it was annexed by China, and he has been a revered and important figurehead for Tibetans in exile. Before the 1950s, his birthday was celebrated throughout Tibet. In Tibet today, celebrations on July 6th are illegal, as the Chinese government deems the Dalai Lama a dangerous anti-PRC radical. In many ways, among Tibetan people both inside and outside of Tibet, the Dalai Lama is equated with a free and independent Tibetan nation. This is the case despite the fact that the Dalai Lama himself stopped calling for Tibetan independence many years ago, instead supporting a “middle way” approach to seeking genuine autonomy for Tibetan regions in China.

Dalai Lama’s birthday ceremony, Dharamsala, 2018.

The official ceremony in Dharamsala emphasizes the holiday’s nationalist sentiment. The courtyard in which the annual ceremony takes place is decorated with large and small Tibetan national flags, and hundreds of streamers in the flag’s colors (see above). While performers, speakers, and audience members filter in for hours starting in the early morning, the ceremony does not officially begin until the Sikyong, the President of the Tibetan government-in-exile, marches through the center of the courtyard to his seat onstage, accompanied by a drum-and-flute ensemble, and ceremonially raises the national flag while everyone present stands and sings the Tibetan national anthem. In other words, the ceremony features all of the pageantry of a Tibetan national event. In this setting, Cholsum Droshey’s nationalist message rings loud and clear. No one was surprised when the anonymous deejay chose to play this song on this nationally significant holiday. Here, dancers and onlookers celebrate the song’s message, and perform the tri-regional national unity described in the chö kha sum narrative.

Honoring Kham

I’m chatting with a few acquaintances in a small shop on a hot afternoon. I’ve just met these folks an hour ago through a mutual friend, and we’re chatting cordially, sipping sweet milk tea from paper cups and getting to know each other. Eventually, I ask which Tibetan regions they’re from. A woman answers that everyone in the group is from Kham, and another woman immediately sings the first few lines of Cholsum Droshey’s Verse 3-A, about the Kham region. Everyone else laughs and teases her affectionately. I smile, compliment the singer’s vocal skills, and ask whether anyone here listens to songs from Kham. The same woman replies, explaining that they all adore songs from their home region, but that they do not have the opportunity to listen to them often. No one sings them in South Asia, where they live now, and decent recordings are difficult to find. Before I have the chance to respond, a man in the group grins and begins to sing the same verse from Cholsum Droshey, while the rest of the group listens. Afterwards, he tells us that he loves this song, then enthusiastically describes the natural beauty of Kham, with its breathtaking mountain peaks, refreshingly clean air, and delectable rare fruits. Everyone else in the group pipes up, adding details to his narrative. You’ll never find a place as beautiful as Kham, I’m assured. Yes, you’ll never find such a place.

In several Tibetan exile communities in South Asia, people from the eastern Tibetan regions of Kham and Amdo are marginalized. Historically, most Tibetan refugees migrated from the central region of Ü-Tsang, including the Dalai Lama and his administration, and founded institutions in exile that center Ü-Tsang ways of life. Today, while many exiled Tibetans in South Asia are Khampas and Amdowas (people from Kham and Amdo, respectively), the majority are Ü-Tsangwas (people from Ü-Tsang). Ü-Tsang political, religious, and cultural practices have a strong influence on Tibetan exile society, while those from Kham and Amdo are less present. Khampas and Amdowas living in South Asia are often marked as different within Tibetan communities, as in, different from the politically and culturally dominant majority of Ü-Tsangwas.

In this listening moment, for this group of Khampas, Cholsum Droshey is not primarily about the Tibetan nation as a united homogeneous whole, but rather is about honoring and celebrating the various Tibetan regions, and Kham in particular. What matters here is not Tibetan national unity, but rather regional identity and the qualities that make Kham uniquely appealing. In this context, Verse 3 functions as a way for my acquaintances to know and experience their home region through music, and to explain it to me, a non-Tibetan. Verse 3 provides these listeners with a way to relate to Kham through music when it is not possible to be there or to listen to traditional songs as they are sung there. It’s not that these Khampas actively challenge or reject the song’s nationalist message by focusing on Kham. Rather, this message just does not matter very much for them in this moment. If nationalism relies on telling a story of unity and emphasizing similarities between people and places within a nation, then the way my acquaintances use Verse 3 in this listening moment exceeds this kind of story, as they set that story to the side and instead focus on one particular region without tying it to the Tibetan nation. This listening moment shows that songs conveying nationalist messages can also serve different purposes, reminding listeners of particular people or places that are valuable and desirable in and of themselves, for reasons other than national unity.

Recognizing Transgender National Identity

It’s Friday evening and the concert is about to begin. As the sky above us darkens into near-nighttime, colorful lights suddenly flood the stage and reflect off the backdrop, an immense banner of a woman in a red, off-the-shoulder evening gown stretched on a ledge, looking up at the camera evocatively, with the words “MARICO¹ MEGA SHOW 2” printed above her. Audience members chat excitedly and snap photos to share on social media. A booming voice fills the outdoor theatre, introducing the evening’s main act, the show’s namesake, and the woman on the banner: Tenzin Mariko. Cheers erupt from the crowd as Cholsum Droshey booms from the sound system, and Mariko strides onstage, clad in an elegant floor-length qipao-style dress, and exuding confidence. Alone onstage, Mariko dances to the entire song, performing Donsel’s original dance steps almost exactly. The boisterous audience’s sporadic cheers mingle with the music, and I struggle to capture the performance on camera, as my view is continually impeded by others’ raised recording devices. Near me in the crowd, a young girl standing on her plastic chair mimics Mariko’s dance steps as she stares at her in total concentration. A woman to my other side turns to her companion and remarks, “She’s so beautiful! And she dances beautifully. It’s strange, right?”

Mariko dances to Cholsum Droshey, Dharamsala, 2018.

Mariko dances to Cholsum Droshey, Dharamsala, 2018.

As of this writing, Mariko is the only openly transgender person and LGBTQ+ icon in the Tibetan diaspora. Since coming out as transgender in 2015, she has gained fame and name recognition among many Tibetans. She maintains an active social media presence, where she posts videos of herself dancing and interacting with her fans, and photos of herself in glamorous Western-style outfits and Tibetan chuba. Although she does not make music herself, she is a central figure in exile-produced shey sarpa. She frequently performs as a dancer at pop concerts in various Tibetan settlements throughout India, and has organized three successful concert-slash-fashion-shows, called “Mariko Mega Shows.”

As the first and only out LGBTQ+ exiled Tibetan, Mariko also suffers prejudice from other Tibetans, because her gender identity directly challenges the conservative gender norms of Tibetan exile society. Every time I saw her walk down the street in Dharamsala, where she lives, I spotted someone else openly pointing or laughing at her, even as others greeted her companionably. After attending the show described above, I spoke with audience members of different ages, who told me that they thought she was “very strange” and that it is probably not okay to be a moli pholi (a derogatory Tibetan term, roughly meaning “neither man nor woman”). Some of the people I spoke to laughed uncomfortably when I mentioned her name, apparently shocked that I wanted to talk about her seriously, and several referred to her using male pronouns. Nonetheless, these folks attended her show, and most told me that they follow her on social media and would attend her future shows, because she’s a good dancer and make-up artist, and they enjoy “watching the spectacle.”

So what’s going on in this listening moment? For the audience members with whom I spoke, Cholsum Droshey’s nationalist message does not itself seem to be what’s most important here. Instead, what matters is Mariko’s “spectacle,” the fact that she is a transgender Tibetan woman dancing to a Tibetan nationalist song, and that in doing so so openly, she protests conservative ideas about gender identity inherent in the tradition-based chö kha sum narrative. Mariko proves that she can perform Tibetan nationalism through music just as well as a cisgender woman can (Tenzin Donsel). Thus, her dance challenges the common belief that only cisgender Tibetans can belong to the Tibetan nation. Despite the fact that many exiled Tibetans struggle to make sense of her gender identity, they flock to her shows and her social media, praise her dancing, and enthusiastically share their videos of her performances. Through continued positive reception to her dances and circulation of her dance videos, Mariko’s audience may begin to imagine a version of the Tibetan nation in which she can belong, at least while watching her performances.

Comprehension and Discussion Questions

1. Now that you’re familiar with the original version of Cholsum Droshey, watch and listen to this cover version, recorded by a musician inside Tibet.
   1. In this cover version, the lyrics in Verse 2-B have been changed so that they mention a different Buddhist leader, rather than the Dalai Lama. Based on what you’ve learned about Tibet from this chapter, why do you think this change was made?
   2. Compare and contrast the original and the cover. What differences in the lyrics do you notice between the original and this cover, besides the lyric change mentioned above? What musical or visual differences do you notice? What similarities do you notice?
   3. In your opinion, does this cover version tell the same sort of nationalist story as the original? If yes, how so? If not, why not? What sort of story does it seem to be telling?
2. After reading this chapter, return to the beginning activity and re-read your answers to questions 1 and 2. How has what you’ve learned in this chapter changed how you think about nationalism and music’s relationship to it? How might you answer questions 1 and 2 differently?
3. How is the vocal melody highlighted in Cholsum Droshey? Why do you think the producers chose to highlight the vocal melody?
4. What do you think the effect of being exiled from Tibet has on the chö kha sum nationalist narrative? What sorts of effects might it have on the production and consumption of pop music? What are some other ways that being exiled from a particular place might affect the musical practices and politics of a given group of people?
5. Imagine that you are making a pop song video of your own that relates to nationalism in some way:
   1. What sort of message would you want it to convey? Why? What are some musical and visual ways that you might convey that message?
   2. After answering these questions, discuss them with someone else who has also answered them. Have your discussion partner close their eyes and envision the song and video as you describe it. Then ask your partner what they think the song is about. Did their interpretation match your intended message? Why or why not? Discuss with your partner.
6. After reading this chapter, revisit the title of this chapter. What do you think is meant by “the social life of Cholsum Droshey?”
   1. Pick a song you like. How might you research its social life? What sort of information might you glean from doing such research? How might this information be valuable?
   2. Free-write for a few minutes about a “listening moment” that you experienced in the past (with any song). Describe the event and the song in as much detail as possible. What about this listening moment was significant to you? Why?
7. Each of the interpretations provided for the listening moments above is just one possible interpretation of the story provided. Can you think of an alternate interpretation for one or more of these listening moments?

Bibliography

Additional Resources

Open Access

For more on music and nationalism:

For more on Tibetan music, arts, news, and history:

Official website for CTA, Tibetan government-in-exile. Includes news, history, official statements, and other information about Tibetan exile society.

News site covering Tibetan arts and entertainment in exile and inside Tibet. Extensive music section.

Provides English translations and commentary for a wide array of writings produced inside Tibet, including pop song lyrics, poetry, news stories, interviews, and essays. Extensive music section.

Scholarly journal for area studies association. Regularly includes articles about Tibet addressing a wide variety of topics, including Tibetan music.

Blog for Jamyang Norbu, exiled Tibetan intellectual. Covers topics such as traditional Tibetan music, film and book reviews, little-known Tibetan historical anecdotes and alternative interpretations of more widely known historical events, and thoughtful commentary on current events.

Video series featuring interviews with diverse Tibetan musicians, focusing on but not limited to those in exile. Each episode features numerous clips of a given musician’s songs. In Tibetan.

Website for premiere performance and educational institution for traditional Tibetan performing arts in exile, located in Dharamsala. Nearly all Tibetan pop musicians in exile train here.

Social media tags for Tibetan performers discussed in this chapter:

• Nepal Tibetan Opera Association
• Tenzin Donsel's YouTube
• Tenzin Donsel's Instagram
• Tenzin Mariko's YouTube
• Tenzin Mariko's Instagram
• Tsering Gyurmey's Facebook

Social media tags for other Tibetan pop musicians

• Phurbu T Namgyal's YouTube. Famous exile-based Tibetan pop musician.
• Sonam Topden's YouTube. Kathmandu-based Tibetan pop singer, famous among Tibetans as well as in other South Asian communities.
• Tenzin Norbu's Facebook. NYC-based Tibetan performer.
• Tibchick's Instagram
• Tibchick's YouTube. Exiled Tibetan Rapper.

Search for videos by these Tibetan pop musicians based inside Tibet:

• Anu Ranglug: Hip-hop duo. Example song: Phur (Fly)
• Dadon: Early Tibetan pop singer from Lhasa, arguably the first Tibetan pop star known throughout Tibetan areas (Dhondup 2008). Example song: E ma tso ngon po (Blue Lake)
• Dubhe: Early performer of dunglen (eastern Tibetan pop genre). Widely known and celebrated among eastern Tibetans. Example song: Khri lor mon (Long Life Song)
• Gebe: Contemporary performer of dunglen. Example song:Yong gi yod (I am Coming)
• Tashi Phuntsok: 2017 winner of “Sing China!” (Chinese American Idol-style TV show). Example song.

Not Open Access

For more on nationalism:

For more on Tibetans in Dharamsala and music:

For more on music inside Tibet:

For more on Tibetan cultural practices from a pro-Chinese political perspective

From pro-Chinese perspective, questions common claim that PRC is destroying traditional cultural practices in Tibet.

PRC government whitepaper discussing government policies regarding Tibetan cultural practices.

Thank You

I would like to thank Amalia Rubin for Tibetan language assistance (find her music on Facebook); the reviewers and editors of this chapter for their guidance; Natalie Oshukany and Elaine Sandoval for the opportunity to participate in this project; and, most of all, the anonymous interlocutors I spoke with in my fieldwork, for their openness, insight, kindness, and patience.