Introduction

Summary

On the morning of January 28, 2018, I sat on a low stool with my notebook in a small home studio in suburban Yangon, chatting with Bya Sar Moe Yi, a fifty-something Lisu singer and songwriter whom I had known a long time ago but did not meet in person until the Lisu Literature Centenary Jubilee in Myitkyina last December. He had served in different local and regional Lisu Baptist churches before he moved to Yangon in 2016. His studio just opened a few months ago. One of his goals was to make more gospel music recordings and Christian materials for preaching in his WeChat (Weixin) group, which he called “online music school.”

I asked about his first music album. mi: TA: je lo (The rise of the sun), he replied, without taking time to think. He told me that he had recorded it as a cassette album in 1989 and only made about two hundred copies. I excitedly asked him to sing one song from the album. He then picked up his hollow guitar and softly played an opening E major triad. After humming the main melody for thirty seconds, he sang the main song “mi: TA: je lo,” from the album, an upbeat, lively ballad in time. The melody features mainly ascending and descending sequences by smaller intervals. It adopts an ABAB’ form, a verse-chorus variant with the chorus B’ having different lyrics the second time. Accompanying himself with solid triads (and the root of the chord on the first beat of each measure), he sang the lyrics, calling the Lisu to wake up through learning the Lord's words and to unite for prosperity.

I recorded his performance of “mi: TA: je lo” during my interview with him. I listened to this recording many times afterward because I was attracted to the meaningful lyrics and the sincere gratitude expressed therein for the profound change that the Christian faith had brought to the Lisu. I did not realize its wide popularity until a later stage. In November 2020, on a workday of writing at my apartment in Minneapolis, when reviewing a souvenir video of a 2007 Thanksgiving celebration in Zhuangfang Church in Lushui County of Nujiang Prefecture, on track 3 I found Sar Moe Yi holding an acoustic guitar and standing at the center of the stage, ready for his performance (figure I.1).