Farmer turns his fields into a stage

URUMQI－Zhang Hongyuan is a different kind of drummer in Northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region.

As a cotton farmer, the 50-year-old looks like any other farmer in the region. But as a drummer, he might be the only one in the country who sets his stage on a cotton field stretching for several kilometers.

His drum kit is also quite special. He found a discarded drum kit in January and refitted it by himself.

With his special stage and shabby instruments, Zhang became a Chinese internet celebrity. Videos of him playing the drums that he shoots have received more than 10 million views and he has also attracted 27,000 followers on a Chinese social media platform.

"It is joyful to sit in an open cotton field and play the drums. It is a kind of emotional release," he says.

"In the beginning, I took some online drum lessons, but they were too expensive for me. Later I began to learn how to play by myself."

Now Zhang has developed his own performance style and started to write songs about his love for his hometown.

Zhang had engaged in cotton farming in the 1990s with his elders.

"The heavy farm work made me swear to never deal with cotton again if I could."

However, he finally went back to his hometown to farm cotton after experiencing a lot of ups and downs in 2013. Before then, he had run various businesses, including in the catering and wholesale-clothing industries. He earned 1 million yuan ($140,000) a year but also accrued debt.

"Fate plays tricks on people, but I can always find my own place in the cotton field," he says.

"Now cotton farming is much easier than before with such technologies as mechanized sowing and drip irrigation."

He has plenty of time to play the drums and shoot videos for his fans after finishing his farm work.

"If someone feeling down or bored is cheered up by my videos, I've achieved what I set out to do."

Xinhua