MORE foreigners make Hangzhou their home, forming bands and performing regularly in the city. Xu Wenwen and Shi Xiaohan meet some of the foreign faces in the local music scene.

Members of The Phoenix Prestige are now more confident about making and performing their music in Hangzhou after the band witnessed how crazy the city's music fans are as they spent hours in heavy rain and covered from top to toe in mud at the Xihu Music Festival held two weeks ago.

"Those fans were passionate, supportive and fantastic, and I believe the organizers must make the festival for music reasons more than financial reasons," says Brendan Donnelly, vocalist and guitarist from The Phoenix Prestige. "So Hangzhou definitely has a lot of potential for developing a music environment in the city."

The Phoenix Prestige is the first local band comprised of foreigners to perform at the Xihu Music Festival - the "local" tag qualifies since the band was established in Hangzhou and all three members now reside in the city.

The appearance of this foreign "local" band at the two-day festival demonstrates that more, though not many, foreign musicians are settling in Hangzhou, creating music, performing at live venues and making a life for themselves in the city.

Shanghai Daily spoke to three bands that feature foreign musicians to find out why they settled in Hangzhou and how they are inspired by living in a different country.

The Phoenix Prestige

On their last EP, The Phoenix Prestige integrated local elements such as Chinese instruments, ideas and musicians in their songs. It makes sense, as Donnelly has a Chinese girlfriend, while John Carroll, the band's vocalist and bass player, married a Chinese woman with whom he recently had a daughter.

Donnelly from Ireland has been living in China since 2005 and is currently a postgraduate student majoring graphic design at Zhejiang University of Technology.

In 2008, he invited his Irish musician friend Carroll to visit China, who later decided to settle in the country and founded the band with Donnelly. The two-piece band was completed in 2009 with the addition of Jay Iverson, a drummer from the United States.

The trio have done a good job - they have released three EPs and completed two tours, in one of which they played in 10 cities across China. Today, look up their name on Chinese Internet search engine Baidu and there are many results.

But they do not have much support or an agent yet, and do everything on their own.

Beside making music and recording EPs, the band also books shows, negotiates with sponsors and show organizers, and even has illustrated their EP cover as Donnelly and Carroll are also talented artists.

But they are still passionate about music and their musical life.

Once when they had gig in Hangzhou, they rented a roofless van to transport their equipment to the venue. Carroll had to sit in the roofless trunk carrying the guitar - so he played on the way.

"People on the bus passing by all stared at him," Donnelly recalls.

As if they have prophetic vision, they chose the name "The Phoenix Prestige" for their band, paying respect to the honorable rise from adversities.

JZ house band

When darkness falls and the lights are lit, the city's party animals swarm out, and JZ bar on Liuying Road opens its door to jazz fans.

As the hands of the clock point to 9:30, the bar's band takes to the stage, playing swinging and improvised jazz, making the bar one of the few offering authentic jazz music in Hangzhou.

The bar is the epitome of many bars with house bands. While members come and go, the music style is always adhered to. And in JZ, there are always expat musicians.

Currently, the house band consists of four members - pianist, vocalist, bassist and drummer - who signed contracts with the bar.

Similar to most foreign bar band members in China, they came to the exotic land for various reasons, however, they have one idea in common - to spread and share Western music to the country.

Pianist Aureliu Radu from Romania has been in this band for eight months, and he believes that music is a language that everybody speaks, while jazz is "even more than a music style, but a lifestyle that can influence people."

The pianist influences the locals by playing his piano. He gives free piano classes to five adult students, who are actually his fans, as it's his job "to share jazz to China," and he recently held a charity concert "Jazz for Kids," playing for children studying piano.

His peer, singer Denise Minninfield from the United States, has the same enthusiasm. She has toured in Asian countries such as Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines, and has spent 15 months in China. She loves to entertain locals with music because "I grew up in Asia and learned a lot since I've been in Asia, and I need to give my gift of music to other people in return."

The Tree

As a fan of traditional Chinese culture since childhood, Fuentes Benat came to China from Spain in 2009 for a change of life, which he certainly got when he met Xu Jun, now his partner in The Tree band.

The two met at a show in Hangzhou in 2009 when Benat was playing guitar, and Xu recognized his gift in sensibility to music. "I sensed that he was capable of much more. We talked and exchanged our music. One week later, we started making music together," says Xu.

Having been a band player since graduation, Xu has worked with lots of foreigners, but found his cooperation with Benat the most satisfactory due to Benat's earnestness to music and life.

The pleasant cooperation has proven fruitful. Earlier this year, they released their first album "The Tree." They chose nine of their songs and recorded them on an eight-track console.

"We do not want to label our music as any one style as it is inspired by the communication between two of us," says Xu. "I do what I like. I think the music needs to touch my heart before touching others."

The two-year-old band is on its first tour to 10 cities across China. The band will play at Shanghai's Yuyintang on July 15 and then give their final performance in their home city the following night at Code Space at 177 Huancheng Road N. in Hangzhou.