United Kingdom: First Performance of the UK “Coming For You” Choir at the Edinburgh Easter Festival

During the Edinburgh Easter Festival celebrations on Sunday the 11th of April 2004, the UK “Coming for You" Choir gave its first official public performance. The choir consists of almost 30 Falun Gong practitioners from across the UK, both Western and Chinese. They sang the song from which the choir gets its name: “Coming For You”.

Before the performance began, an introduction was given in both English and Mandarin describing the background behind this beautiful piece of music. In November 2001, 36 western people from Europe and North America went to Tiananmen Square in Beijing to appeal for an end to the brutal persecution of Falun Gong in China, which has claimed hundreds of innocent lives. In the face of violence and danger, they held up a large banner reading, “Truthfulness, Compassion, Forbearance" before police arrested them. They wanted to let the Chinese people see that the world knows Falun Gong is good and is against this persecution. One Falun Gong practitioner was deeply touched by this event inspired to write the song “Coming For You”. Two of the UK choir members had actually been to China to appeal for freedom and justice for the Chinese people and for them this song had a special significance.

The first performance took place on an open air stage and started off an afternoon of entertainment accompanying the Edinburgh Easter Festival parade. The background of the famous Edinburgh Castle created a beautiful picture and complemented the simple but beautiful melody of the song. The second performance was on a larger outdoor stage in front of an audience of several hundred people. Both performances received a large round of applause.

Written in four part harmony and sung in both Chinese and English, the song has a simple yet beautiful melody. From the faces of the singers and the energy radiating from their performance, the song’s message of compassion touched the hearts of the audience. One audience member told a practitioner after the performance that they felt their whole body tingling from the beauty of this performance.