CAMBODIAN MUSIC FESTIVAL
When: 2-10 p.m. Saturday.
Where: Pearson Park Amphitheater, 401 N. Lemon St., Anaheim.
Tickets: $50, $25 for children 12 and younger, $200 VIP.
Information: 310-863-9690, www.cambodianmusicfestival.com.
It’s been a big year for 25-year-old Long Beach native Borey Chau.
Just weeks ago he graduated from Cal State Long Beach with a degree in science and mechanical engineering and scored a job in the aerospace industry.
It’s an impressive accomplishment for the son of Cambodian immigrants who grew up with a family of seven in a two-bedroom apartment in a rough neighborhood.
But it’s not his math and mechanics skills that will impress people later this week.
Instead his rap skills will be on display during the second annual Cambodian Music Festival in Anaheim on Saturday.
“I feel blessed. I feel honored to be a part of it, to represent a part of my culture and my generation,” said Chau, who goes by the hip-hop name G Funk Supreme when he’s not at his day job at an aerospace company.
Chau will be one of eight acts on the bill during the event, where the music will range from hip-hop to R&B, electronica and pop by Cambodian artists or those influenced by the culture.
“The show will give a little something for everybody,” said Seak Smith, founder and co-director of the festival. “We wanted to bring different artists together that are Cambodian artist or artists that have been inspired or fallen in love with Cambodian culture in one way or another.”
Besides Chau, the lineup includes psychedelic electronic act Indradevi; Cambodian-American singer Savy; R&B artist Sophyrum Mang, who sings in English and French; Jay Chan; Gobshite MGC; Long Beach local DJ Hunny; and Grammy-winning Evrywhr.
The festival isn’t just a day of music at Anaheim’s Pearson Park Amphitheater, it’s also a way to show that despite the brutal rule of the Khmer Rouge that devastated the country in the 1970s, Cambodian art and artists continue to flourish.
“After the genocide in Cambodia, 90 percent of our artists were targeted for execution. So a lot of us in the diaspora community feel a need to give back, to do more to continue to rebuild the arts,” Smith said.
Smith has been listening to Chau’s music since he released his debut album, “Forever and a Day,” in January. The 15-track album showcases his smooth, lyrically driven, soulful rap. Chau points to artists like Kendrick Lamar, J. Cole, Snoop Dogg and Outkast as his influences.
“His experience is such a great experience, such a great story to tell of someone who just graduated from college,” Smith said. “That’s another part of the festival, is that we want to give a lot of the youth positive role models within the Cambodian community.”
Chau’s parents left Cambodia in the late 1970s and moved to an apartment rented from an uncle in Long Beach. It was in a neighborhood in the middle of Asian, Latino and African-American gang territory.
Growing up, Chau felt some pressure and influence from older Cambodians to join gangs.
“You’re down the street from a Hispanic gang, you’re living in the same neighborhood as the black gang and the same neighborhood as the Asian gang, so you see a lot of things, but that was life, that was reality,” he said.
“My mom was so strong, she steered me in a way that kept me on the right path, a crooked path, but I still walked the right road.”
In eighth grade, after taking a poetry class, he discovered a love for writing. His friend then showed him a CD of his cousins rapping, which helped spark his love for hip-hop.
“They were tight and they were Asian, back in the day you didn’t hear of no Asian rappers,” Chau said.
He kept practicing throughout high school and college by rapping at parties and for friends.
After a friend posted one of his raps on Facebook, Chau decided to get more serious about music. At the same time he was getting more serious about his academic career.
“I didn’t want to just write about things that rhyme and didn’t mean nothing. I wanted to think out of the box and say things that make you think,” he said.
It took him two years to write and record his independently released album as he worked toward his degree while holding a part-time job and an internship.
“My degree, really I did it for my mom because I wanted to make her proud, but I want to use that as a platform to jump-start me to where I need to be,” said Chau, who still lives with his mother in the same Long Beach neighborhood where he grew up in order to help her out, albeit in a house now.
“If it’s going to school, if it’s working, if it’s going to be a rapper, I’m going to maximize every opportunity I have to see what works for me.”
He’s hoping the album makes enough noise to help him make a name for himself and launch a long career in hip-hop, which is why he named it “Forever and a Day.”
For now, he has more immediate goals for Saturday’s show.
“We’re going to give not only a memorable experience for the people, we’re going to represent to the fullest the hidden talents that lie within the city and our culture,” he said.
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