A folk dance from the Hani ethnic group of Yunnan province expresses the longing for love. [Photo provided to China Daily]

Having provided dance training to the university students for over a year, Gao says that they now have an overall mastery of all the elements of the dance and the project has had a substantial effect on the inheritance of intangible cultural heritage.

Since 2017, the project has been led by Huang Yihua, director of the Chinese Ethnic and Folk Dance Department. Under her advocacy, Chen Xiang has been incorporating folk dance forms from other countries, in particular countries involved in the Belt and Road Initiative. For example, the fourth installment of Chen Xiang included a traditional dance from Romania.

Continuing this approach, this year's compilation includes two dances from foreign countries, one of them being the Serbian traditional folk dance, kolo, which was chosen by teachers at the academy who visited Serbia on a field trip.

Yuan Jia, a teacher of Chinese ethnic and folk dance and a tutor at the dance rehearsals, says the group from the academy found many similarities between the Serbian and Chinese folk dances.