LIH NGOLIO – VOICE OF THE EAGLE 

Deep in the Congo forest, a rapper named Phael meets and falls in love with a community of forest people known as the Baaka.

Together, they make beautiful music and dream of taking their musical group – Lih Ngolio, or “Voice of the Eagle” in local dialect – to a to big-city music festival. Many had never left their small village on the edge of the forest, but Phael was raised was in the tough neighborhoods of Brazzaville, Congo, in times of revolution and war, often finding himself surviving in the streets and more than once facing a premature death. Rap was both refuge and potential ticket to a better life.

Through education he found a new life passion: working to protect forest elephants and conserving the Congo forest ecosystem, 12 hours north and a world away from the big city. There he met the Baaka, on whom he was forced to rely as protectors and guides based on their centuries old knowledge of the forest. As Phael helps the Baaka preserve their beautiful forest music and experience broader horizons, he himself discovers love, family and a new sense of personal meaning.