(Photo provided to China Daily)
After returning to Shenzhen, Li decided to quit his job and devoted himself to promoting hip-hop in China, which was an underground subculture in the country then.
"The situation is much better now and more people enjoy hip-hop music. That's why this year's festival is themed 'Wake Up'," he says.
To make his point, he says: "From the rising number of dance-training studios across the country, it's apparent that once-disapproving parents now support their children when it comes to learning street dance."
He also says that instead of violent and explicit lyrics, young Chinese rappers write in a unique style, telling stories about their daily lives.
"Unlike hip-hop music in the West, which has lots of fans and the industry is mature, China's hip-hop music scene is still in its infancy," says Li.
"The good thing is that without record deals and profits, Chinese rappers are passionate about hip-hop music, which they are very emotionally attached to."
Wang's song, Fight For It, was inspired by a friend who gave up his dream of doing oil painting and obeyed his mother's wish that he get a stable job after graduation.
Sun Xu, who won the second prize, performed the song Sun Dasheng, inspired by the Monkey King, the best-known character in the Chinese classical novel Journey to the West.
Unlike Wang, who is a newcomer to the hip-hop scene, Sun, 31, has been working in hip-hop music for 10 years with his group, Dragon King, a popular hip-hop trio based in Beijing.
Sun hopes to create a unique hip-hop music style by using Chinese folk tales and idioms in lyrics.
The Beijing native has been a fan of hip-hop since 2001, when he watched underground rap battling for the first time. He says that hip-hop has become more popular among Chinese youth in recent years than when he started.
"The main reason for this is that the younger generation has been raised to pursue individuality. Hip-hop music allows them to express their emotions," says Sun.
The fact that many outdoor music festivals across China have stages for hip-hop music and rappers make a living through commercial shows proves that hip-hop is getting bigger in China.
"I have been waiting for 10 years for Chinese hip-hop to blossom and I see some hope out there," he says.
About hip-hop
Hip-hop music is a music genre which took root in the United States in the 1970s. It consists of a stylized rhythmic music that commonly accompanies rapping, a rhythmic and rhyming speech that is chanted. It developed as part of hip-hop culture, a subculture defined by four key elements: MCing/rapping, DJing/scratching, break dancing, and graffiti writing.
Other elements include sampling (or synthesis), and beatboxing.
