China’s music festival Modern Sky will be held in Helsinki, Finland, on August 26-27. It is the second time the festival, which has also been held in New York and Seattle since 2014, will be held in Finland.

“What? A Chinese music festival in New York?” That was how many Americans reacted to Modern Sky’s festival in New York’s Central Park in 2014, according to Michael LoJudice, director of international affairs at Modern Sky Entertainment, who has spearheaded the company’s international push.

“(Modern Sky CEO) Shen Lihui said, ‘OK, let’s do it, a music festival in New York.’ He is a little crazy,” LoJudice said.

Two years ago, the idea of a Chinese music festival was totally new for Americans. Modern Sky brought its own brand to New York for two days in October that year. That was the first time an Asian music festival had been exported outside the continent.

The company marketed the festival to the Chinese community, American-born Chinese and Chinese students — in fact pretty much anyone with a connection to China.

“For average (American) music fans, Mandarin pop is a foreign language, so it is not very accessible,” said LoJudice.

More than 6,500 people attended the gig in Central Park — smaller than the audiences for Modern Sky’s festivals in China. In New York, Chinese indie rock bands including Rebuilding the Rights of Statues, Queen Sea Big Shark and Second Hand Rose played alongside Western musicians like Cat Power, Ted Leo and Aimee Mann.

But not all foreign markets are the same. In Helsinki, for example, there is a very small Chinese community. So the company worked with Finnish bands that toured China and worked with the local government, which co-financed the event.

At the same time, the festival was timed to coincide with Europe Asia Roundtable Sessions (EARS), a conference for the creative industries. “That’s why we chose Helsinki over London, Tokyo or Paris,” LoJudice said.

Modern Sky’s efforts to head west have followed a proven pattern. For Japanese festivals, the first step toward growth was to gain more exposure among Western audiences. Japan’s 20th Fuji Rock Festival was held in mid-July and may be the best-known music festival in Asia.

“We book around 25 artists every year,” said Akira Okada, founder of the Taico Club festival, which focuses on intelligent dance music, a form of electronic dance music that emerged in the early 1990s.

“Half of them are from Western countries. They tell people in their countries that Taico Club is great, so we see more and more overseas audiences, especially from America and Europe,” Okada said.

The Vh1 Supersonic festival in Goa, India, was launched by radio DJ and MTV presenter Nikhil Chinapa, who was inspired after visiting different bars in Europe. The fact that English is widely spoken in India helped Chinapa in his efforts to expand Vh1 Supersonic. He and his wife started out by inviting DJs from Europe to host free beach parties.

The second step in the push westward by Asian music festivals is to build connections with overseas partners.

LoJudice has experience in the United States and an understanding of Chinese companies and artists. He came to China from New York in 2006 — when “everyone was looking for a Chinese partner” ahead of the 2008 Olympics in Beijing.

After working in Modern Sky’s Beijing office for three months, he told CEO Shen that they could put together some partnerships. Shen said yes and the company launched its New York office.

“We were not sure how to sustain Mandarin rock music in a Manhattan office. How would the market react?” LoJudice said.

He said work in the early stages largely involved websites and design projects for bigger New York City firms that outsourced to Modern Sky’s designers in China.

“We weren’t sure if we could sell any Mandarin rock records. How would it work for bands coming over? We just did anything that brought money back to the company. We were working 100 hours every week.”

It can be hard for Asian music companies or artists to gain traction with Western audiences.

There are just 69 albums in history that have sold more than 20 million copies worldwide and not one of those is Asian. Michael Jackson’s Thriller, released in 1982, has sold 65 million.

Although album sales are not the only way to rate music, they suggest that bringing Asian music to the West can be difficult. Most Asian music festivals in Western countries are held by, and for, local diasporas.

LoJudice said staging outdoor music festivals is never easy. “You need a lot of time. Visas (for artists) are a little complicated,” he said.

“When we produced our first overseas festival, our New York office didn’t have the connections we have now.”

And then there is the weather.

“Last year, in Central Park, we had a hurricane that week. We had a special guest who should have performed with Yoko Ono, but she got sick the day before and cancelled, that was too bad. It would have been pretty crazy.”

Despite the challenges, Modern Sky has been successful and has emerged as the only major festival brand from China operating in the West. It gives Asian artists a greater chance of exposure to Western audiences and those same audiences a greater understanding of Asia, particularly China.

LoJudice said music can overcome language barriers. For example, many Americans have heard of Youku, the New York-listed China online video and streaming service platform, which is promoted in the US even though its content is in Chinese.

The third step may be the most crucial — to export artists and gigs. To do this, they might have to work more closely together.

Some Japanese bands and artists like Mono and Cuushe, respectively, have put on great performances overseas. But they are in the minority.

“Japanese artists are too shy to go out of Japan,” said Okada, who plans to launch a booking agency to create tour routes for artists who played at the Taico Club festival and to export Japanese artists to Western markets and to other locations such as South Korea and Hong Kong.

LoJudice said Asian festivals need more cooperation and better consolidation, to share networks and resources within Asia. At the same time, they need to borrow ideas from older overseas festivals in Europe and America.

“There are a lot of cool things happening in China, but the distribution channel is filtered. It’s really hard to get it to the rest of the world,” he said.

“People get interested in China, but the media usually talks about economics and politics. There is not a lot of information about ‘cool China’, such as independent music, movies and art.”