Puoro ki te Ao, Gardens Magic, 14 January 2023

Puoro ki te Ao | Te reo Māori fusion A celebration of Māori music healing, language, and storytelling with a twist of Japan.

Puoro Jerome, Salina Fisher, Ruiha Turner, Tāmihana Kātene and Toni Huata.

Puoro ki te Ao - a celebration of Māori music, healing, language and storytelling.

Puoro ki te ao features an array of award-winning artists - Including taonga puoro exponents Tāmihana Kātene, Jerome Kavanagh Poutama and Ruiha Turner, sharing the voices of the elements along with ancestral stories and ruruku traditional and contemporary chant.
To make the night even more magic, singer, actor and composer Toni Huata will improvise songs of reo with the group and will seamlessly weave the performances together as the concerts MC. Internationally renown composer, violin and Japanese Koto instrumentalist Salina Fisher will join the combination to finish presenting a culmination of cultural delight and unforgettable experience for all, in Gardens Magic.

Jerome Kavanagh - Ngāti Maniapoto - Matakore, Mōkai Pātea, Ngāti Rangi - Whanganui, Ngāti Tūwharetoa, Ngāti Kahungunū iwi (Māori), Caomhánach (Irish)

Grammy award-winning Taonga Puoro practitioner Jerome Kavanagh Poutama (Puoro Jerome) hails from Maniapoto - Ngāti Matakore, Mōkai Pātea, Kahungunū, Ngāti Rangi - Whanganui tribes (Māori) as well as the Caomhanach clan (Irish). Jerome has taken Taonga Puoro all over the world and performed at The Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, Sydney Opera House, The British Museum, Te Papa Tongarewa National Museum, and was selected in the New Zealand Art Delegation at the 11th Festival of Pacific Arts in the Solomon Islands. Jerome is currently the 2022 Composer-in-Residence at Te Koki NZSM at Victoria University. He is also a member of Haumanu Collective and has toured extensively sharing the ORO ATUA Puoro Māori sound journey and his school show Power to the Puoro. https://www.puorojerome.co.nz and SOUNZ.

Salina Fisher - Japanese, European

Salina Fisher (b.1993) is an award-winning New Zealand composer based in Te Whanganui-a-Tara Wellington. Her highly evocative music often draws on her Japanese heritage, as well as a fascination with the natural world. Her music has been commissioned by ensembles including New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, International Contemporary Ensemble, Albany Symphony, New Zealand String Quartet, NZTrio; and performed worldwide, including at Lincoln Center, Philharmonie Berlin, Walt Disney Concert Hall, and The Kennedy Center. She won the SOUNZ Contemporary Award for Rainphase (2016) and Tōrino – echoes on pūtōrino improvisations by Rob Thorne (2017), and has received awards from Fulbright, The Arts Foundation, Creative NZ, and CANZ. She is a graduate of Manhattan School of Music, New York, and New Zealand School of Music – Te Kōkī, Victoria University of Wellington, where she was Composer-in-Residence in 2019-2020, and is currently Teaching Fellow in Composition. https://www.salinafisher.com and SOUNZ.

Ruiha Turner - Ngāti Kahungunu, Pahauwera

Ruiha Turner, a Māmā who is of Pāhauwera - Kahungungu ki Wairoa iwi joins the wave of emerging wāhine Taonga Puoro Practitioners in Aotearoa. She works alongside her partner Jerome Kavanagh Poutama as Poumanawahine for the ORO ATUA Puoro Māori sound journey and they have both toured throughout Aotearoa with a focus on hauora, schools and marae. https://www.puorojerome.co.nz/korero-mai.

Tāmihana Kātene - Ngāti Toa Rangatira, Ngāti Tama, Ngāti Koata, Te Taoū - Ngāti Whātua

Tāmihana has lead and taught many community-based wānanga exploring the creation of Taonga Puoro, their associated pūrakau(stories) and their use as musical instruments. Outside of this environment, he has also frequented Te Kōkī, The New Zealand School Of Music, as a guest lecturer in Ethnomusicology studies and as a teacher of performance, particularly within Haka, moteatea and Taonga Puoro. Tāmihana’s passion for Tikanga and Te Reo have lead him to the composition of karakia and moteatea, specifically used to encapsulate and retain the knowledge pertaining to Taonga Puoro. These resources will serve as a set of tools to ensure that intergenerational learnings will be passed on from our tūpuna. https://www.haumanucollective.com/tamihana-katene/.

Toni Huata - Ngāti Kahungunu, Rongowhakaata, Lebanese, Northern European

Toni is a singer, composer, actor, tutor, producer, director and MC whose talent allows her to perform at various music and dance festivals both nationally and around the world in London-UK, Basque, Spain, Holland, Germany, Canada, Hawaii, Rarotonga, Manila-Philippines, Palau, America Samoa, Solomon Islands, Australia, China, Hungary, Austria and Japan. A graduate of Whitireia Music course in Rock and Jazz styles, Toni's deep spiritual roots and vocals range from jazz to soul ballads, opera to haka. Toni has 7 solo albums, 20+ music videos and her voice has featured in many theatre, TV and films including Rugby World Cup, World of Wearable Art, Mataku, Maui and King Kong to name a few. Toni was the first to headline at Ronnie Scotts in London with her compositions in te reo Māori. http://www.tonihuata.com and SOUNZ.

We would like to acknowledge the support from:

Te Runanga o Ngāti Kahungunu ki te Whanganui ā Tara and Wellington City Council - Gardens Magic