A First Music Festival

Te Ao Hou, December 1956, Page 29

Detail of one panet of a gatepost sarved by boys of the Minginui Forest Maori School. Toolmarks and tiny defects are still visible, but will be removed later. A First Music Festival by G. A. McCRACKEN A few Weeks ago, three schools in the Te Whaiti-Minginui district of the Urewera, came together to perform their first Music Festival. Being the first of its kind, and successful beyond expectation it will be followed probably by another Festival at Minginui, and it is likely that schools in other places will follow the lead and also combine. How does one go about starting a Schools' Music Festival? Probably with an idea, for these festivals are things that just grow, once that little seed idea has been sown. Cities have had such concerts for years, but they have taken time to develop even where transport is not a problem. In the country there are more difficulties. Before the first attempt, the children will not necessarily know what a Festival is even; suggest the possibility, and you will hear them chattering wonderingly away, ‘we're going to have a “bestible;” ‘What is a “bestible” ever.’ But it will not be long before they are noticing photos and comments about say, Auckland's Schools' Festival in the newspapers, perhaps listening to it on the radio, and then, after their own effort they will be looking, listening and above all comparing. The Minginui Festival began with the songs the schoolchildren were learning from the school sessions of the radio broadcasts. As the year advanced they acquired quite a repertoire of songs which they liked and could sing well; then came the idea…‘let's have a combined concert … a Festival of Song’ an idea which meant revising Tihema Ruri is lost in contemplation of an intricate piece of his own pattern work.

Figures carved by the boys are placed on every post of the school fence. Here is Bonnie August with his own carving. some extra songs from former years, and learning some well-worn favourites, for the parents. So the teachers, aided by a willing local pianist, and the broadcast lessons, taught the children enough songs to have two concerts. Yet you don't get so far without doubts. At first you feel confident enough, for the date of the performance is well ahead, and perhaps not even decided. But the weeks slip by and then the date becomes a threat on the horizon. Teachers confident enough in their classrooms begin to doubt the wisdom of conducting their children on the public platform. And that is the moment when someone has a brainwave…‘We could have a guest-conductor.’ This sounds pretty grand because the great symphony orchestras of the world are known to have guest-conductors, and it is also the way out, for the guest conductor is the scapegoal: And of course there are people who didn't mind being scapegoats but it is not so easy to get one to visit a fairly remote settlement like Minginui because not everyone can spare the time needed to get there. I had not seen Sid Mead, now headmaster of Minginui Maori School, since our Training College days; then we met by sheer chance at Kennedy's Bay during the Easter holiday. It was this meeting that reminded him to write to ask me if I would be their guest conductor; letters passed to and fro and finally all was settled, dates, songs, the approval of the Board and the Maori Schools' Inspectorate. I set off one lovely morning to Rotorua, on to the Rainbow Mountain, along the straight pine-shadowed pumice roads of the Kaingaroa Plains to Murupara, and reached Te Whaiti by dusk. Monday dawned brilliantly fine and very cold; there was a dusting of fresh snow on the bush covered hilltops which surround Minginui. This was rehearsal day and down at the schools an atmosphere of excitement was apparent. By about 9.30 a.m. the children had all assembled at the hangar-shaped Hall, and practice had begun. Two taperecorders whirred slowly in front of the stage, a mystery and novelty to many of the children. The programme worked through was a long one. It included two sections of the combined choir singing a wide variety of songs; in addition each school was to present a section of its own. Minginui Maori, the smallest group, sang Maori songs, Te Whaiti Maori performed action songs, and Minginui Forest presented percussion band items. Time slipped past on oiled wheels. We began with the massed choir. I was delighted with the infectious enthusiasm of these children, as delighted in fact as they were to have some of their worst worries taken off their shoulders; when to come in, counting, how to cope with the wide range of European songs. What smiles of relief spread over those eager happy faces! Maori children favour the smaller range which is more natural to them, and they sing with great confidence within this range with a quality of voice which is not in any way English, but which has the chesty richness of the Mediterranean peoples, the Spaniards and the Italians. There seems too to be a fundamental difference between Maori and European children in that the former prefer the slow sad songs and the latter the fast tripping ones. Perseveringly we held on notes that were being cut too short, we practised exciting changes (concluded on page 48) Sample of the boy's work from an ornate gate post.