Robert Wiremu: A musical connection

In this kōrero with Robert Wiremu — an Auckland-based composer, singer, choirmaster, teacher and all-round music-maker whose work Reimagining Mozart is being performed in Dunedin and Wānaka this weekend — Dale Husband (a talented muso himself) got the chance to talk about one of his favourite subjects.

 

Tēnā koe, Robert. You’ve been doing some awesome mahi in the classical music world over the years. It’s lovely to have a kōrero with you. Let’s start by celebrating your folks and your tribal connections. Can you paint a picture of your whānau for us?

Yeah, cool. Mum, Rauhina, was from Bridge Pā, Hastings. She was Ngāti Kahungunu with a very strong Ngāti Porou connection. Dad was Robert Pātena Williams. He was Tūwharetoa, and he was raised at Rātana Pā. He grew up there and went to boarding school, Hato Pāora, in Feilding. Mum went to Church College in Hamilton.

They met on a shearing gang in Mataura, down Southland way, and I was brought up between Whanganui and Hastings. We went back and forth between the two places a lot. Eventually, they decided that they wanted to settle permanently in Hastings.

I moved up earlier than the rest of the family and lived with my grandparents for about a year. And while I was there, my grandmother decided it might be a good idea for me to have piano lessons. She sent me to the same teacher that my aunties and my mother had had a good 20-something years earlier.

And those piano lessons were like finding a place that felt like home. Music felt like home.

I’m not surprised, because Rātana has such a strong musical tradition — and the same with Church College because the Mormon whānau love to sing as well, bro.

Well, Dad did play in the Rātana band for a time. He played the E-flat horn in the Rātana band in the 1960s. And my mother, when she was going to Church College and being brought up Mormon, was also musical. Mum’s parents were very musical people.

Then, when Mum and Dad were living in Rātana Pā in the early ‘70s, Mum helped out with fundraising for the Manuao, which is the big building at Rātana Pā. She did fundraising concerts which included things like cabarets and Māori culture performances. So, yes, music was strong in our family.

Tēnā koe. How many tamariki in your family, Robert, and where do you fit in?

I have one sister and one brother, and I’m the oldest. And because music was my thing, my brother and sister avoided it. It wasn’t until I’d moved away and was studying at university in Wellington that my sister got involved in music. My brother has an interest because he lived with my dad for a long time, and the guitar was always around there, but he didn’t take it up in the same way.

I’ve got a niece, Mahinārangi Lawrence, my sister’s daughter, who’s doing some really good work as a singer. She got a couple of awards at the Māori Music Awards last year. She’s brilliant.

I’ve interviewed Mahinā — how cool. Well, people know you as a classically trained choral coach and musician. But I’d guess the musical taste of your Māori whānau probably included the Mills Brothers and the Andrews Sisters and the rock and roll songs of yesteryear. Was that the case? More pop music, perhaps, than classical?

Well, the music that Mum and Dad played around the house a lot was Motown and some early Beatles stuff, and Elvis Presley. Dad was an amazing party guitarist. He could learn songs quickly and just had an amazing ear. He could play all night long. He’d just sit there with his guitar, and people would bring him food, whatever he needed, so he never had to move, and the music never had to stop.

Those were the days when people weren’t singing along to records, they were singing along to a live guitarist.

People think that all Māori can sing, and that we’re naturals at harmonising. What do you make of that? Is there anything genetic to suggest that that perception is accurate?

I think it’s a little bit true. Māori, like our Pacific cousins, sang a lot because singing was accessible and available. It didn’t cost any money to sing. It’s what you did to connect with whānau and friends, and with people that you hadn’t seen in a long time.

Singing is a thing that you do when you celebrate — and that can be a happy celebration or a sad celebration. You know, when something important happens, you don’t pull out your dance shoes necessarily. The first thing you do is work out what to sing. That’s the first thing people tend to do.

But I think the opposite of that paradigm also proves its truth. Our Pākehā cousins and our Asian cousins often have the resources to pay for violin lessons or piano lessons, so their access to music is different.

That’s a very broad generalisation, of course. But I think it’s true that when Māori people get together, and we celebrate, we commemorate, we grieve together, it’s through music.

I remember going to one of the Matatini regionals here in Auckland, and seeing how the audience takes part. It’s not necessarily the elite teams in that regional competition, so you get some of the teams singing waiata that everyone in the audience knows. And everyone in the audience stands up, everyone in the audience sings, and everyone in the audience is doing the actions along with them.

Now, where does that exist for our tangata Tiriti cousins? Where does that exist for other New Zealanders? We have that unwritten Māori songbook that’s a kind of common language, a common thing that connects us.

Some ethnomusicologists have suggested that we didn’t have a melodic history, that our mōteatea was the way that we expressed ourselves musically. Do you also think that our music sound was dirge-like?

I think to describe it as dirge-like would be to compare it to other music traditions — and I don’t think that’s the right thing to do. Pre-colonial Māori music needs to be considered in its own right. It doesn’t need to be compared to any other musical tradition.

You’re right that things like the mōteatea are prevalent in ancient music. But even considering it as music isn’t necessarily right. It’s just a way of transmitting text, a way of transmitting whakapapa, a way of transmitting history, a way of transmitting, I don’t know, recipes or warnings about certain plants to avoid or dangerous areas to avoid.

I think the idea that something is “music” is a western idea. Music as something that exists on its own, without history, or music without story, or music without whakapapa, didn’t happen for us. It was an important vehicle for carrying messages and a mechanism for transmitting ideas. It wasn’t necessarily a classical art form that existed in its own right with no other associations.

We’ve been very strongly influenced by musical notation, which we tend to think of as western, and that’s influenced the way that we perceive music. How do you feel when you hear, for instance, Chinese or Asian music, which is vastly different to the musical notation that we take for granted? The same could be said of Arabic music and other ethnic-derived music. Does it all sit comfortably with you, or does it sound foreign to you? Do you enjoy hearing other people’s musical styles?

I think there’s beauty in all music. There’s beauty in any communication that has the objective of sharing ideas or sharing stories. And if I don’t find a particular music interesting, it’s my problem to deal with. I have to keep looking until I find that thing. That’s not the fault of the music itself — that’s the fault of the listener.

I don’t necessarily immediately connect with certain kinds of rap, but I’ll keep listening to it until I can find what I think the appeal is to other people. And I might not connect directly to certain country western music or folk music from certain countries. But I have to keep investigating until I can come to some kind of understanding where it makes sense to me. And sometimes, that’s by changing my own sense, if you understand what I mean.

Fascinating area. I could talk to you for ages about it. But let’s talk about harmony. It’s very beautiful when you get these combined voices, or when you use some instruments as voices, as I’ve heard taonga pūoro players speak of their instruments. How does it feel when you’re the catalyst to bring the combination of voices together in a very pure sound, a harmonic sound, whether it be instruments or voices?

When I’m listening to other people harmonise, especially if they haven’t had the same kind of westernised education that I’ve had in music, I’m amazed at the freedom, the instinctiveness that people have when they harmonise. They instinctively know that there are certain notes that go together, that line up so beautifully, that create a richer sound.

But I also think that, sometimes, and this is the contrast of anything, it can be made more beautiful by making what happens immediately before it more ugly. The most beautiful harmony might be preceded by the most jarring dissonance. And that makes that change into the beautiful harmony, a relief. There’s a sense of release and a sense of breaking tension.

I love the idea that harmony is just another layer of storytelling.

Ka pai. I’m intrigued by this because, in broadcasting and voice work, there’s a microphone, there’s intonation and there’s inflection — all these little tools. I know you’ve done a lot of work as a choirmaster during your career. How important is it to use these tools and to understand the dynamics that are achievable?

I think there’s something almost miraculous about being able to bring together a bunch of people who have the intention of being on the same page, but who arrive not being that united.

They’ll arrive at rehearsal, and some of them will have come from work, where it’s been stressful. Some of them will have come from classes. Some of them will have come directly from family, and this is their moment to take some time for themselves. And they come together to this gathering, where they become united, often in an unspoken way.

Some conductors are very chatty, some conductors aren’t very chatty. They will achieve unity in different ways. And there’s just this amazing willingness to make something together where each individual voice, each person’s experience, contributes to this one amazing and corporate idea.

The most amazing times that I’ve had as a music maker are when I’m communicating with the people I’m performing with without talking — but somehow we’ve agreed to do something. And it might be something that’s never happened in rehearsal before — it’s just happened there in the middle of the music-making.

And then you come to the other side of it, and you know that you can never recreate that moment again. But the point is that you might want to look for it again. You might never actually find it, but seeking those moments is part of what we do.

And there is magic in that search.

Yeah, it’s magical in many ways, and it shows the kind of psychic connection that humans can have with each other. We don’t need to speak, but we often know what the other person is thinking.

And when you get a whole group of people — and sometimes I’m working with choirs of up to 200 people — and they have all individually decided to give their egos over to this one person standing in front of them, who they trust is going to look after them, who they know is going to care about the final results — then the music-making becomes more than just the sound that you’re making. There are many more ways to it than that, and it’s mostly about that human-to-human connection.

I think that’s really interesting. And perhaps that’s why the career of a solo performer never really appealed to me. I was never going to be the kind of pianist that was going to be happy being on stage alone. But when I go to a piano recital, and I see those amazing pianists playing some incredible repertoire, their connection is not with anyone else on stage, because it’s just them — their connection is with the audience.

So, there’s always an element of human connection, which is critical.

When I look at your CV, I can see that you’ve done some amazing work. You’re obviously hugely experienced and highly regarded in your field. It’s fair to say that we don’t have a lot of Māori who are well-known in classical or operatic or composition. So you’re a bit of a rarity, brother.

Yeah, I’m really blessed to be able to do what I do.

You’ve worked with choirs and ensembles, small vocal groups and big ones. When you look back, have there been a couple of moments that you could share with us that illustrate where it all came together exactly how you might have dreamed it would, and everything hit the mark at the right time?

There have been amazing moments on stage where I’ve not really understood what kind of thing just happened to me, but just been blown away by it. There have been moments that have happened on tours, with large choirs and small groups with opera singers on stage.

But I think the biggest thing — and I know it sounds like I’m saying this because it’s the kind of thing I should be saying as a teacher, but the biggest thing is facilitating the work of other musicians. That has seemed the most important and satisfying to me, and the nexus of all of the work that has gone before.

Recently, I’ve been performing less and doing more writing, more composition work, more musical directing, and more musical producing.

I got to write a waiata for a New Zealand Symphony Orchestra concert, which was based on a 19^th-century theme by Brahms, which was then developed through Marlow, and then ended up in this waiata that I wrote.

There’s the piece that’s being performed today in Dunedin and tomorrow in Wānaka, which is a reimagining of Mozart’s Requiem.

And these have been moments where I’m not the one on stage. I’m not the one in control. It’s something that I’ve put my heart and soul into writing, and then I hand it over to the performers, and say: “Now it’s your turn. Do what you think is right for this story. Whatever you think the next part of that story is.”

And I’ve just completed a concert as part of the Auckland Arts Festival. We did a performance called Toiere, which was operatic arias translated into te reo Māori and mashed in with well-known Māori songs. And being able to facilitate that for a bunch of emerging young singers who are just starting their careers — that was amazing.

The Mozart reimagining is amazing, too, because that’s going to be performed by the national choir Voices New Zealand — and it will be one of the pieces that will represent what’s happening musically in Aotearoa when they go on an international tour in October.

So, I think that’s the best: when I’m helping other musicians to be the best that they can be. It’s certainly what I try to do with all of my students.

Tēnā koe, Robert. We seldom talk about what goes on in a composer’s mind when you’re writing a musical score for multiple instruments and voices. Your head must be awash with musical ideas. How do you control all of it?

The advice that I always had from my teachers was to ask for limitations. If you’re not given limitations, give them to yourself. Because if you have nothing but blank pieces of paper with all the options in the world and nothing to stop you, you often don’t even know where to start.

So, I will give myself limitations. I will start with rules. For instance, in the case of Reimagining Mozart, I decided that I would use the material of Mozart’s Requiem. That was one rule. And I would tell the story of the Erebus tragedy of 1979 — that was another limitation. And anytime I use Mozart’s vocal music for the choir, I aim never to change his notes.

Another limitation I gave myself was to not depict any actual person or event in telling this story about Erebus, which is still a very sensitive thing for many people, not the least of whom are the families who are affected directly by that tragedy.

So, giving myself limitations is really important. I think I’m putting myself at risk of writer’s block if I don’t have a starting point. And I do all that before I write a note.

Then every time I start writing, I have to keep asking myself the question: “Is this telling the story? Is this thing that I want to do with this music? Is it propelling the story forward?”

And if the answer isn’t yes, then I abandon that idea. There have been a few ideas that I abandoned along the way, and I’m glad I did, because I think I’ve got a more cohesive piece of storytelling by sticking to those particular rules.

Tēnā koe. You describe yourself as a storyteller, a composer and a music maker. In Reimagining Mozart, how much of yourself did you bring to this project?

I have great admiration for the music of Mozart, but I don’t treat it quite as religiously as some people do. I believe that any time you approach any composer’s music, you’ve got to do it with your own experience. I don’t believe in trying to recreate how Mozart would have heard this in the 1790s. I don’t have the ears of a 1790s composer. I’m not Austrian. I wasn’t brought up like Mozart was, touring palaces and castles throughout Europe as a child.

So I don’t have those experiences. I have my experiences of growing up in Rātana Pā and Castlecliff in Whanganui and Flaxmere in Hastings. Those are my experiences. So, I bring what I can to the music of Mozart.

At the same time, I have to be respectful of the people who truly admire Mozart. And I have to be respectful of those families who had a direct connection to Erebus, some of whom are sick and tired of people dredging it up when they’re just trying to move on.

Well, I know that your efforts, Robert, encapsulate our collective grief, so thank you for putting this piece together, as difficult as it is as a subject. It’s a wonderful contribution to our nation’s musical catalogue.

You’ve taught a lot of young people, and celebrate their rise in confidence on the classical stages here and overseas. What are you making of the new crop of young Māori and Pasifika talent in the classical space?

There are some really lovely voices coming through with a lot to share. I’m looking forward to hearing what’s going to happen with the ones I worked with on Toiere. Some of them will be on the verge of making a decision about whether they want to go overseas or not, which is a big decision.

It’s not a choice for everyone because it’s not the most glamorous lifestyle if you don’t like living out of suitcases, hotel foyers, airport lounges. And it takes a lot of investment to go through the training programmes.

We can do brilliant things here in New Zealand, but then they have to go somewhere else to do the polishing-off work, and to get that exposure to the operatic art form that can’t exist here. You’ve got to go away to Europe or North America to be exposed to the sheer amount and the quality of opera work, and the teachers and other students who are often inspiring to us.

Tēnā koe, Robert. It’s been a pleasure talking with you. I’m imagining you at your piano with your musical notation books, and battling away on behalf of choirs and ensembles. But what else do you do, Robert Wiremu, to keep yourself fresh and loving life?

Well, I very rarely sit at the piano. I try to avoid it, because I think that’s a limitation on my ability to write. I don’t want to be limited by what my hands can do, because someone else’s hands are going to be much more dexterous than mine. So I only want to be limited by what my brain can do.

But I try to do other things. I’m interested in how other art forms tell stories and express beauty or humanity. So I’m, as much as possible, going to see films, even if it’s just on Netflix. I’m as much as possible going to dance or the theatre. I did make it to the Matatini regionals last year, and I watched the Matatini nationals this year. It was absolutely amazing.

And because I work in this very marginal field of classical singing and choral singing and opera, I want to get involved as much as possible in all kinds of other art forms to see what the shared experiences are.

And I’m on the board of different committees, for example, with the Choirs Aotearoa committee, and the Kiri Te Kanawa Foundation. And then I’m also on the board of the New Zealand Centre for Music, which is much more interested in new music than classical.

So I’ve always been exposed to what other composers are up to and to the ways they like to challenge convention — which appeals to me as someone who’s quite disruptive and likes to challenge convention.

And I go to as many classical concerts as I can fit in. I’ve already got all my tickets for the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, the New Zealand Opera and the Auckland Philharmonia, and the Auckland Theatre Company.

I just want to go to everything I possibly can.

And I love going to art galleries. That’s really my favourite thing of all.

(This interview has been edited for length and clarity.)

Voices New Zealand is touring Reimagining Mozart with Chamber Music New Zealand: 6pm on Sunday, March 30 as part of the Dunedin Arts Festival. Tickets available from here. And 7pm on Monday, March 31, as part of the Wānaka Festival of Colour. Tickets here.

E-Tangata, 2025