Hello everyone
Finally I found some time to access the internet here in New Zealand. Things have been so busy we’ve barely seen our hotel room!
Let me tell you what we have been up to lately…
My last post dates back to Monday morning while we were in Sydney Airport. As you would know from that post, our flight was delayed by about 3 hours because of “the late arrival of the aircraft” as they always say.
Well and truly, 3 hours after we were meant to leave, we could finally board the massive Emirates Airbus 380 bound for Auckland… to discover that the air conditioning didn’t function properly! So we had to wait while that was being repaired. The plane got hotter and hotter and everyone more and more impatient, and approx. 45 minutes later, we finally closed the doors and taxied to the runway.
A smooth 3 hour flight later, we landed in Auckland where we were welcomed by the ground staff of Group Events, the organiser of this festival. We were immediately bussed to Rotorua, a 3 hour drive, to arrive at our hotel shortly after 9pm (we were meant to arrive just before 5pm). Anyway, we had a lovely dinner – albeit late – and went to bed. It didn’t take anyone much longer than a good 30 minutes to get to sleep – we could hear very little noise coming from the students’ rooms.
A good sleep later, it was Tuesday, and time to get into things. In the morning, after a nice breakfast buffet, we headed to the Wai-O-Tapu thermal wonderland. A beautiful place of volcanic rock, sulphur lakes and funky coloured water. You’ll see the photos when we come back in a few days. This was the first time we actually really experienced the typical “Rotorua-smell”, which made some of the students look a bit paler than normal…
Then it was off to the Rotorua museum, where we watched a movie on the history of the city – complete with moving seats and special effects! A little while later we were invited to perform in the big tower of the museum. A fantastic acoustic! The Conservatorium flutes played first, followed by St Mary’s. “The” harp was waiting for us there, boxed up in a road case, totalling just over 140 kilos. It is now Friday and my back… well, let’s say it’s seen better times. Lifting a harp on and off a bus about 8 times in 4 days, I’m starting to feel it. Thank goodness we’re off to the Polynesian spa tomorrow for a good hot soak.
Anyhow, back to my post. After the museum we went back to the hotel where we rehearsed in a room hotter than the average sauna. Needless to say the rehearsal sounded a bit lethargic.
The evening of the first night we were welcomed to the Agrodome – a big shed, essentially, where we were introduced to the different breeds of NZ sheep (of course), saw some excellent sheep shearing, cow milking, etc. A very entertaining show, after which the deputy mayor of Rotorua welcomed everyone to the city. We were given some dinner, had a bit of a dance, and then went back to the hotel for more rest and a good night’s sleep.
Tuesday then. Again a wonderful breakfast, and then it was off to Mamaku Primary School, a small and poor school in the bush not far from Rotorua. Mamaku is the 2nd highest settlement in NZ and that was easy to feel when we hopped of the bus, into the NZ morning air. The hall we played in was just a cold because the heating hadn’t been switched on yet. Anyhow, a bit of harp movement and back cracking later, we were ready to go. The flutes played first followed by the orchestra. The students of the school were so well behaved, everyone was very impressed. They absolutely loved seeing the flutes stamp and play and whack boomwhackers whilst playing on headjoints, cheered at one of their mates taking the baton and conducting the St Mary’s Orchestra in the Pink Panther, nearly lost it when Julia played the typewriter piece, etc.
Principal and students were very appreciative – I just received an email from the principal saying that the kids were still talking about it.
With a warm fuzzy heart, we took off to our hotel, where we were adjudicated. The Orchestra played first and we heard from the adjudicator that he was very impressed with the blend of our sound, considering we have a rather unusual combination of instruments in the orchestra. He workshopped with our girls and worked mostly on dynamics and phrasing. The girls loved it.
The flutes then performed as well and nearly blew the adjudicator away. He was incredibly impressed with their standard and the fact they play unconducted and can stay together so well.
After this performance, some selected students of both our groups went off to Honours rehearsals. A few different honours orchestras, bands and ensembles have been put together to give students another opportunity to challenge themselves. They all had a good experience playing in stage band, orchestra and concert band.
Tuesday evening was the time to be picked up to travel to the Tamaki Maori Village. This is a Maori Village built in the traditional way. We appointed a chief for our bus, were welcomed in the traditional way – with Haka and all – and listened to the Maori singing and dancing and telling stories of days long gone. A beautiful Hangi dinner later, it was 10pm and time to get some sleep – so off we went to the hotel and off to bed.
Thursday was the day for another schools performance. This time at Western Heights Primary School. The difference between Mamaku primary and this school was enormous: Western Heights has approx. 350 students where Mamaku has about 60. Western Heights’ Hall was bigger, there was even a piano, and surprisingly, the students were far more distracted and less attentive than at Mamaku. Anyhow, they all loved the music we brought them, and at the end of the concert the whole school population (teachers and all) stood up and performed their Haka for us – it’s quite something, to see 6 year old students chant and dance, speaking in the traditional Maori language. Pretty cool!
After this performance we were off to Rainbow Springs, a nature park where we learnt about local fauna and flora and saw some interesting animals, including albino trout (very rare!) and the native Tui. We then visited the “Kiwi Encounter” where we learnt about the conservation of the Kiwi bird, and saw some kiwi birds in action running around scouring for food.
Then lunch, and then a bit of fun: we went up the Skyline here – a gondola ride – that took us to a luge track. Two luge rides later, we were ready to board our bus to get back to the hotel. The honours students rehearsed again, after which we went to dinner. After dinner it was time to perform in a public concert – each school and group performs at some point and we were all given a 7 minute time slot. Having said that, not too many schools seem to have an idea of what 7 minutes is like, because most of them went over time. Not us of course. The flutes performed in the beginning of the program, the orchestra more towards the end. The audience went nearly berserk when the flutes played – they absolutely loved them. The orchestra received quite the cheer as well – so everyone had a good feeling afterwards, while we got back to the hotel.
And this is where I will leave you at the moment. It is now Friday, about time for lunch, and I must finish up now to go and see what students have been up to in the many workshops that have been running this morning. They’re off to more workshops and rehearsals this arvo, and then we are going to see the honours groups perform tonight in a big concert. Should be excellent – we’ll cheer very hard for all our students involved.
Talk to you very soon, if not via this blog, it’ll be “live” on Sunday night or Monday morning.
All the best
Peter Wouters
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