Bob Bickerton (taonga pūoro) and NZ String Quartet Photo: Aotearoa NZ Festival of the Arts
Performed by Bob Bickerton (taonga pūoro) with New Zealand String Quartet at the Aotearoa New Zealand Festival of the Arts 2022.
Hine-pū-te-hue is the Māori goddess of peace. She’s most often associated with the gourd or hue, and there’s a connection with stringed instruments in that both are made of plant material, with the sound being emitted through a sound hole.
In Hine-pū-te-hue Gillian Whitehead includes several taonga puoru made of gourds - the poi awhiowhio, which opens the piece is swung around the head, the large hue puru hau is blown across the open neck, there are gourd rattles and the koauau ponga ihu (a nose flute) which closes the piece is also a small gourd. Other taonga pūoro in the piece are – the nguru, a flute made of whale’s tooth or maire wood, the ku, played like a jew’s harp, using the mouth as a resonating chamber, the putatara (or conch), the pū kāea (a war trumpet), the pūmotomoto (a very quiet wooden instrument associated with birth), the pupu harakeke (or flax snail) and the tumutumu (a tapped stone, bone or piece of wood).
Bob Bickerton plays pū kāea Photo: Aotearoa NZ Festival of the Arts
Bob Bickerton plays ku Photo: Aotearoa NZ Festival of the Arts
Bob Bickerton plays koauau ponga ihu Photo: Aotearoa NZ Festival of the Arts
Bob Bickerton plays taonga pūoro Photo: Aotearoa NZ Festival of the Arts
Recorded 10 March 2022, Michael Fowler Centre, Wellington by RNZ Concert
Producer: David McCaw
Sound Engineer: Darryl Stack
