Patea Maori Club
Poi E
Album · Worldwide · 2009 · DALVANIUS PRIME
Producer Dalvanius Prime served as musical director of Patea Maori Club in the 1980s as an open-genre celebration of Māori pride. The project’s 1984 album combined traditional Māori music and culture with contemporary and classical elements of Western music. That ambitious brief yielded such diverse results as the R&B-flavored “Kua Makona” (“I’ve had enough”) and the synth-meets-classical and opera motifs of “Anei Ra Overture and Aria.” Performed entirely in te reo Māori, the title track topped the New Zealand pop charts for four weeks after being featured in a segment on Eyewitness News, a popular nightly show that aired throughout the ’80s. Linguist Ngoi Pewhairangi penned the song’s lyrics specifically to stoke pride in young Māori, and its left-field success spawned not only a timely breakdance mix but a prominent UK tour for Patea Maori Club. “Poi E” reentered the charts in 2010 after its inclusion in Taika Waititi’s 2010 movie Boy, and the film’s actors even recreated the song’s original video with their own joyful update of it.
Poi E
Patea Maori Club
Producer Dalvanius Prime served as musical director of Patea Maori Club in the 1980s as an open-genre celebration of Māori pride. The project’s 1984 album combined traditional Māori music and culture with contemporary and classical elements of Western music. That ambitious brief yielded such diverse results as the R&B-flavored “Kua Makona” (“I’ve had enough”) and the synth-meets-classical and opera motifs of “Anei Ra Overture and Aria.” Performed entirely in te reo Māori, the title track topped the New Zealand pop charts for four weeks after being featured in a segment on Eyewitness News, a popular nightly show that aired throughout the ’80s. Linguist Ngoi Pewhairangi penned the song’s lyrics specifically to stoke pride in young Māori, and its left-field success spawned not only a timely breakdance mix but a prominent UK tour for Patea Maori Club. “Poi E” reentered the charts in 2010 after its inclusion in Taika Waititi’s 2010 movie Boy, and the film’s actors even recreated the song’s original video with their own joyful update of it.
