2015 Term 2, Week 5: NZ Music Month - NZ Music from Last Century

NZ Music Month - song a day calendar continued
Monday May 18: Blue Smoke by Pixie Williams 

 Blue Smoke was the first NZ record composed, recorded and pressed in the country. It was recorded in 1948 and issued in June 1949 by the new TANZA ("To Assist NZ Artists') label. It was a hit and sold over 50,000 copies.  It was sung by Pixie Williams and written by Ruru Karaitiana in May 1940, while he was on the troopship Aquitania taking the Maori Battalion  to the Second World War. Private Ruru Karaitiana was a dance band leader and he played many instruments. He recalled that one day on the troopship they were off the coast of Africa, "halfway across the Indian Ocean", he was sunbathing on the deck when a sergeant came along, stopped beside him and looked up: "Look at that blue smoke," he said, pointing up to the smoke drifting from the funnels. "It's going  the right way - back to New Zealand- and we're steaming father from home." 

Tuesday May 19: Life in Sunshine by Jamie McDell

 Jamie McDell was born 3 November 1992 and is a singer songwriter from Auckland. She used a variety of social media to gain exposure, posting YouTube videos, and using Twitter and Facebook to get her music to people.

"I write songs about a lot of different things depending on what's happening in my life. Lately my songs have been about relationships, dealing with loss, and wanting to go back to the beach!  I can really get inspired by anything. 


Wednesday May 20: Special by Six60

Thursday May 21: Burning Bridges by Broods   

Friday May 22: Sun Goes Down by Nesian Mystik
 Nesian Mystik is  Polynesian culture merged with RnB, Hip Hop and Reggae. The boys met while studying music at Western Springs College and found success after winning the Smokefree Pacific Beats competition. They wrote and produced all their own material highlighting the group's ability in songwriting, musicianship and production. They had tten top ten hit singles, and the bad also composed the score for NZ's first Pacific Cartoon Bro Town. 

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New Zealand Music From the 1960s. 

C'mon  was the most popular NZ music show of the mid 1960s. (It was the only NZ pop music show on tv at that time.  There was only one channel, and it was in black and white.)   There are very few programmes from early NZ tv that were saved so these are very precious memories - and history - of NZ music of the past.

This is the last C'mon show recorded (Part 1).      And Part 2 of the same programme.

All the performers were very well  known and the celebrities of the day.