Tama Waipara - the Tairāwhiti Arts Festival director who proves that anything is possible

Wednesday, 18 August 2021

Tama Waipara​ is the third person to apologise about the bitter Gisborne weather as we sit inside his newly furnished Te Tairāwhiti Arts Festival office space on a Tuesday afternoon.

The walls are covered with the work of local artists, some of whom now live on the other side of the world.

From the small Eastern Bay of Plenty town, to Auckland to New York for eight years, the softly spoken musician, artist and singer, who grew up in Ōpōtiki​, has been creative director of the festival since it started three years ago.

His life’s journey could be compared to the room of doors in Alice in Wonderland, where each one leads him to somewhere incredible, but somewhere not without its challenges.

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If you asked Waipara whether he ever expected to be creative director of a festival that attracts more than 16,000 people, the answer is no. In fact, his life has taken several twists and turns, due to a freak accident while studying overseas.

Waipara’s father is from Gisborne and his mother from Christchurch and the pair met at teachers’ training college. Waipara was born in Rangiora​ in the South Island and moved to Ōpōtiki when he was 10.

The youngest of three boys, he attended Ōpōtiki College​ and developed a strong love of music from a young age.

The voices and music of Nina Simone, The Beatles, Bob Marley, Bach, Mozart, Miles Davis and Carole King wove their way through his childhood, with their influence reflected in his own work later on.

“Mum was a flautist and Dad was very musical. He played the guitar, sang and was an artist, he painted, carved and wrote poetry.”

Waipara’s heart lay with the clarinet, and he took music lessons at kura, played in a band and involved himself in Whakatane’s music scene.

“The Kora brothers were all in my year, now [reggae band] L.A.B, and they were the luminaries of the area.”

Waipara’s sole focus was classical music. He later auditioned for Auckland’s School of Music, to which he was accepted and gained an honours degree, but after completing university, he felt at somewhat of a “loose end”.

His aunt, who lived in New York, encouraged him to audition for the Manhattan School of Music.

“I was drawn to it, because, while I still had this classical focus, my interest was quite broad. I was interested in a lot of different styles of music, including singing, but I was more of a closet singer.”

In 1998, aged 21, he travelled to New York, auditioned and was accepted into the school’s masters programme.

“I can’t imagine what American Idol was like, but it felt very intimidating and the judging panel are people who are world-class musicians. Sometimes I felt quite powerless, but I had two amazing teachers who had completely different approaches.

“It was probably then that my artistic journey exploded because I think the potential you can see beyond your horizon grows so quickly … anything is possible

But in just moments, Waipara’s life made an unexpected and rapid turn. He’d just completed the first year of his masters programme and was waiting outside a lift in his student hostel, when the lid of a fuse box, which was mounted about two metres above the ground, crashed down on to his head.

“I remember the sound before the pain. I heard this ‘bang’ and then felt the pain. There was blood everywhere.”

In true Kiwi style, he then “walked a couple of blocks” to the hospital, where he passed out on the floor of the emergency room. In ICU, he had multiple brain scans, and remained in hospital for nearly two weeks.

He was discharged from hospital right in the middle of orchestra auditions for the second semester.

But Waipara had post-traumatic headache (PTH), causing extreme sensitivity to light, nausea, and blackouts, all of which were exacerbated by playing the clarinet. He reluctantly took the semester off.

“The accident certainly pushed things along in a certain direction, but certainly that inner desire to get beyond the confines of this one thing was always there.”

It was then a friend suggested he take up singing, something he had only ever done “around the house”.

“It helped me to build my confidence when I wasn't allowed to play clarinet – and I wasn’t allowed to play for the next nine months.'

He returned home in 1999 for some downtime and was welcomed by a huge support network.

“People would ask, ‘have you tried carrot juice, have you tried cranial osteopathy?’ and so on. It's a very Kiwi thing, feeling very invested in others.”

Waipara slowly began to play the clarinet as his body allowed, before returning to New York the following February to finish his degree. But, having unlocked a new door with singing, his interest in that grew.

“I joined a band, The Occasions, which had no material, and that’s where I discovered I had a real love of writing.” The band was then approached by a record label, whose creator asked Waipara to work together, which led to him signing a contract as a singer/songwriter.

“It was the weirdest pivot,” Waipara laughs.

His singing career then took him all over the world, from Europe to America and eventually back to New Zealand, working with artists such as Emily King​, Nathan Haines​, Annie Crummer​ and Maisey Rika.​

‘’There’s a real sense of whanaungatanga​ and family in our little musical community, and that’s another reason why staying here has been so easy.

“When I was overseas I started to see the likes of Fat Freddy’s Drop and Trinity Roots doing massive things in Europe, which was so inspiring to see … it made me realise how possible it was to come home and make music from there.”

He returned home again in 2007 and his path changed course again.

While living in Auckland, he got a job at the Auckland Arts Festival, starting off as a marketing assistant.

After releasing his first EP, Leaving Paradise, the same year, he went on tour, but the festival remained on his mind.

“I really enjoyed the atmosphere of the festival and being behind the scenes in what you could create and how you can work together with a team of people to do something really special.”

Waipara also lectured at universities, mentoring music for the New Zealand Music Commission, and he worked on theatre sound design and film.

Then the opportunity of running an arts festival in Gisborne came up, and he leaped at the opportunity.

From Raukōkore to Rangitukia, Manutuke to Muriwai, Tikitiki to Tūranga-nui-ā-Kiwa/Gisborne, once a year ,the region comes alive with theatre, music, dance, whakairo, taonga, light and sound.

Last year's festival attracted 16,000 people and was the first festival of its kind, post-lockdown.

Sixty-one per cent of last year's ticket-buyers were under the age of 45, which was “unusual within domestic arts events and a testament to the intergenerational whānau focus”, Waipara says.

“This place is just so rich in talent in every respect. There’s a real special energy here which is created by artists and it’s built by artists who live here, but also those who are out in the world achieving great things.

“What’s most special about it is we’re unashamedly celebrating where we are as a place. It was really important for us to say this is who we are, and it’s determined by the land and the landscape.

“Since living here, I’ve learned so much about who I am and why I am and where I fit into the bigger picture. This role is a privilege, and it’s about serving our community. It’s a special job.”

Te Tairawhiti Arts Festival takes place from October 8-17 this year.