Maori music

Traditional Māori music, or Te Pūoro Māori is composed or performed by Māori, the native people of New Zealand, and includes a wide variety of folk music styles, often integrated with poetry and dance.

In addition to these traditions and musical heritage, since the 19th-century European colonisation of New Zealand Māori musicians and performers have adopted and interpreted many of the imported Western musical styles. Contemporary rock and roll, soul, reggae and hip hop all feature a variety of notable Māori performers.

Songs (waiata) are sung solo, in unison or at the octave. Types of song include lullabies (oriori), love songs (waitata aroha) and laments (waiata tangi). Traditionally all formal speeches are followed by a waiata sung by the speaker and their group of supporters. Some of the smaller wind instruments are also sung into, and the sound of the poi (raupo ball swung on the end of a flax cord) provides a rhythmic accompaniment to waiata poi.

Captain Cook reported that the Māori sang a song in "semitones" and others reported that the Māori had no vocal music at all, or sang discordantly. In fact the ancient chants, or mōteatea, to which Cook was referring are microtonal and repeat a single melodic line, generally centred on one note, falling away at the end of the last line. It was a bad omen for a song to be interrupted, so singers would perform in subgroups to allow each to breathe without interrupting the flow of the chant. Mervyn McLean, in "Traditional Songs of the Maori", first notated the microtonality in a significant number of mōteatea. Ngā Mōteatea, collected by Sir Apirana Ngata, is an important collection of traditional song lyrics.

A karanga is a formal, ceremonial call and response at the start of a pōwhiri (welcome ceremony) between the tribal community of a marae (traditional Maori pa or tribal grounds), or equivalent venue, and a group of visitors. The karanga is given by women only. The woman performing the call for the welcoming group is called the kai karanga, while the woman responding on behalf of the visitors is called the kai whakaatu. The karanga follows a format which includes a series of discussions (such as whaikorero, mihi and whakawhanaungatanga) and addressing and greeting each other and the people they are representing and paying tribute to the dead, especially those who have died recently. The purpose of the occasion is also addressed during this time. Traditionally, the karanga was a time where the tangata whenua could determine whether the visiting party were visiting in peace or for purposes of war. Skilled kaikaranga are able to use eloquent language and metaphor to encapsulate important information about the group and the purpose of the visit.

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