Bilingual duo Aro, are taking their music on the road this spring to celebrate and share the stories of our waters, in
support of their latest project, & EP release ‘He Wai’. The tour intentionally coincides with Māhuru Māori and Te Wiki o te Reo Māori which celebrates the
Māori language. Aro are performing across the whenua, throughout September & October, visiting coastal communities, big & small, and other intimate venues near bodies of water as part of their ‘He Wai’ National release tour.
During the spring tour, Aro will also continue on with their established education programme within schools around the
country, proudly supported by the NZ Music Commission.
‘He Wai’ is the third major project out of five for Silver Scroll APRA Maioha Award and APRA Best Children’s Award
Finalists – Aro. Each project has featured a new music release (an album or EP) and these new waiata are then used as a
part of the education resources & programme created for schools & Kura Kaupapa Māori.
Husband and wife duo, Charles (Ngāpuhi, Te Rarawa, Ngāti Te Ata, Ngāti Mutunga) and Emily Looker, proudly share a
passion for the power of language and music to tell stories and remind us of our cultural identity. The moving new EP,
‘He Wai’ celebrates 5 waiata inspired and guided by our relationship to te taiao and what we can learn from it about
ourselves and each other. ‘He Wai’, is the bands 3rd project, following 'Manu’ and 'He Manu Anō'.
The bands latest EP release features Aro’s signature playful and uplifting sound, using a plethora of instruments and
taonga pūoro, including guitars, strings and saxophone. A multi-genre offering of storytelling pop, RnB, electronic and
jazz, fusing vocals, tāonga puoro and chants, each song also thematically explores the ideas of kaitiakitanga and
manaakitanga - looking after ourselves, looking after each other and looking after our environment.
Aro have been performing nationwide in Aotearoa since 2017 when they were established after meeting while both studying
Music at Auckland University. The pair have completed three nationwide tours, and played to thousands at numerous
festivals including Auckland Arts Festival, Wellington Gardens Magic, Auckland Folk Festival, Festival One, Okura Forest
Festival, Waitangi Day Festival (Paeroa), Kauri Karnival, Flava Urban Beats and Music in Parks with several more lined
up for 2021-2022. They have also been featured on RNZ, have been consistently broadcast on Māori Television, and have
been featured on and performed on radio & TV stations across the country. Consistently growing their audience over the past few years, the pair have reached
200,000 streams over their waiata on Spotify, and have released several music videos which have been broadcast
nationwide.
As the band have a strong focus on tamariki and encouraging young people to be proud of who they are and their unique
identities, In 2018, Aro developed an education programme delivering workshops, informed by mātauranga Māori of our
natural environment in Aotearoa New Zealand, to schools and kura kaupapa Māori. They have taken this resource to
communities around Aotearoa with their past projects, and will continue to build on this with ‘He Wai’, visiting coastal
communities in particular in 2021. Feedback from the past workshops was immense and overwhelmingly positive, resulting
in the 2020 & 2021 education programmes growing year on year and taking place with the support of Creative NZ in 2020 and the NZ
Music Commission 2021. Aro aim to keep building on this success, and to increase the number of schools & kura kaupapa Māori visited in 2022 threefold.
In 2021, Aro will be using the stories of He Wai, of Aotearoa’s native sea/water creatures and the importance of caring
for our environment, while making te reo Māori and whakataukī accessible and interesting for young people.
Both Emily & Charles have successful careers in music as individuals, but meld together with a stunning harmony and a breathtaking
loving presence as Aro, Emily, who performs solo under her maiden name, Emily Rice, has been twice finalist of UoA’s
songwriter of the year, has gone on to release four successful EP’s since 2012, has lived and performed across Europe
and collaborated with countless fellow musicians, and is also currently part of the rōpū House of Misfits. Charles has
been writing and performing since 2012, studying first at MAINZ and then completing a Bachelor of Music at Auckland
University. He then went on to complete a scholarship Post Grad in teaching and trained as a Te Reo Māori teacher.
Charles is also part of House of Misfits and is one of the key songwriters of this collaborative gospel group.
After living in a van touring full time, writing music together for two years from 2017-2019, the couple now base
themselves in Pukekohe and have a new baby girl called Olive - who arrived in Feb 2021. This will be the first tour with
pēpi and the couple are excited to be taking her on the road for her first big trip around the motu, with a grandparent
or two joining them for parts of the adventure.
“The musicianship through out – haunting and interlocking vocals, stick percussion, evocations of taonga puoro, touches
of Latin rhythms – is clever and diverse” – Graham Reid | Elsewhere Magazine
“This is currently my go-to album to take a break from the world and let the music wash over me.” – Corinne Rutherford | muzic.net.nzAro - He Wai’ Release Tour:
Tickets available via undertheradar & aromusic.co.nz from Tuesday July 13th.
Saturday 4th September- Bellamys Gallery - Dunedin
Saturday 11th September - House with no Nails - Wardville / Matamata
Friday 17th September - 4th Wall Theatre - New Plymouth
Thursday 23rd September - Le Cafe - Picton
Friday 24th September - Boathouse - Nelson
Saturday 9th October - D’vine Oasis - Russell
Labour Weekend - Wellington Folk Festival