The beginnings and development of a New Zealand music: The life ...

Downstage Theatre, and He Mana Toa (1967) by James Ritchie directed by
Richard Campion for the Maori Theatre Trust. He Mana Toawas reviewed
by Jenny McLeod in Landfall, who made the following comments about
Lilburn's music:
of War
Other
"Douglas Lilburn's music, his first electronic
music written here for a live production, was
used mainly in the creation scenes •••• Here
it was wonderfully effective as an evocation of
primeval Nature; perhaps electronic sound,
with its 'extra-human' associations, is the
only possible medium in which to achieve this
successfully. Yet it is still music in human
terms, with all the strength and feeling of a
man whose subject touches him deeply."2
136
tape works dating from the late-1960s include Poem in Time
( 1967), Cicadas, Oscillators and Tree Fro~s (1967) , 8tud~ from One
Note (1967), Three Studies for Gustav Ciamaga (1968), Five Toronto Pieces
(1969), and Summer Voices (J969). Two of these works were included in
the box set of records entitled'''New Zealand Electronic Music", released
on the Kiwi label. 3 Lilburn explains the genesis of each one in the
accompanying booklet to the recordings. Of Summer Voices he writes:
"In 1966 I was fascinated to study a recording
by children of an East Coast school of the
cha.nt PoPo, an old lullaby telling of how the
kumara-waB brought to New Zealand, with a
wealth of historical materials woven into the
story. I had rashly thought of trying to
create a sound image of the chant as I had
done with Alistair Campbell's poem The Return,
but could find no valid w'ay to do this. Echoes
of the sounds.remained in my mind through a
hot dry summer, and seemed to blend with near
and distant sounds that floated in through an
open studio window. And I found that rhythms
of the chant could be printed onto electronic
sounds, suggesting ghostly voices whispering
through dry grass and a chorus of cicadas,
and other impressions of half-heard sound in
the summer air."4
Of Poem in Time of War Lilburn wrote:
"The suffering of all people caught up in the
Vietnamese war was strongly felt 'by many of us
in this country in 1967 when I made this piece.
2 Jennifer McLeod, "He Mana Toa". Landfall vo1.21 no.2, June 1967:
190- I .
3 SLD-44 146.
4 Douglas Lilburn, Introductory notes ~n accompanying booklet to
KIWI 8LD-44/46, p.8.