SOLD: Beautiful Happyzine

I’ve played music since I was four years old when I was in a ‘pots and pans’ band with my little sister Zoe.

I started writing and producing music for children and families when my daughter Malaika was born 9 years ago but worked with children and performing arts for 10 years previous to that touring shows around New Zealand schools with different troupes of performers. In the last few years my work has been often in inventing new musical instruments from upcycled materials and in sharing these ideas in shows and workshops with children, educators and parents.

My favourite instrument that I have made is currently the xylopump which is a combination of a church organ powered by 9 yoga-ball pumps and a xylophone. I play it with my feet and hands at the same time and it produces a very bright and happy feeling soundscape.

I am currently looking for a publisher to collaborate with in making use of the $10, 000 grant I just won from NZ on air to produce a song and music video that can also be published as a children’s book with a CD insert. I’ll be working with Guy Capper who is a clay-mation genius (grown ups check out his series with Jermaine Clement on youtube called ‘The Pen’) and make a video also using various stills from the clay-mation as the illustrations for the book. I haven’t decided on what song to use yet but it will be something suitably quirky and hopefully soon a household name.

I am also intending to offer my shows to more Nelson and Tasman schools and hopefully some follow up visits to workshop new musical instrument creation.