(last updated 16th March 2019) click here for updates list
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Some great books have been written about New Zealand popular music (amongst others - "Stranded in Paradise", "When Rock Got Rolling", "Hostage to the Beat"), but these focus on the celebrity performers and the history of bands. There are many fine musicians you won't find in any books and whose experiences are not documented.
These pages tell the story from the musician's point of view, bringing back some long forgotten memories and personal details. A number of the musicians that I grew up with have now passed on, their memories lost forever.
The layout of this site has deliberately been kept 'plain'. The musician's stories are the focus and don't need any special effects.
Make sure your memories of New Zealand's unique musical history are preserved!
If you want to make sure your memories are preserved, please email your story/tribute/photos to me for inclusion - andy@nzmusos.co.nz (preferably in MS Word or email format). I may edit out some of the bad bits (e.g. criticising other musicians), otherwise the layout/spelling/grammar/etc is entirely over to you. It's your story - record it in your own way.
Don't worry if your recorded memories are incomplete or possibly incorrect, send them anyway. I'll update them when you send me further details and/or amendments.
Tributes
You'll find a section on some of the musicians' pages called 'Tributes'. This is for other people to record their memories, and is particularly relevant where the musician is no longer with us (e.g. Tommy Adderley), but there's absolutely no reason why you shouldn't pay your tribute to living musicians.
Links to other web sites
Bruce Sergent has created a splendid web site that documents the history of New Zealand bands. He has kindly let me link back to his site for Band details.
Kevin Hill photographed the Christchurch music scene from 1967 to 1980, and has created a wonderful photographic record of those times. There are links to Kevin's photographs throughout this site.
An interesting site featuring many NZ Brewery Circuit bands and musicians can be found at www.ricko.co.nz.
And another fantastic constantly evolving NZ music site is www.audioculture.co.nz, the brainchild of Simon Grigg. AudioCulture has a team of great writers and is fully funded by NZ on Air.
Regards,
Andy Shackleton