Hinewehi Mohi was named Dame of the Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit in 2021, for services to Māori, music, and television. Photo / Paul Taylor
Hinewehi Mohi was named Dame of the Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit in 2021, for services to Māori, music, and television. Photo / Paul Taylor
A new scholarship has been launched to encourage more Māori and Pasifika women to become music therapists.
To mark Music Therapy Week, the new Masters award, which is worth $8000, is intended to assist women wanting to study a Masters of Music Therapy full-time.
Musician, producer and Hawke’s Bay icon Dame Hinewehi Mohi DNZM said there’d been a serious lack of Māori and Pasifika music therapists for a long time.
Due to workforce shortages, oversees therapists were engaged, but “we have some really dedicated, beautiful humans up there.”
Born in Hawke’s Bay and now living in Havelock North, she was made a Dame Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit last year, and she now works for APRA - encouraging and supporting more Māori music.
“Musicality and [the] tradition of music for Māori is another feature that a Māori music therapist can bring to this type of work.”
The Raukatauri Music Therapy Trust (RMTT), which Dame Mohi founded in 2004, has supported nearly 1000 clients since its establishment.
The Kate Edger Educational Charitable Trust (KEECT) launched the scholarship on Tuesday, backed financially by the Gattung Foundation and supported by the Raukatauri trust.
Te Herenga Waka/Victoria University of Wellington is the only institution nationwide where a Masters degree in music therapy can be obtained.
Mohi’s ultimate goal is to improve access to music therapy services around the motu.
She says we need more music therapy services around the motu, because when you see a loved one with dementia “smile and connect with people again - it’s beautiful.”
Angela Gattung, from the Gattung Foundation, says they were keen to “make a tangible difference - especially for Māori and Pasifika women”.
Nina Tomaszyk, from the Kate Egder Education Charitable Trust (KEECT), says they’re proud to announce this while there’s “high demand for music therapy services”.
Dame Hinewehi Mohi DNZM sings the national anthem with 45,000 fans at Ngā Ana Wai/Eden Park at the final of the 2022 Women’s Rugby World Cup. Photo / Getty Images.
In 1999, she sang the New Zealand national anthem in te reo Māori at the Rugby World Cup in Twickenham. It was the first time this had been done at an international rugby match, sparking the now customary practice of singing the anthem in both te reo Māori and English at events of national significance.
Mohi also sang the national anthem with 45,000 fans at Ngā Ana Wai/Eden Park for the final of last week’s Women’s Rugby World Cup.
When asked about the occasion, she’s firm that “sometimes people get distracted as that being the main story. I bore myself talking about it!”
Successful students will be placed with the Raukatauri Trust in their second year.
