John Archer: A great transformation comes over Ohakune

Ohakune on Mardi Gras weekend. As the week progressed, all the trappings for an outdoor rock concert were assembled at the Junction: sound stage, speaker tower, giant TV screen, perimeter fencing and floodlights, carnival ride, food stalls, beer booths and lavatory lorries.
But there was an even greater change right throughout the town when all the young people started arriving on Friday. Holiday houses that had been dead for eight months suddenly came alive. Cars filled each driveway, warm lighting filled the windows and porches, and the boisterous energy of young men's voices filled the evening air.
By Saturday afternoon the streets around the Junction were filling with cars, camper vans and the occasional horse float. The vacant section behind my house sprouted multi-hued tents, and for 18 hours freedom campers swamped the nearby streets. As evening fell, dozens made their way towards the Junction. Many of them were in fancy dress; teddy bears, dinosaurs, French maids and a whole crop of carrots.
I would have liked to have joined them, to join in their dancing, but lacking a ticket, I headed back home, only a few hundred metres from the sound stage's zillion-watt speaker tower, and I enjoyed the music in front of a nice warm fire.
I got most enjoyment from the first band up, Dave Baxter's Avalanche City; to me it sounded like good old-fashioned rock and roll. Pirongia schoolboy band The Good Fun, and Clap Clap Riot from Canterbury followed with faster tempos, but less punch and variety than Baxter's band. Then came Jason Kerrison's Opshop, complex and solid, with crystal clear vocals in the choruses. Everybody in Ohakune now knows that Love must always win, after hearing him repeat it about 20 times.
However, after only four hours playing, the musicians packed up their guitars and the merry revellers were provided with only canned disco music to dance to, so many started leaving. By 1am it was all over, in contrast to the early days at Mangamahu, when dancing went on until dawn. I wonder if the premature ending of dances these days is because the musicians can only play dance music that they themselves have composed, and so run out of material quickly? Certainly I did not hear one well-known song played all evening.
I have also noticed the same reluctance to perform well-known songs at kapa haka festivals. Not being fluent in following oral Maori, I have collected the tunes and lyrics of well-known waiata and associated chants over the past few years, then found translations for them and researched their significance.
It has been an interesting project, culturally, historically and etymologically: I've been fascinated by the stories behind some of the words I've found in these songs. One WWI soldiers' song contains both wiwi and Wiwi, the former referring to deception tactics and the latter to the people who said "Oui, oui!" the Frenchmen.
But when I've attended concerts and kapa haka festivals, or listened to a Maori radio station, in the hope of hearing some of these classics, all the items appear to have been recently written by the cousin of the performing group's tutor.
So I was very happy when I went to the Ruapehu Schools Maori Culture Festival at Raetihi a couple of weeks ago and was treated to a feast of items I actually knew. The group coached by Lulu Simi, from St Joseph's in Taihape, was a special delight. They performed Honor Goldsmith's Rona, the moon-lady song, Richard Puanaki's Ka waiata ki a Maria, a recently written hymn to Christ's mother, but often sung to honour all mothers, and Tika tonu, the advice about integrity that Waimarama Putara gave to his schoolboy son in 1915.
Those three compositions all share the classic song-writing virtues: First your attention is caught with a simple theme concisely conveyed, then the song is fixed in your brain with a natural rhythm produced by repetition that has some variation, and finally, your mind is piqued with a couple of unusual words that add mystery. Songs such as Pokarekare ana, Poi e, Hoki mai, E papa waiari, Hine e hine and He puru taitama all share these qualities, making them internationally popular.
Ka Mate also shares these traits, the mystery words in it being "tangata puhuruhuru". Does the man's hairiness refer to his hairy legs, to his virile strength and leadership qualities, to his long beard, old age and semi-divine status, or to his recently achieved puberty? During the past 500 years, all of these meanings have been used in different versions of this ancient cultural treasure.
The St Joes' boys did this haka also, as did about six other groups at the Ruapehu Festival.
But they all seemed to have been influenced by TV, imitating the All Black's mashup of Te Rauparaha's relatively recent modification of Ka Mate.
Last year at Mangakino, I watched some schoolchildren perform a much older version of Ka Mate. Perhaps at the Raetihi festival next year we may also see a real heritage Whanganui version of it. Aue! Aue!
John Archer lives in Ohakune and shares his views with readers, coloured by his love of the mountain life.