Charles Maimarosia

Bamboo sounds from Melanesia (Solomon Islands)

Charles Maimarosia and Willie Tekatoah are internationally renowned musicians from the Solomon Islands, an island nation in the South Pacific, east of New Guinea.

Charles Maimarosia was born on the island of Malaita. He was the lead singer, choreographer and songwriter of the globally successful Narasirato Band, which popularised traditional bamboo music, including at the Glastonbury Festival/UK, at Fuji Rock in Japan and at festivals in Taiwan and Australia.
Today, Charles Maimarosia lives in Melbourne/Australia and is passionately committed to the music of his 'Are'Are ancestors with his musical projects: he plays panpipes such as the Au-Rerepi and the Awaa, but also bamboo percussion and acoustic guitar and sings the traditional songs, which are characterised by their simplicity and grace. At each concert, he takes the audience on a spiritual journey from the past to the present. He says: "My 'Are'Are culture is a gift. It is our choice to share this gift with people of other cultures through music." An important theme of his current songs is a problem of the entire Oceanic region: the climate catastrophe that the people in this region are experiencing as victims.
"On the Solomon Island of Guadacanal, the corals have been pale for several years. There is no life left in them, the spawning grounds for the small fish have been destroyed. We also notice that the water is rising every year. It has flooded the grassland where our huts used to be. We have nowhere else to go. We can't get papers for other countries. At some point there will be overpopulation. We have to plan our future very carefully," he says.
Charles Maimarosia will be accompanied by Willie Tekatoah, an excellent traditional musician on bamboo instruments, guitarist and singer, who comes from the village of Mungiki and currently lives in Auckland, New Zealand. Willie Tekatoah is also the artistic director of the internationally renowned band Kaumaakonga ("KMK"). For KMK and other music projects, Willie researches, arranges and performs songs and sets stories of his Polynesian ancestors to music. This repertoire was banned for a long time during the colonial era and was in danger of disappearing completely.