Ajay Peni with his band Black Robin Photo: supplied
Born and raised in Rēkohu, the largest of the Chatham Islands, musician and storyteller Ajay Peni is a young ambassador for the revitalisation of Moriori culture and its rongo, or music.
While now based in Perth, Peni’s blues-rock group Black Robin provides a contemporary musical window into the experiences and stories of this remote and wild South-Eastern part of Aotearoa New Zealand.
Alongside his own music, Peni has been collaborating with the Hokotehi Moriori Trust for many years, creating new compositions, and composing music to revitalise old Moriori rongo - the lyrics of which were recorded by Hirawanu Tapu and Alexander Shand in the 1880s and 1890s.
Ajay Peni Photo: University of Otago
RNZ’s Claire Concannon caught up with Peni at the University of Otago’s performing arts centre, where he and taonga pūoro musician and maker Alistair Fraser have been working on rongo for an exhibition about Moriori and the Chatham Islands.
The exhibition will be the culmination of a project aimed at helping the revitalisation of Moriori culture - on display in Tūhura Otago Museum across July and August 2024. Part of the exhibition focuses on two remaining Moriori albatross bone flutes found in museum collections that have been CT scanned and 3D-printed, to allow the next generation to learn about construction, carving and playing of these mīheke oro (treasured musical instruments).
A story on the wider project by Concannon features on RNZ’s Our Changing World here.
