Laughton Kora Photo: Supplied
The first indication of Laughton Kora's near-magical ability to understand and create music was apparent at a young age.
Kora (Ngāi Tūhoe, Ngāti Pūkeko) and his brothers had been in a band with their father from age 6. They couldn't read music so they learned to play by sound, sometimes learning whole albums overnight.
"By age 11, we knew like 500 songs on three different instruments. That was our upbringing," Kora told RNZ's Saturday Morning.
Kora was a prodigy who came out of a humble upbringing in Whakatāne and went on to international acclaim in a host of different musical genres in heavy metal to reggae to classical music. His career also includes acting in the TVNZ mini-series Coverband and in a critically acclaimed performance as Judas in the Auckland Theatre Company's Jesus Christ Superstar.
But it was at age 17 that Kora first came onto the radar of the New Zealand music scene when his band Aunty Beatrice won the Smokefree Rockquest. The band ended up touring New Zealand and released a single.
Aunty Beatrice was the real life aunty of the band's bass player who drove them around even when they ditched school to work on their music.
"Part of [the name] was we just thought it was funny because we didn't think we could become famous," Kora said.
His upbringing wasn't all music. The family is heavily into sport. Kora's dad was a kickboxer, boxer and gymnast. His mum played on a touch rugby team.
Kora got into touch and gymnastics, which created an intuition for body movement. It's a lens through how he looks at artforms like breakdancing. He walked around with a rolled up cardboard ready for a breakdancing battle at a moment's notice.
What was his signature move?
"I was a human skipping rope. The boys used me as the rope," he said.
When asked if he was a fan of Raygun, the Australian breakdancer who triggered a controversy with her unorthodox moves at the Paris Olympics, it was a flat "no".
Raygun, whose real name is Rachel Gunn, competes at the Paris Olympics. Photo: Odd Andersen/AFP
"I just thought if you break down hip hop to its core, the source of what it is... it was a culture," Kora said. "They would come and break and that was their way of relief from gang life and that type of culture."
"Have a look at these great breakers, they are telling stories with their bodies," he added.
After that early success in music with Aunty Beatrice, Kora made his way to Te Anau, near Queenstown, where his mum was building a hotel. He didn't go to further his music career but to train as a carpenter. He left his small-town upbringing behind and figured out who he was as he became a husband and father.
"That is when I found out what I was capable of," he said.
Kora figured out that playing at venues on the ski slopes secured you a season lift ticket. He and some friends, including KP and PDiggs, threw a band together to get the season pass. The band was called Soul Charge, a precursor to his most well known music venture KORA.
The three of them - Kora, KP and PDiggs - wrote 'Politician', which is now the band KORA's most played song on Spotify. It's a protest song about legalising marijuana and is considered a Kiwi reggae classic.
Kora encouraged his three brothers to move to Wellington with him. The band Kora was formed and the single 'Politician' was released.
Laughton Kora performs at Play On. Photo: Supplied
"We didn't realise it would have that impact at all. It was beautiful and scary," Kora said.
Since that success, Kora has gone on to a solo career along with numerous collaborations. That includes working with various Māori poets and putting their work to music, partly using native instruments, with the organisation Storybox.
"For me, I get really affected by the natural sound and vocals," he said.
Laughton Kora is back on the stage at Fly My Pretties gigs in Wellington this month.
