Rebel Reid (Ngāpuhi), is one of the founders of the hugely successful band, Valkyrie, she's also considered one of the best female guitarists in the industry.
She's just released her new solo EP, Hiria, dedicated to and named after her late mother, as a gift for her, on the day Matariki is celebrated.
“It was a way of me getting out of the dark place,” Reid says.
Reid was able to express her feelings and grief of losing her mother through music.
“Even at the time, I forgot that I could express my pain through music. I was letting it eat my whole entire wairua (spirit) up. Once I remembered, I just put it all into a ball and then chucked it into my music and that’s when I started my healing journey.”
Reid says her inspiration to compose the three waiata in her EP came from a book by eminent author Witi Ihimaera, Navigating the stars.
“It was te ao Māori that sparked that epiphany to celebrate Mum’s life through Matariki and Te Ao Māori.”
Launching her EP on Matariki Day was a way for Reid to pay tribute to her late mother and look forward to the future.
“I was looking for a date that would represent how much Mum meant to me and this was my first time celebrating it in this kind of way because I’m still on my journey of learning te ao Māori.”
All three waiata in Reid’s EP are bilingual, incorporating te reo Māori and English with the help of another Māori musician from Maimoa, Kaaterama (Te Arawa, Ngāpuhi) and reo exponent Ruth Smith (Ngāti Kōhuru, Te Aitanga a Mahaki), who also features as a backup vocalist.