Two Voices Of Tonga

Pacific Personalities

MARJORIE CROCOMBE interviews two prominent Tongan musicians

PENI TUTU'ILA MALUPO: Poet, composer and choreographer

\I.C. Peni, you went to Rarotonga some years ago.

Why did you go there?

P.T.M. I have always wanted to go there and my dreams came true. I wanted to see the differences between Rarotongan and Tongan dances.

M.C. What differences did you find?

P.T.M. It’s the movement. Rarotongan dancing is very fast, especially in the shaking of the body, but in Tonga the dances are slow like the leaves waving in the wind.

M.C. You have been composing Tongan songs for many years. When did you start?

P.T.M. It was back in 1931 when I was eighteen years old that I began to compose love songs. Since then 1 have written about 200 songs altogether.

M.C. Who taught you to compose?

P.T.M. My mother. She was a composer for many years and she herself learnt from her father and her uncle.

I learnt from them how to put tunes to the words of my own poems. I wrote a lot of music for my beloved Queen Salote.

M.C. What system do you use when you write your music?

P.T.M. I use the Tongan system. The first teacher who came to Tonga in 1866 taught the people to write their music. I use the Tongan system which uses numbers instead of the tonic solfa system—for example, number 3 stands for the term "Doh” in tonic solfa; number 4 is “Ray”; number 5 is "Me” and number 6 stands for “Fah” and so on. This is used by Tongan composers quite a lot today.

M.C. You are also well-known as a poet in Tonga, P.T.M. Yes. My main work is writing poetry and I give them to people who ask me to write for them. Some times a group will ask me to come and write a poem for them. I keep a copy of all my poems in a book in my house. It’s like a football match, you know. You get the ball and you pass it out to the first five-eighth.

In my home the first five-eighth is my son or my daughter; or I pass it out to the second five-eighth, and that’s my grand-daughter, you see. So it was with my father, my mother and my mother’s father. They were all composers. I hope my son or daughter will be com posers too.

M.C. Where do you get your ideas for your poems and songs?

P.T.M. When I see something as I walk along, say, at the market, on the road or anywhere I note it in my head and when I get home I write it down. Many things come into my mind and I write them all down in poetry.

It is very easy for me to write poetry. The poem that I wrote for a poetry session on Peacesat took a little time to do.

M.C. So you write poetry and music and you also work out the actions to various dances that you teach your groups?

P.T.M. We have different kinds of dances. At this time of the year there are groups practising for concerts and they ask me to come and write poems and music for them and I also work out the actions for these dances.

Then they ask me to announce their items at concerts.

In December every year we have a singing festival here in Nukualofa and I am kept busy writing music for that too. I have my own choirs in different parts of Tonga; in Ha’apai, Vava’u and Tongatapu. Apart from working with them I also run a programme of Tongan songs called "Tongan Carnival”. I play Tongan and other music from Pacific Islands.

M.C. What are you working on now?

P.T.M. The same things—poetry and music. I’ll go on writing till I die! , . . and SEMIS! MA'U: Guitarist M.C. Semisi, you are conducting guitar classes in some of the high schools here and you also hold a talent quest every week in Nukualofa. How did you come to have this interest in music?

S.M. When I was young I always heard my father play the flute and the guitar. Also, 1 learnt from my brothers how to make a ukulele from a tin, a piece of wood and nylon strings. At one time, too, in 1960 my brother, Manoa, organised my brothers into a band but we had not one electric instrument then, just a banjo, mandolin and a guitar and we played in the villages about Christ mas time. So it seems that my environment influenced my life and interest in music.

M.C. You went away from Tonga to learn music. Where did you go?

S.M. I went to Wellington for three months and while 1 was there I was very sad because the environment in New Zealand gives them the chance to develop their music but in Tonga it is very hard for music to develop because of our customs. When people play in a band in Tonga for a party or something like that, people pay with food instead of money. It is not enough, be cause instruments are very expensive to buy. Now we run dances to earn money.

M.C. What music classes did you attend in Wellington?

S.M. I found a teacher, Ten Doran. He’s a guitarist.

He said I would have to study for exams from Trinity College, London, and I would have to have a teacher.

That’s my problem here in Tonga—l don’t have a teacher for the practical work so I just learn by my self. I try to follow the music notation, then I transfer

it to the Tongan notation system. 1 try to show that the Tongan system of notation is sometimes a little quicker than the alphabet. The Tongan system is based on the number system and you cannot get confused. I tried to learn the classical guitar in New Zealand. It is easier to transfer from the classical to the modern guitar.

M.C. You had a short stay in New Zealand. Why did you return so soon?

S.M. I wasn’t allowed to stay by the Immigration Depart ment because I went there as a visitor and not as a student.

M.C. What happened when you came back to Tonga?

S.M. There was some misunderstanding between my family and the people. My brothers sent me to New Zealand to earn money to buy instruments. But, 1 couldn’t work for a month and when I started in the

second month my money went into paying all my bills for the flat, food and my teachers. I had three teachers—a pianist and two guitarists—so I spent all my money in New Zealand. When I came back 1 told my brothers I’d like to tell the people how far behind we are in our music in Tonga. But I believe we can have a sort of development like they have in New Zealand and Australia because here in Tonga we have more time to practise and so there is a chance to develop our music more quickly.

M.C. How did you come to be teaching music in some of the high schools in Tonga?

S.M. Music is life. It’s my aim to encourage music in Tonga. I try to meet the headmasters of the high schools and ask them to let me take classes. I want to start some sort of revolution like the Beatles did in Britain; they made a revolution in music. I believe they had the right chance, the right environment and the right time, so they were able to develop their music.

But it is very hard to do this in Tonga because of our customs.

M.C. Do you want to create new forms of music then?

S.M. It doesn’t really matter for me but what I want to do is encourage the young people. You know, when I was young we didn’t have much music at school and that made me sad. That’s why I took off from school.

About a year ago I started a weekly talent quest but some people call it talent “rigours”. I teach the kids to play to a lot of people from the stage so they get the ex perience and not become afraid.

M.C. How many come to your talent quest?

S.M. Too many now. There are about 400 young people every Friday afternoon. At the beginning there were only about 58. People called me “Foolish Guy”. I was very happy they called me that because they showed they recognised me and I try to put what I believe into action. That’s why I hang around the schools. When 1 went to Tonga High School 1 sent posters there and signed my name. Someone put an arrow from my name and wrote “Marijuana” and “Fakasesele”, meaning “Foolish”. I laughed because I was happy the students came to see the “Fakasesele”—the foolish guy, and the foolish kids. I use a large hall in town for the talent quest.

M.C. Do they let you know they are going to perform?

S.M. I try to get them to let me know they are per forming. There are many people in Tonga with musical talents but the problem is they have no instruments like the guitar, drums, and amplifier. I don’t always play for them but if a performer comes up and asks me to play and I can’t then I ask someone to help out. My main aim is to help them. They play lots of songs but it is hard for them to know the difference between pop music, rock-‘n’-roll music or the blues. I have found many Tongan kids who can compose songs.

In Tonga when we talk about music, people only think of such composers as Peni Tutu’ila Malupo and others who have been composing for a long time but there are many young people with talent now.

M.C. Do your brothers help in your talent quest?

S.M. My brothers are still afraid in case something goes wrong. They still doubt what I do. I use their in struments during the show.

M.C. What do you hope to do in the future?

S.M. To go back to Wellington and learn more music so I can help the young people of Tonga with their music. If I can’t go overseas myself then I’ll try to run programmes to earn money to send some of our talented young Tongan musicians overseas.