03 Jun 2025
He Ingoa is a new work by emerging theatre-maker Raureti Ormond, premiering as part of the 2025 Kia Mau Festival in Wellington. It’s a powerful musical exploration of identity, whakapapa and the stories our names carry. The work has been developed with the support of Creative New Zealand’s Early Career Fund and presented through Kia Mau’s He Toi Hou stream for early-career artists.
He Ingoa is an Indigenous musical incorporating te reo Māori, where each of the six characters sings the story of their names.
“This show is born from my relationship with my name, ‘Raureti’, and how I’ve carried it at different stages in my life,” Raureti says.
“It has been mispronounced and misspoken in every way, shape and form you could imagine. So much of my life I’ve felt a lot of whakamā about my name. But as I’ve grown, I’ve found that so many people share this same experience.”
He Ingoa is described as a “musical ritual of identity”, blending story, sound and ceremony to delve into the lived experience of names that are often mishandled or misunderstood.
“I wanted to create something to excavate the untold stories of our names and highlight their mana. They are waiata by their very nature.”
The piece is grounded in Raureti’s experiences as tangata whenua (Ngāti Tūwharetoa, Ngāti Tahu, Ngāti Whao) and shaped by his desire to uplift Indigenous narratives.
As part of Kia Mau Festival’s He Toi Hou stream, He Ingoa sits alongside other new works by emerging artists from Te Whanganui-a-Tara.
“We’re all early-stage artists at the beginning of our careers, and through this programme we’re being provided with a framework to develop our creative practice. The way in which Kia Mau continues to awhi and tautoko our artistry transforms our visions into reality,” Raureti says.
The Kia Mau Festival is a major platform for Māori, Pasifika and global Indigenous voices, so being programmed within it adds a special significance.
“The audiences this festival caters to are exactly the people we want to see our show, and the people who will connect with it the most - those with big brown names that weigh heavy on the mouths of others.”
Raureti received support through Creative New Zealand’s Early Career Fund, designed to help artists build sustainable creative careers through dedicated time and resourcing.
“Ultimately, funding is a means of accessing people, space and time. It allows me as an artist to invest in professionals who make excellent collaborators, as well as high-quality production elements. But more importantly, it allows me some freedom to invest in myself as a creative and undertake a process that is enriching and not weighed down by financial burden. It’s completely transformed the scope of the two shows I’m creating this year.”
He Ingoa is just the beginning for Raureti , who is currently working on two new projects: a solo show called Grass Roots, premiering at Tahi Festival in collaboration with Taki Rua Productions, and a folk musical Te Whio.
“Grass Roots is an exploration of rugby culture in Aotearoa and how it shapes the experience of growing up as a boy in this country,” says Raureti.
“I also want to further develop Te Whio, a folk-musical retelling of the Tangiwai Railway Disaster. Though quite large as a story, it’s a simple reminder of the importance of whānau and home.”
He Ingoa plays at Circa Theatre in Wellington on 30 - 31 May and 11 - 13 June 2025.
Share this
