Te Vaka
group members
OPETAIA FOA'I (Tokelau)
founder,composer,lead vocalist
OLIVIA FOA'I(Tokelau)
dancer, singer, chorerographer
MATATIA FOA'I(Tokelau)
percussionist player & composer
SULATA FOAI-AMIATU(Tokelau)
singer
DOUGLAS BERNARD (Samoa)
singer,keyboradist,percussionist
JOE TOOMATA(Samoa)
electric guitarist,percussionist
NEIL FORREST(New Zealand)
bass,flute,percussion
ETUENI PITA(Cook islands)
dancer
DAVE KURESA(Samoa)
dancer
inspo
Most of Te Vaka's songs are written in the Tokelauan language, a reflection of Opetaia Foa, the group's founders' heritage. Te Vaka uses traditional musical instruments from the Pacific region like pate, pa'u, and bass drums.
watch this video because its got a whole little children love story its adorable
also how cute is this little plant what
acheivements
Te Vaka has accomplished so many achievements in the time span of 23 years (1994-2017).
On their website, over 80 of their accomplishments are listed, and even in their first few years as a band they acheived: (1997) being the only band in New Zealand who could lay claim to "Original, Contemporary, Pacific Music", and making the top 10 on several world music charts, aswell as becoming one of ARC music's all time best selling albums. From there their popularity only grew, becoming the most number one group in most of the pacific in 2002, their album Tutuki winning “Best Pacific Music Album” in the New Zealand music industry awards in 2004, and they continue on with similar patterns all the way up to 2016, when the entire band flies up to LA to record vocals for the disney movie moana which gets nominated for 2 oscars.