Piopio College head girl Ava MacKenzie spoke about musicians at Gallipoli. PHOTOS SIGRID CHRISTIANSEN
Musical themes featured strongly in Piopio’s Anzac Day service.
Piopio College head girl Ava MacKenzie gave an original speech about music’s spiritual role in the disastrous Australian and New Zealand landing at Gallipoli. It connected well with the crowd of more than 100 locals who gathered at 11am on Moa St, at the Piopio Memorial Hall.
“Not a lot of people know the story,” Ava said, before going on to tell of pipers, brass players and a violinist known to have been present in the tragic campaign.
Describing the beach as “utter chaos,” she said the army musicians’ efforts had helped to keep the soldiers and others as calm as possible as the Turks opened fire.
“Music offers hope, motivation and support. It should never go unrecognised,” she said.
Another story concerned a fiddler who “smuggled his violin onto the boat,” and cheered his fellows with his original compositions before being “sadly mistaken for a Turk” and accidentally killed by a member of his own side.
To research her speech, Ava used sources from the internet.
“I don’t really have any ancestors that I know of that have fought in a war, so I decided to go online.”
Aria school principal and MC Pam Voyce praised Ava’s words and originality.
“Your approach was refreshing, and we appreciated it very much,” Pam said, addressing Ava in front of the crowd.
Pam said next year the parade would be even more musical, with the area’s three schools coming together to sing a waiata.
“That will give us some more volume,” Pam said.
Her husband, Peter Voyce, said he enjoyed the musical content of Ava’s speech and how it took a different angle on the Anzac conversation.
“That’s the first time we’ve had that topic,” Peter said.
The day’s real-life musicians included drummer Sandy Dawson and her husband, piper Bob Dawson, who has played bagpipes for around 30 years.
“It’s something to do for the community. We normally do Te Kūiti Anzac parade and then come back and do Piopio,” Bob said.
His bagpipes had belonged to late father, Peter Dawson, who had started learning the instrument in the years prior to his death in the Erebus airline disaster in 1979. Peter had been famously proud of his Scottish heritage.
Bob started his love affair with the instrument after beginning with a modest goal.
“I sort of wanted to learn one tune and I just carried on from there.”
Sandy said she had been playing drums for many years “since our kids were tiny,” playing in the band alongside her husband.
“I joined the band, so I knew what he [Bob] had to learn,” she said.
Bugler Steve McQuilkin played the Last Post and Reveille.
The day’s traditional features included the laying of wreaths by organisations such as Piopio St John.
Locals including Bill Wana, Ripeka Price, Thomas Young, David Ronaldson and Bill Harrison presented other items including karakia, and read the names of locals who had been killed in the First World War and later conflicts such as Korea.
