New Zealand Music Month occurs every year in May. It started as New Zealand Music Week which was launched in 1997, but in 2001 it became New Zealand Music Month. It aims to boost the visibility and success of New Zealand music. It was developed to support the New Zealand music industry by creating a commercially successful platform for local performers.
On Canterbury Stories, we are lucky to have some fascinating photographs relating to music. Some of my personal favourites are the music posters, which were digitised from the Christchurch City Libraries’ ephemera collection for New Zealand Music Month in 2007. The collection predominantly covers New Zealand bands in the years between 1980 and 1989.
One of my favourites is the below poster advertising the first two bands (The Clean and The Pin Group) that signed with Flying Nun Records. Flying Nun Records was established in 1981 by founder, Roger Shepherd. Their work concentrated on Christchurch bands with the exception of Dunedin’s The Clean (as it was Shepherd’s favourite band at the time). Flying Nun Records are still around today and are advertised as an independent New Zealand music label. They still release new songs and artists on a regular basis.
If you want to see more photographs from this collection, you can in the Music Posters collection on Canterbury Stories.
Do you have any photographs of the music scene in Christchurch? You can contribute to our collection via the Discovery Wall website.
References
NZHistory. 2023. New Zealand Music Month. [online]. Accessed on 27 April 2023.
Flying Nun. 2023. 1996 "Official History" of Flying Nun. [online]. Accessed on 27 April 2023.
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