“Pokarekare Ana” – Traditional New Zealand Maori Love Song – 1914 – arranged for solo ukulele (fingerpicking style) by Ukulele Mike Lynch

According to Wikipedia, we find that Pokarekare Ana is a traditional New Zealand love song written in Māori, probably communally composed about the time World War I began in 1914. It has been translated into English, and also enjoys some popularity in Australia
The song is very popular in New Zealand, and has been adapted for multiple purposes, including in advertising and by sporting groups. Notable uses include:
• “Sailing Away”, which promoted New Zealand’s 1987 America’s Cup challenge, and featured an ensemble choir of famous New Zealanders recording as ‘All Of Us’,
• It is best known worldwide through Air New Zealand’s TV advertisements in 2000. This version was performed by Rose Hanify (later of NZ Band Supermodel). In particular, the song became a phenomenon in Australia during the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, where the song again became another unofficial anthem, this time for the success of Oceania into the new millennium, specificially during the time of the Olympic Games, and beyond
• “Pokarekare Ana” was sung at the opening of the 2009 World Games in Kaohsiung by Hayley Westenra and Russell Watson.
In popular culture, “Pokarekare Ana” was used as the theme song for the 2005 South Korean film Crying Fist.

Below is a performance of “Pokarekare Ana” on You Tube

My arrangement of Pokarekare Ana is in a rolling straight 8ths fingerpicking style. The melody primarily resides on the first string with the other 3 strings providing harmonic accompaniment. I’ve set this in the Key of C as it gives us a lot of open strings to help make this piece more accessible to more people. One, with a sense of improvisation, could treat it with a swing style if you wish. I’ve heard it in both styles. The short clip below is at the head of the piece and shows a typical chord played on the first beat of the measure with rolling arrpegios following. Try to roll those chords in a harp-like fashion to give it more elegance and depth.

The music clip below shows a typical riff used in music arrangement. It is an inverted 6th interval. Not strictly a chord since it’s only 2 notes but you can hear this riff in SO many songs. Just imagine, if you can, the opening riff of “PEACE TRAIN” by Cat Stevens and you’ll know what I mean.

The third clip shows us doing some barring in this piece. At measure 10 we barre the 5th fret while the pinky play the 8th fret notes on both the first and second strings.

“Pokarkare Ana” is not included in any of the Ukulele Mike eBook collections. . . It is only available at this time as a single tablature.   Sheet Music with standard notation as well as ukulele tablature is available for purchase $5.39 and can be purchased by paying thru the paypal donate button on the UKULELE MIKE website: http://www.ukulelemikelynch.com  Once purchased it will be personally emailed to you within the day.

Questions regarding any Ukulele resource, please email: TheUkuleleMan2012@hotmail.com