Wild Geese - Then and Now

In the mid eighties of last century Brendan Connor and Mike Dew were both primary school teachers in the rural town of Masterton in the Wairarapa region of New Zealand.  They both acknowledged their common interest in Irish music and joined one another to sing and play regularly at The Wairarapa Folk Club. Mike was interested in trying out some of Brendan’s original songs and Brendan was glad to have Mikes extra vocal and instrumental abilities (guitar, bouzouki and small whistle) alongside to give his songs a bit of depth.

Radio New Zealand

Early in 1987 Radio New Zealand’s National programme invited folk musicians to audition for a slot on their programme to help celebrate New Zealand Music Week.  Brendan and Mike selected three songs and decided to give it a crack.  Rick Laing was a local musician who had played alongside Mike in previous bands and he was invited to join them at the auditions.  To their delight they were selected by producer Dick Le Fort and their songs were recorded at Radio New Zealand’s Studio Two in Broadcasting House in Wellington and subsequently played on National Radio later in the year.

Commissions

By the end of the year Brendan, Mike and Rick were asked by Dick Le Fort to prepare six more songs to make up a half hour programme.  By this time they had given themselves the name Wild Geese and invited keyboard player Maurice Brader and drummer Kenny Walker to join the team.  Thus began a ten year stint for Wild Geese recording programmes at least once a year for Radio New Zealand with Neil Maddever and assistant Andre Upston as engineers and Dick Le Fort as Producer and sometime keyboard player.  Brendan and Mike remained the core of the band and other musicians came and went as the years progressed.

Albums

As the programmes came along so did a stockpile of tracks and the idea of an album of these songs was mooted.  With the assistance of David Lindsey, manager of Radio New Zealand’s Replay Radio, the first album, ‘The Leaving” was released in 1990.  This was followed by ‘Ocassionaly Celtic’ in 1993, ‘Betwixt Time and Place in 1997, (Tui Award for best Folk Album), ‘Looking Back’ in the same year then ‘Promises to Keep, in 2002.

Goodbye Studio Two:

In 1997 the government in its wisdom decided to close down Broadcasting House and thus Studio Two ceased to exist.  Wild Geese were the last band to record there before the final ‘shut down’.  Left empty, Broadcasting House eventually burnt to the ground that same year and the site is now a grassy knoll sitting next door to the Houses of Parliament, a memorial to some of New Zealand’s top musicians who had recorded there.