Gareth Farry is director of the independent label Sugarlicks Records, Business Manager for the British Council, and producer of the People In Your Neighbourhood project, a homegrown world music collaboration. The project involves aspiring artists and performers from Auckland's ethnic communities, working with contemporary UK talent, to create an album and perform a live music show.

Renee Liang* caught up with Gareth.Gareth Farry is director of the independent label Sugarlicks Records, Business Manager for the British Council, and producer of the People In Your Neighbourhood project, a homegrown world music collaboration. The project involves aspiring artists and performers from Auckland's ethnic communities, working with contemporary UK talent, to create an album and perform a live music show.

Renee Liang* caught up with Gareth.Renee: How did you come up with the idea for People in Your Neighbourhood?

Gareth: It's always been a part of the music philosophy Sugarlicks follows. You know, the idea of a melting pot. I was in the studio going through old files, and after a few listens, I started hearing things. From there I just let the process play itself out, to let the music basically write itself, and the idea slowly formed organically from that.

The idea of multi-stranded ethnic/cultural themes was already there in the music and we went with that. The oldest track came about eight years ago, and some of the other tracks have arrived slowly over the last 3-4 years.

R: Wow. That's a really long incubation period.

G: I find that if the music isn't ready to be finished, coming back to it after a few years is a great idea. Then with British Council on board we created and finished 3-4 new tracks over a six month period. And from there the idea of having a live show was born.

R: So how would you describe the "feel" of the album - and the live show?

G: I guess it's two things:
Firstly it stems from a love of old soul, reggae and jazz music. Many of us involved have been listening to that stuff over the years - it's our inspiration, you know.

Secondly, it stems from a spirit of positive political messages through music, the harmonious power of music, and again the idea of a musical melting pot.

R: Wow. That's a lot of ideas.

G: Yes. Making tea....

R: The British are quite good at tea! But seriously, it's a cool metaphor for what you're doing. Chuck in a mix of different tea leaves, add a bit of hot water and brew. See what flavours come out/are enhanced.

G: That's the idea, to try to find the magic in the music. It's all in there anyway.
The thing about that resultant mix as well is that it is intangible, so you have to finetune your ears and your sense of hearing.

R: True. So how did you 'find' that magic? You're a record producer and now a show producer. Do you have a process?

G: No, I had to find out along the way! I am a firm believer in striving for the absolute best - even if you can't get there for years - you have to strive to be a master"¦. But there was a bit of blind luck involved as well. My friend Natasha told me about the Urban Soul Orchestra (USO) when we were on the Waiheke ferry together. So I went home and googled them...as you do.

I realised they played the strings on some of my favourite music from the UK at that time ... Soul2Soul, Incognito, Gabrielle etc. So there was really no question about getting them involved. It's part of the British Council's mission to spread UK expertise through cultural collaborations - and especially urban deepness like these guys!!

R: At what stage in the project did you get them involved?

G: I went to the British Council interview and pitched the idea, and got the job! So then Stephen from USO came here in August 2008 and had a listen.... and away we went.

R: So you've had very little time to complete the album, let alone put together a whole stage show?

G: Yes, but in a way that's the beauty of it. Maybe one day we'll have the luxury of taking time but not at the moment. The idea came first, and we could all see an outcome so it wasn't really uncharted waters.

R: How did Sugarlicks Studio and the British Council put this together?

G: The music came out of the Sugarlicks studio, and was mixed by Ekadek. At the same time we went through the project organisation phase, got people on board, decided on the event timeline, and made key decisions. For instance, we decided to make it creative commons, i.e. a free music project that other people can use - parts are loaded online for free download. This just seemed right in the context of inter cultural dialogue. So the idea was born out of the collaboration inherent in the Sugarlicks family, and British Council came on board to realise it and to also broaden the idea and its potential application.

The CD is out in a few weeks, and then we will prepare for the live shows on the 12th March (Auckland) and the 14th (WOMAD). The band will get the music tight, then we add the other performers to the mix, and when USO get here from the UK we have 3 days of rehearsal. Whew!

R: Who are some of the artists involved?

G: There are a lot of people involved from small creative groups around in Auckland. For example there's Yao the Chinese GuZheng player, Levani Vosasi and his people, Korean mover and shaker Josh Jang, and many others including yourself. So the whole thing is constantly evolving, which is exciting. The whole creative cities idea is a natural, but very future looking one.

R: It's definitely a great looking future"¦.

G: Again the potential is there, and the idea of a future harmonious interweaved society already happens in thousands of small transactions every day in this city. We are just putting the soundtrack to it!

R: I get the idea you don't want this project to stop at the CD and live show. Is the idea to 'seed" something that will grow and sprout in other directions?

G: Absolutely. The British Council is taking it into new directions next year. We want to involve theatre, and/or visual arts, digital guerilla arts. So the first year is music, but ultimately a bigger group collaborating cross-media and across-culture will happen, we hope. It was always envisioned to be about empowerment for artists, especially those that aren't from the host culture - I mean like a lot of us, we find very little inspiration in our current mainstream creative culture.

R: A crosslinking. And an evolution.

G: Yes. The British Council is establishing an East Asia creative network. It's an opensource free service to do creative business, so this project will eventually be part of a more far reaching Creative Cities British Council project.

R: So the only limits are our own imaginations"¦? (grin)

G: Absolutely!

* Disclosure - Renee Liang is one of the artists featured on the PIYN CD.