Olympic breakdancer Dujon Cullingford and dancer Adelaide Levy. Photo / Tom Eley
Stages rise and sound gear rolls across Claudelands Oval as crews race to transform the venue ahead of tomorrow’s Homegrown festival.
The first running of the festival in Hamilton will see more than 60 New Zealand artists, including Six60, L.A.B., Devilskin, Blindspott, and Supergroove, perform across seven stages.
One of those stages is dedicated to up-and-coming artists, and Homegrown will also see the return of breakdancing.
Olympic breakdancer Dujon Cullingford was among the people on site this week, chatting with fellow performer Adelaide Levy as behind them, crews assembled a 1000-seat performance space.
“We’re just sorting the stage for Saturday,” Cullingford told the Waikato Herald, during a behind-the-scenes sneak peek.
“All the bits that go with it, fun times.”
Cullingford said events like Homegrown created rare opportunities for dancers and performers in New Zealand.
“I mean, with our dance events, they’re usually grassroots, small community events.
“We’re lucky if we get a couple of grand funding, and because of that, our dancers don’t get to experience maybe that level of professional type of events that you’d see overseas.”
Cullingford said performing at Homegrown also created opportunities for the dancers to connect with major names in the industry.
“We have a national event where you can rub shoulders with your idols on stage,” he said.
“But also, if they win, they get a bunch of money, and who knows, they can use that to travel or compete in another country.”
By the time the gates open tomorrow, Claudelands will have been turned into a music hub hosting tens of thousands of fans.
Ahead of the festival, representatives from Ngāti Wairere, local kura students and the Homegrown team will come together for a whakatau (welcoming ceremony) to welcome the event to its new home at Claudelands.
Homegrown chief executive Andrew Tuck said he was especially looking forward to this.
“We’ve always wanted to do a whakatau as part of the beginnings of the festival,” Tuck said.
“Now in Kirikiriroa we’ve finally been able to do that thanks to the design and set up of the festival.”
Cultural elements will also be woven throughout the site, with pūtātara (conch shells) placed on each stage as part of the festival’s design.
For Tuck, the festival’s arrival in Hamilton is also something of a homecoming, with Homegrown going back to an extreme sports event called X*Air, which was held in Claudelands.
“Coming home and delivering this to our people at Waikato is really, really nice.
“We started off with three stages and 10,000 people about 18 years ago.
“Over time, we grew to five stages and about 23,000 people in Wellington. Now coming back to Hamilton, we’ve got seven stages and a much bigger area.”
Tuck said the line-up reflected the depth of New Zealand music.
“Who would have thought 18 years ago that you’d have 60 top New Zealand artists.
“And if I look at who we didn’t put on this year, there were another 110 artists we could have chosen from.”
Despite the scale of the event, the festival still runs on a small core team for most of the year.
“There are four of us who work fulltime on it,” Tuck said.
“As we get closer to the event, we bring in part-timers, and by Saturday, we’ll have about 2200 people working on the day. Then in a month’s time it will be back down to the four of us again.”
Homegrown has long been a showcase for established Kiwi acts, but Tuck said the festival is equally focused on the next wave of musicians.
That included the Nexus Stage, which would give six emerging artists, selected from 150 entries, a chance to break through.
For Tuck, bringing the festival to Hamilton is also about raising the city’s profile.
“Hamilton has been lacking a centrepiece event for a while now,” he said.
“We’ve watched [the city] grow, all our kids have been through school here, so we’re really set on making sure Hamilton becomes the next biggest and greatest thing.”
With fans travelling from Auckland to Queenstown, he hopes locals embrace the event as their own.
“This is their festival now,” Tuck said.
“We just want Hamilton to go, ‘hey, this is ours’, get in behind it and welcome everyone coming to town.”
The acts will perform from 1pm to 11pm.
The bridge to Homegrown walkway will connect the CBD to Claudelands Oval, transforming Claudelands Bridge into a festival link with performers, entertainment, food trucks and activations throughout the day.
For this, Claudelands Bridge will close to vehicles from 6am, Saturday, March 14, until 3am, Sunday, March 15, to reopen as a pedestrian-only link from 10am.
Temporary road closures and traffic management will be in place around Claudelands and surrounding streets.
An alcohol ban will apply in the public areas surrounding the event.
Free Park and Ride services will operate from Rotokauri Transport Hub to Claudelands Oval and from the University of Waikato (Gate 2, Knighton Rd) to Claudelands Oval.
Pre-event services will run between 11.30am and 2.30pm.
Post-event services will run between 10.30pm and 1am.
Rotokauri Transport Hub is ideal for those travelling from Auckland or the north, the council said, while the University of Waikato hub is suited to those travelling from Tauranga or the south.
Valid Homegrown tickets include free travel on Hamilton’s urban bus network. Visit Busit for more information.
Taxi and ride-share drop-off and pick-up areas will operate near the venue.
Homegrown has a partnership with Hamilton Taxis to help avoid price scalping. Look out for the blue bubble taxis, the council said.
The taxi loop is from Stanley St and Heaphy Tce to Thames St.
Uber and private drop-offs can be reached at the Settlement Centre on Boundary Rd.
Free mobility parking will be available on Brooklyn Rd, between Pearsons Ave and the Five Cross Roads roundabout.
Drivers will need to present a valid mobility pass to the traffic controller on Pearsons Ave to gain access.
Bike stands by Entry 5 of Claudelands Arena will be accessible on event day. Additional bike parking is available at The Magical Bridge Playground.
Tom Eley is a multimedia journalist at the Waikato Herald. Before he joined the Hamilton-based team, he worked for the Weekend Sun and Sunlive. He previously worked as a journalist at Black Press Media in Canada and won a fellowship with the Vancouver Sun.