Occupation: Musician
Hometown: Wellington
Year you started in the arts: When I was seven
What are you doing now? Touring the U.S.
Favourite musicians: Opshop, Goldenhorse, Flight of the Conchords (there’s a bandwagon for a reason), Breaks Co-op, Katchafire (I’m serious), Anika, Bic and Dave, of course.
Favourite books:
Emergency Sex and Other Desperate Measures by Heidi Postlewait, Kenneth Cain and Andrew Thomson (it’s not about sex but it will get you some interesting looks on planes)
Same Kind of Different As Me by Ron Hall and Denver Moore
The Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning
We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed with Our Families by Philip Gourevitch
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time by Mark Haddon
Letters and Papers from Prison by Dietrich Bonhoeffer
The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis
The Pursuit of God by Aiden W. Tozer
Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller
Favourite movie: The Sound of Music
Brief history
Brooke Fraser is a singer-songwriter.
Brooke studied piano from the age of seven, began writing songs at 12, played clarinet (”very averagely!”) from 13, and at 15 got sick of writing slow piano ballads and playing Baby Elephant Walk in the school concert band, so taught herself the acoustic guitar.
She’s since recorded two albums, What to Do With Daylight (2003) and Albertine (2006 NZ, 2007 Australia, 2008 USA), which both debuted at #1 in New Zealand and between them have reached 13 platinum sales and achieved seven #1 airplay singles.
Following the release of What To Do With Daylight, Brooke played a number of co-billed and headline tours throughout New Zealand, and in 2004 toured Australia and New Zealand with John Mayer and supported David Bowie.
In June 2006 Brooke temporarily set up base in North Hollywood, California, to record, after making a return trip to Rwanda – the place in which the roots of the new collection of songs for her second album Albertine lay.
This year she’s released Albertine in North America and is touring extensively through the States with her band of merry men (+ one woman) from June through September.
Brooke has won four New Zealand Music Awards:
Best Female Solo Artist, 2004
Breakthrough Artist of the Year, 2004
Highest Selling Album (Albertine), 2007
Airplay Record of the Year, 2007
Brooke has also won three APRA (Australasian Performing Right Association) Awards:
Most Played Composition in NZ (Better), 2004
Most Played Composition in NZ (Deciphering Me), 2007
The APRA Silver Scroll (Albertine), 2007
Check out some of Brooke’s music videos…
Brooke will answer more questions on Pacific Starmap in coming months, so join our email list to be the first to know when she is our featured Champion.
PACIFIC STARMAP CHAMPIONS:
Albert Wendt | Brooke Fraser | Nathaniel Lees | Neil Ieremia
Sia Figiel | Sima Urale | Sopolemalama Filipe Tohi
