The Moana story begins with Foa’i’s dad Opetaia, and his Pacific supergroup Te Vaka (who celebrate their 29th anniversary in 2025). In Te Vaka’s AudioCulture profile, Graham Reid writes: “Foa’i was chosen by Disney after they heard the band’s many albums – he seems an almost obvious pick as the one to bring authentic Pacific beats, harmonies and language to the blockbuster project”.
Following the success of the first Moana film, Opetaia reunited with music director Mark Mancina to compose the score for the sequel, while Abigail Barlow and Emily Bear contributed songs, replacing Lin-Manuel Miranda from the first film. To perform and record some of the songs, Opetaia brought with him members of Te Vaka, plus Olivia, her brother Matatia. Their mother Julie Foa’i (who is a musician in her own right, releasing music under the name Miss French) was there too, managing all the moving pieces.
The film’s reception has so far surpassed the creators’ expectations. According to a release from Disney, Moana 2 set a new Thanksgiving weekend box office record in the US, making $225 million (NZ$382.4m).
Moana 2 Reo Māori is also the first Disney animated feature to premiere in an indigenous language directly alongside its English-language counterpart.
While Olivia Foa’i is a key player in Te Vaka, and the Moana story, she is far from being in her parents’ shadow, firmly walking her own path as an acclaimed singer, dancer, choreographer, and filmmaker.
In 2018 Olivia launched her solo career with the single ‘My Way (ft. Matatia Foa’i)’. Described in The Guardian as “one of the biggest stars in Pacific Music”, she was awarded Best Female Artist at the 2020 and 2023 Pacific Music Awards. Her debut solo album Candid won the Tui for Best Pacific Album at the 2020 Aotearoa Music Awards.
growing up in te vaka made for an unusual childhood
Te Vaka runs deep in Foa’i’s veins, and growing up in the band made for an unusual childhood. She first danced on stage at the age of two; at 12 she performed with Te Vaka at the Rugby World Cup in Paris and the Beijing Olympics the following year. She has performed with them for over 20 years in around 40 countries, and has sung on on every Te Vaka album, except for the debut.
During this time, Foa’i became aware that the work her parents were doing was important. She also realised that they each influenced her in different ways.
“I admire my dad for his leadership abilities, his integrity and for finding such a powerful niche sonically. I am very much a product of his sound in my own music. But I also really admire my mother’s persistence in going after big dreams, and organising every little detail to realise those dreams. And her versatility while doing so. While we were performing as Te Vaka, she was a mother, a tour manager, a band manager, the costume maker, our in-house health specialist, our counsellor, so many things at once. She taught me how to be diligent and really see things through.”
There are at least 10 people in Te Vaka at any one time, including extended family who had an impact on Olivia.
“I remember looking up to the females of the group, Sulata Foa’i-Amiatu, Melodee Panapa, and my sister Alana Foa’i-Auimatagi. I also remember every now and then my dad would try and bribe me with lollies to come and sing on a track in his studio!”
Olivia’s aunt Sulata Foa’i-Amiatu has her own musical story. After joining soul/hip hop group Colony in the early 1990s, she was picked up by the Deepgrooves label, releasing the critically-acclaimed album Kia Koe (“For You” in Tokelauan) in 1997, when she was 20. Following the closure of Deepgrooves, Sulata joined Te Vaka in the late 1990s.
Olivia says of Sulata, “Watching her as the lead female singer for Te Vaka from when I was a baby was very inspiring. She has a beautiful voice which I think really shines in a special way when she sings my dad’s music. Maybe it’s the language but I consider the pairing to be quite iconic, as biased as I may be.”
“Originally it was never really a choice to join my parents’ band Te Vaka and thus start a career in music,” says Olivia, “it was sort of just something you do when you see the rest of your family doing it.
“in my young adulthood I started to understand why Te Vaka shows felt special”
“It took many years for me to feel confident as a singer, despite having performed as one in many countries throughout my childhood and teen years. But in my young adulthood I started to understand why Te Vaka shows felt special. Through every moment on stage you understood that the purpose was greater than you. These are precious stories born from rich cultures sung in our own languages in the hope that we might share some of what we’ve inherited from our ancestors. That was what made me want to do music of my own, and probably why I naturally incorporate the Tokelau language. I always want to really believe in what I’m making.”
In 2007 the Foa’i family moved to Australia to expand their horizons; “it all felt bigger once we arrived here so I suppose that was the objective.”
Olivia’s debut solo album Candid was released in 2019, and featured both English and Gagana Tokelau, a language considered severely endangered by UNESCO. Her affinity with the language grew, and she went on to write the Tokelauan theme song ‘Mai Anamua’ for the documentary Pacific Mother, which collected numerous awards including Best New Zealand Feature at DocEdge 2023.
“‘Mai Anamua’ was a huge personal milestone for me,” says Olivia. “It is the first song I’ve ever written entirely in Gagana Tokelau. I wasn’t raised speaking the language, but I was raised singing in the language. It wasn’t until adulthood that I really started to put in effort to learn. Not the easiest feat, as being such a minority language – around 5000 speakers – the resources were very scarce.
“I struggled a lot with the language conversationally, but found comfort in writing lyrics. Each set of new lyrics would give me more confidence and allow new words to sink into my memory. Tokelauan has many similarities to other Pacific Island languages such as Tuvaluan, Samoan and Māori, and often many words are discernible across languages. But I find it in some ways gentler than its many siblings, while retaining a strong rhythmic nature that I really love.”
November of 2023 saw the release of her second album, Tūmau Pea (“Everlasting”), a further exploration into both modern and Pacific Island influences which earned her three nominations at the 2024 Pacific Music Awards for Best Album, Best Female Artist and Best Pacific Language Album.
The album ‘candid’ “really sets the tone for what I want out of life: meaning, love, peace, growth.”
Comparing the recording of Tūmau Pea with her debut album Candid, Olivia says of her latest album, “it was a beautiful opportunity for me to play, lyrically and musically. I got to put some recurring ponderances into song form, and process some of my past too. It was cathartic and really sets the tone for what I want out of life: meaning, love, peace, growth.”
Older brother Matatia produced Candid and co-produced Tūmau Pea, with Abraham Kunin joining as co-producer.
Olivia discusses bringing Kunin on board for her second album. “I wouldn’t have seriously entertained the idea of not having Matatia produce my whole second album but circumstances rendered him unable to finish it. He had essentially already completed the first half. One day on a visit to Tāmaki Makaurau, Bev Adair-Beets introduced me to Abraham. We tried a song together, then another, and I discovered he was so easy to work with. And challenging in the best ways, in that I could write in styles I hadn’t dared to before, knowing that Abe would guide it all beautifully.”
Her love of filmmaking began with the ‘Lakalaka’ music video. “Before that time, I had dabbled in little projects here and there, mostly centred around dance. ‘Lakalaka’ came about when one day I realised Te Vaka hadn’t put out a music video for 10 years.
“I pitched the idea to my parents, then my mum and I pitched the idea to Disney. It was a big production, about 30 cast and crew, for my first real directing/producing gig. I took on more than I should have, as I was also the singer of the song and choreographer, but the project was so engaging and meaningful to me, and getting to work with crew and talent on that scale ignited a fire in me.”
On top of her multiple film-making projects, Olivia has begun to tour her music in earnest, starting with headlining Brisbane Festival’s “Pasifika Made” show in September 2024.
As another string to her bow, in December 2023 Olivia attended the COP28 United Nations Climate Change Conference in the UAE.
“I performed with Small Island Big Song as part of the Planetary Guardians launch. I will just speak from the artist’s capacity in which I was there. I don’t know how effective the plans might be, but we did our best to appeal to the attendee’s humanity and inspire respect for the environment.”
What’s next for this very busy artist? Alongside shooting a new video for Te Vaka which will be released through Disney, for the last five years she has been working on a Te Vaka documentary.
“Osnat Shurer – producer of the first Moana movie – said she scoured the libraries of Pacific Island music and when she found my dad, she had no doubts it had to be him. Their mission statement right from the beginning was to share the South Pacific with the world and Moana really was the icing on the cake for that dream. I’m so proud of my dad and mum for the 20 years of prior hard work they did establishing their niche leading up to landing such a fitting project.”
