The Gathering 97/98
Open-air dance festival to celebrate New Year.
Vital statistics: 48 hours, 700 crew, 8,000 Gatherers
Working dates: September 1997 - January 1998
Event dates: 31 December 1997 - 2 January 1998
This was the second Gathering at New Year, and the number of Gatherers doubled compared with those of the previous year.
My roles included:
- Wellington regional organiser
- Website designer
- Producer of The Gathering 97/98 documentary
- Stage manager of the Trance zone
I was invited to co-ordinate the DJs and live acts from the lower half of the North Island, and ended up taking on a larger role, kind of a "bits and pieces manager", picking up loose ends which I could see the four main organisers in Nelson would not have time to complete.
I also created The Gathering website, which I developed over the next 4 years into a 900-page source of information about Gatherings past and present, and which received over 7,500 hits per month.
My responsibilities included:
- Wellington Regional Organiser - managing the call for submissions and mix tapes from the region, liaising with DJs and live acts and organising transport for them to and from The Gathering
- Website design, creation, content provision, HTML, JavaScript, graphics, animations and architecture & navigation systems. My favourite website, my "baby", which I constantly worked on, developing and improving it for four years. I provided this service for free, and estimate its worth to be around $100,000 - more info
- General support for the four main organisers in Nelson
- Stage manager of the Trance zone,
a complete dance party in its own right. This consisted of
48 hours of zone management as a member of a team of two,
including:
- checking DJs and live acts on and off-stage
- maintaining the functionality of sound and lighting systems (with tech support when needed)
- ensuring the safety, well-being and general good vibe of the Gatherers
- Producer of The Gathering documentary - more info
I think this was my favourite Gathering. It was all so fresh and new, I was in my favourite place - the Trance zone - for pretty much the whole party, which meant I could dance as well as work, and I felt a bit like the "camp mother" of the zone - making sure that Gatherers and performers were all happy, safe and looked after.
Following The Gathering 97/98, I was made a minor partner in The Gathering Company, with a 4% share, as a thankyou for all the work I had done. The plan was for me to assist and support Jose Cachemaille, one of the four directors. However, later that year, three of the directors resigned, leaving Murray Kingi, the creator of the event, in sole control. He invited me to become one of three full-time directors for 98/99.
The Gathering 97/98 was awarded Dance Event of the Year by both the b.fm New Zealand Music Awards 1998 and RE:MIX magazine New Zealand Music Awards 1998.
