Hope Haami is at Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Te Kōtuku teachings youth self-expression through beatboxing.
It was a mic drop moment when Hope Haami owned the stage at Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Te Kōtuku.
TKKM o Te Kōtuku student Tākiri Te Ata Tohe says "Whaea Hope taught us how to use our mouths as percussion instruments. Something we didn’t know how to do before. I like beatboxing now.”
Students gave shame the boot and experienced a new way of self-expression.
"In my opinion beat boxing is cool, since Whaea Hope arrived I’ve enjoyed doing it. So I’m going to look her up on the internet and look at her skills and the shows she’s done."
As a child Haami was told by male class mates that girls couldn't beatbox.
"You shouldn't assume what any genre or gender of a person should determine their skill level. It didn't discourage me it encouraged me to be like, you know what, I'm going to do what I want to do. So being able to do that over and over again. I already had a passion for music so being able to interpret that with beats and just beatboxing along with music I created this passion that I just wanted to know more.” Says Haami.
She has since demolished this assumption, gaining world titles and inspiring masses along the way.
"I would love to inspire a whole generation of beatboxers because, as I said, beatboxing is quite small. So what I want to do is ignite fires in children everywhere to be able to go yup I don't even need to buy an instrument, I don't need to spend $1200 on a drum machine. I can do it with my mouth."
Haami will be in Aotearoa presenting her School of Beatbox Hope Tour workshops for the next two weeks.