The New Zealand Symphony Orchestra (NZSO) is the national orchestra of New Zealand. It is a crown entity owned by the Government of New Zealand, with 90 full-time players.

The orchestra was founded in 1946 as the National Orchestra (by Oswald Astley Cheesman and others) and administered by Radio New Zealand until 1989, under the name of the NZBC Symphony Orchestra (New Zealand Broadcasting Corporation). It is currently based in the Michael Fowler Centre but frequently performs also in the adjacent Wellington Town Hall in Wellington.

The NZSO has always had a heavy touring schedule within New Zealand. It performed in Christchurch as early as 1947. It performs its core series of 12 programmes in Wellington and Auckland, about half of those in Hamilton, Christchurch and Dunedin, and visits several provincial cities each year. It has several times toured overseas, notably in 2005 to the BBC Proms, the Snape Maltings, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam and the World Expo at Aichi in Japan.

For a number of years, the NZSO had no permanent conductor, but has had chief conductors. Franz-Paul Decker was chief conductor from 1991 to 1996, the last conductor to hold this title, and now has the title of Conductor Laureate. The first conductor to have the title of Music Director of the NZSO was James Judd, from 1999 to 2007. Judd is now the orchestra's Music Director Emeritus. In May 2007, Pietari Inkinen was named the NZSO's second Music Director, and he formally took up the post in January 2008.

Dame Kiri Jeanette Te Kanawa, ONZ, DBE, AC (pronounced /ˌkɪri tɨ ˈkɑːnəwə/; born 6 March 1944, Gisborne, New Zealand) is a New Zealand / Māori soprano who has had a highly successful international opera career since 1968. Acclaimed as one of the most beloved sopranos in both the United States and Britain she possesses a warm full lyric soprano voice, singing a wide array of works in multiple languages from the 17th to the 20th centuries. She is particularly associated with the works of Mozart, Strauss, Verdi, Handel and Puccini.

Te Kanawa's voice has been described as having "a vibrant but mellow quality that is ample in size without being overly heavy or forced"^{[citation needed]}. Music critics have consistently praised the freshness and warmth of her voice^{[citation needed]}. The sheer beauty of Te Kanawa's voice made her one of the leading operatic sopranos internationally of the 1970s and 1980s. She found particular success in portraying princesses, noble countesses and other similar characters on stage, as her naturally dignified stage presence and physical beauty complemented these roles well.

There are at least four different people called Te Kanawa.

One is the ancestor of the Ngāti Te Kanawa iwi of the Tainui confederation of iwi. He was born before 1700 and lived in Hangatiki.

Another was a chief of the Ngāti Maniapoto, another Tainui iwi. He was alive in the early 19th century. Te Kanawa was a warlord of Maniapoto; he settled disputes with a taiaha within Tainui or outside Tainui. Some of these disputes were boundary disputes, hence the Ngāti Hari connection. The boundary line between Tu Wharetoa and Maniapoto and the marae Hia Kaitupeka by Taumarunui. He is represented by an amo on their carved meeting house.

Another was a chief of the Ngāti Katoa. He was killed in the campaign known as Putu-karekare (or Patu-karekare, or Te Karekaernga), which was fought at Kawhia in the time when Ngāti Katoa were the tangata whenua. This was before Te Rauparaha had left Kawhia around 1820.

Angela Ballara: "Taua".

Pei Te Hurunui: "King Potatau"

Another was a chief of the Ngāti Mahuta and Ngāti Naho iwi, and was one of the principal chiefs of the Waikato Māori. He was a close confederate of Pōtatau Te Wherowhero, the first Māori King, and lived from c. 1770 to c. 1860. He was also known as Tuhoro Te Kanawa and was signatory to the treaty signing at Kawhia. He was one of the eight chiefs who sat with Pōtatau at Haurua Pā, which stood where the Waitomo golf links are now.

Hilary Hahn (born November 27, 1979) is a Grammy-winning American violinist.

Hahn was born in Lexington, Virginia. Beginning her studies when she was three years old at Baltimore's Peabody Institute, she was admitted to the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia at age ten, and in 1991, made her major orchestral debut with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra. Hahn signed her first musical recording contract at age sixteen in 1996 with Sony Music. She graduated from the Curtis Institute in May 1999 with a Bachelor of Music degree.

Hahn plays on an 1864 copy of Paganini's Cannone made by Vuillaume. Her main interest is in solo performance; she also performs chamber music.

Hahn began playing the violin one month before her fourth birthday in the Suzuki Program of Baltimore's Peabody Institute. She participated in a Suzuki class for a year. Between 1984 and 1989 Hahn studied in Baltimore under Klara Berkovich. In 1990, at ten, Hahn was admitted to the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia where she became a student of Jascha Brodsky. Hahn studied with Brodsky for seven years and learned the études of Kreutzer, Ševčík, Gaviniès, Rode, and the Paganini Caprices. She learned twenty-eight violin concertos, recital programs, and several other short pieces.

The Lark (L'Alouette) is an English-language version of a 1952 play by Jean Anouilh about Joan of Arc. It was presented on Broadway in English in 1955, starring Julie Harris as Joan and Boris Karloff as Pierre Cauchon. It was produced by Kermit Bloomgarden. Lillian Hellman made the English adaptation and Leonard Bernstein composed the incidental music. The two stars of the play reprised their roles in a 1957 television production of the play, as part of the anthology series Hallmark Hall of Fame. There is another English translation by Christopher Fry.

The play covers the trial, condemnation, and execution of Joan, but has a highly unusual ending. Joan remembers important events in her life as she is being questioned, and is subsequently condemned to death. However, Cauchon realizes, just as Joan is burning at the stake, that in her judges' hurry to condemn her, they have not allowed her to re-live the coronation of Charles VII of France. The fire is therefore extinguished, and Joan is given a reprieve. The actual end of the story is left in question, but Cauchon proclaims it a victory for Joan.