Milk & Honey Festival Announced For International Women's Day

The inaugural Milk & Honey Festival has been announced to take place in venues across the nation in celebration of International Women's Day, happening on Friday 8th March. Featuring a dazzling lineup predominantly comprised of female artists and crew from throughout Aotearoa, the multi-venue festival organised by Lani Purkis (Elemeno P) and Teresa Patterson will occur on the same evening in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch, including a special event curated by the Moments collective. The organisers shared their excitement about the festival, stating...

“We really wanted to create something where younger girls and women have someone to look up to and aspire to, and something where women are very clearly visible in all parts of the event.”

Milk & Honey Festival
International Women's Day - Friday 8th March

Powerstation, Auckland - Tami Neilson, Nadia Reid, Julia Deans, Ria Hall and Sandy Mill (DJ)

Whammy Bar / Wine Cellar, Auckland - carb on carb, CHAII, Cheshire Grimm, Dead Little Penny, HEX, LEXXA, Randa, Sami Sisters, Tooms, Wax Chattels, Valkyrie

121 Club, Wellington - Alexa Casino (DJ), Half Queen , Peach Milk , Amy Jean, curated by Moments 

Blue Smoke, Christchurch - Bic Runga, French Concession

Here's Tami Nielson's superb video for 'Devil In A Dress' from her latest album Sassafrass!...

Watch the candy-coloured clip for Hex's 'Runes / Ruins'...

Check out live footage of Peach Milk performing in 95bFM's studios for the Freak the Sheep show...

Watch French Concession's hyperreal video for her recent single 'Empress'...

Press release:

To celebrate International Women’s Day in 2019, over twenty of Aotearoa’s finest female artists are gathering across three cities to perform a series of shows on Friday March 8th.

The team behind Milk and Honey are Lani Purkis and Teresa Patterson. The two have a wealth of music industry experience between them, from management, promotion, and booking, to performing, teaching, and mentoring.

While working on other projects over the past 12 months, they began thinking about how wonderful it would be to create a series of shows where the majority of musicians and crew were women, and decided it was the perfect goal for International Women’s Day 2019.

They have three key aims: To celebrate the incredibly talented women who work in all facets of the New Zealand music industry; To make female artists and crew visible to younger women, and encourage them to see many different possible roles they could find for themselves in the music industry; To provide a safe, inclusive, respectful festival and gig environment.

“We really wanted to create something where younger girls and women have someone to look up to and aspire to, and something where women are very clearly visible in all parts of the event.”

Tami Neilson states: “I'm so excited to be part of the inaugural Milk & Honey Festival. We're going to blast the roof off The Powerstation with this powerhouse line-up! What a way to celebrate International Women's Day.”

The Sami Sisters agree: "We are super pumped to be part of Milk & Honey! It's been a while since we played and we couldn't be more excited to take part in this festival celebrating our wāhine toa on International Women's Day."