Navigating The Fiery Maze

Even when he was just a humble rock and roller in the '70s in New Zealand, Tim Finn's work was never far from the theatre. Finn's theatrical prowess showed itself through flashes of Split Enz costumes and make-up, and the vivid sonic images that flowed through his Crowded House and solo work. Now it's found a solid home with new theatrical song cycle, The Fiery Maze. Hosted by The Malthouse Theatre, The Fiery Maze is a collaboration between Finn and Australian poet Dorothy Porter. Those across their cultural legends will know that Porter is sadly no longer with us, but the project - which was conceived two decades ago - remains fresh and energised. Now it is finally finding its audience.

Talking from his home base in Auckland, Finn explained the show's two-decade journey. "Around the time of Monkey's Mask, I read the book and loved it, and got in touch with Dorothy and suggested that we write some songs. So these songs are from 1994, they've never been published, never been heard," he says. "When I suggested to her a couple of ideas I was interested in exploring in song, she came back with a whole lot of lyrics. I did all of these demos in my studio in Melbourne in the early '90s and I wasn't really sure what to do with them, and Abi Tucker came down from Sydney to sing on them. She was only 19 at the time, and she just gave them this kind of raw, beautiful atmosphere."

"Everything changed in the early '90s, and so iconic rock singers like Jim Morrison or Jimi Hendrix were being resurged."

The return to the work let Finn attend to something of a fire that the original collaboration lit. "[After recording demos in the '90s] I wasn't quite sure what to do next, so I kind of left them in the bottom draw and got on with other projects. As did Dorothy," Finn continues. "Just really shortly before she died we started to talking again saying 'let's do something with this', because the songs wouldn't leave either of us alone. She would play them in her car, I would play them in my car, and our kids started to get to know them, but just, yeah, we thought 'let's do a theatre show' and started workshopping it, and then next thing I was told is that she had died. I hadn't realised that she had been really ill, so it was really shocking."

Porter's approach to language was revered during her lifetime, and since, as wonderfully distinct, and a shared love of music, with its ability to move between the high and low brow, brought the collaboration together. "At that time, because of grunge I think, I was noticing that young people were investigating music that was from before they were born. And I suppose in my day that would have been unthinkable, it would have been like us listening to Glenn Miller or whatever, and it just wouldn't have gone there. But everything changed in the early '90s, and so iconic rock singers like Jim Morrison or Jimi Hendrix were being resurged - I found that quite interesting. So you know, I was just throwing those ideas around, and I think Dorothy then began to explore that huge grand passion of being 'too hot not to grow cold' and using rock and roll."

The logistics of coming back to a show that Finn calls "a project that I had thought was never going to see the light of day, as much as I loved the songs" have finally come together, with Tucker returning to sing live. "[Tucker] sent me an email a few years ago just saying 'What's happened to those songs?', so she didn't forget about them either." The return brings what he calls "more maturity and authority", but also, "you know, it's the same singer, she's got this magnificent voice and she just connects with the material."

Following an invitation from Porter's partner and Malthouse Theatre, Finn set about getting The Fiery Maze to stage. Finally returning was a bit of a job in aural archaeology. "I didn't write anything down, I don't write music anyway, so I could hear these songs on DAT tapes, those early digital tapes, and they starting to degrade with funny glitches and things, so I became obsessed with trying to figure out what I'd actually played, because I really liked them. So I re-learned them all and then put them into my computer to be sort of safe, but I didn't change a single note. It was just trying to decipher, like ancient hieroglyphics or something," he laughs.