One of Samoa’s hottest acts is taking the stage at this year’s Pasifika – the first time the songstress will perform in front of a festival crowd.

Tofaga Meke has been a regular feature on New Zealand’s YouTube music charts for the past few months, despite her songs being sung entirely in the Samoan language.

The 32-year-old’s hit songs – including Kauvaga Lī, Lē Kea Ai Sesi, Sau i Lalo and O Ai Na a le Matagi – have been trending at the same time as some of Aotearoa’s most well-known artists, including Stan Walker, and international acts such as Beyonce, Miley Cyrus and Tongan-Hawaiian singer Josh Tatofi.

Meke has a huge fanbase among Samoans in the motherland and overseas, including here in New Zealand, and has performed to sold-out crowds with DJ Dave NZ & Big Boys Crew at Otara’s Parataiso Bar in South Auckland.

She is expected to reel in a huge crowd when she takes the Samoan village stage today at the Pasifika Festival in Western Springs.

“I never believed that I could get to where I’m going to perform – at the Pasifika Festival. I’m thankful to God for His blessings and especially such opportunities,” she told the Weekend Herald.

“I’m really happy to be there as this will be the first time I perform at a place like this.”

Meke started singing alongside her cousins at church, as part of the praise and worship team.

But her singing career started after appearing on a television singing competition dubbed Star Search – Samoa’s version of American Idol – in 2020. She made the top 12 before being eliminated from the show.

“I came away from that and started writing and composing a song that basically started my singing career on YouTube and social media.”

The artist has almost 800,000 total monthly streams across YouTube, Spotify and Apple – with just over 650,000 monthly streams on YouTube alone.

Four of her music videos are currently charting on the official New Zealand YouTube music charts, with her song Kauvaga Lī accumulating 1.8 million YouTube views in four months.

According to the statistics, the top four countries listening to her music are people from New Zealand, the US, Australia and Samoa.

Pasifika is running for two days this year and will see musical and cultural performances on seven Pacific Island villages – Tonga, Fiji, Samoa, Tuvalu, Cook Islands, Niue and Aotearoa. A Fale Pasifika village will showcase performances native to Hawaii, Kiribati, Tahiti and Tokelau.

Each village will feature traditional and contemporary island foods unique to that specific motherland and the many handicrafts stalls will give visitors the chance to buy traditional arts and crafts from the various Pacific nations.

Among some of the big names taking the stage today and tomorrow are roots band Unity Pacific with Tigilau Ness and Che Fu, Parris Goebel’s Royal Family, Samoan singer Puni, Tatau Dance Group, Seth Hapu and Mal Lakatani.

‘On pea kakou’ – keep on keeping on

This year celebrates the festival’s 32nd birthday; and with the weather promising sunny skies on both days, big crowds are expected. In previous years, the festival has reeled in up to 130,000 people.

Meke said she believed one of the key reasons her songs were popular with the public was her choice to use the everyday slang and conversational Samoan people used on a daily basis.

“I think the use of everyday language makes it easier to understand. With some people, when the respectful dialect is used, they don’t understand,” she said.

“But I just use the words that I feel and write those using everyday language.”

Speaking about what music means to her – and for many others – she said she saw it as a form of medicine.

“In times of pain and hardship, music takes away those burdens you’re thinking about. Lots of things that aren’t worth it and rubbish.

“If I can feel it and I know the message of a song, then other people will be able to feel it too.”

Meke’s newest song, with DJ Dave, is dubbed On A Kakou – a message about keeping on when times are tough.

“It’s a bit of a mixed song in that you can siva (dance) to it, but there’s also a key message in there – don’t take negative comments against you seriously.

“Ae on pea kakou (we keep going on),” she laughed.

Tofaga Meke is playing on the Samoan village stage today at 5.20pm.

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Vaimoana Mase is the Pasifika editor for the Herald’s Talanoa section, sharing stories from the Pacific community. She won junior reporter of the year at the then Qantas Media Awards in 2010 and picked up the best opinion writing award at the 2023 Voyager Media Awards.