Scholarship Recipient Has Singing Career In Her Sights

Motueka High School student, Lucy Summerfield is one of this year’s recipients of a tertiary scholarship from Network Tasman Trust. Summerfield says when she got the news she started dancing.

“I was so excited I was dancing around my kitchen. One of the scariest things about heading off to university is that you go from having everything paid for you, to having to pay for everything and it's really expensive. I've just put down five grand for a hall that I can’t even move into until February and I was feeling quite worried and anxious and the scholarship was a reminder that other people have faith in me…. It also means that I can really focus on the learning part of university rather than stressing about my financial situation.”

Summerfield is heading to Massey University’s Centre of Creative Arts in Wellington next year to do a Bachelor of Commercial Music and says the Wallace Rowling Scholarship fund of $3000 will go towards accommodation or course fees.

“My ultimate goal is to be a professional singer/songwriter but I can also see myself moving in to spaces like producing and even sound engineering. I have an idea of what I want to do but I'm really excited to see what I learn from the course and it might be that there is areas of the music industry that I haven't discovered yet or considered that I really, really enjoy. I just think moving in that space is where I’m supposed to be.

Summerfield describes her music as ‘folksy’ and says she takes a lot of inspiration from Kiwi artists ‘so I think it has a bit of a Kiwi vibe too’. She composes in Te Reo and in English and says she is still developing her musical tastes. “I feel like I haven’t found my sound yet so part of this course is to help me discover what I actually do want to sound like as an artist.”

Summerfield says that one of the things she is looking forward to most about the course is meeting other students with a shared passion for music.

“I come from a small town and I love the people here but it's so cool to think how many other people who love music just as much as I do and in completely different ways with completely different ideas who have grown up in completely different places with completely different world perspectives and they're all going to be there and I'm going to get to meet them and work with them and hear their ideas and their stories - that's really exciting to me. Also the recording studios and the facilities they have are incredible and I'm really looking forward to getting to use those.”

“I feel really thankful for all of the people who invest in young songwriters in New Zealand. It started off by Smokefree request and then Play It Strange. I've had three recording opportunities with all different levels of independence and guidance and I think it's been really awesome getting to do that… I think it's really cool seeing how much support there is for young musicians and I feel lucky to be a part of it.”

Network Tasman Charitable Trust established the scholarship in memory of Sir Wallace Rowling, a former Prime Minister of New Zealand, who was also a Network Tasman Trust Chairman and Director of Tasman Energy.

Each year, Network Tasman Charitable Trust bestows the scholarship to at least two students, one from a rural school, and one to a student from an urban school, within the Network Tasman Trust distribution network. At the end of the year, four students were awarded the scholarship to support their first year of tertiary study. The other 2022 recipients of a Wallace Rowling Scholarship are Imogen Harris (Golden Bay High School), Samantha Harman (Waimea College) and Ella Patchett (Nelson College).

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