Tēnā tātou katou
Ko Rangi ki runga, ko Papa ki raro, ko tātou kei waenga nui
E rere ana ngā tae o mihi ki a tātou, te hunga
Ko tēnei taku mihi ngā tāngata whenua o te rohe nei
Ka mihi hoki au ki ngā tohu o te rohe nei
I hoea mai ōku tīpuna i Fermanagh me Antrim ki Aerana,
me Kōtirana
Ko Montgomery te hapū
Ko Marcia tōku wahine
Ko Niamh rawa Féilim āku tāmariki
Ko Brendyn tōku ingoa
I tipu ake au ki Ōtepoti
E noho ana au ki Whakatū
E ki ana te whakataukī
Ranginui above, Papatuānuku below, we are in the middle
May my greetings be as vast as the tides to us all, the living
I acknowledge the indigenous people of this area
I acknowledge the important landmarks of this area
My ancestors come from Fermanagh and Antrim in Ireland
and also Scotland
My family name is Montgomery
My wife is Marcia
My children are Niamh and Féilim
My name is Brendyn
I was born in Dunedin, New Zealand
I live in Nelson, Aotearoa
As the whakataukī says
“E kore e mau i a koe, he wae kai pakiaka”
Nō reira, tēnā koutou katoa
Therefore, my acknowledgement to you all
Flute player, lover of Irish music
Instruments: Irish Flute, Whistle, Fiddle, Tenor Guitar
I’m a traditional Irish musician based in Nelson, New Zealand. I’m lucky enough to be considered one of New Zealand’s leading traditional Irish musicians, playing and teaching flute, whistle and fiddle. In 2003 I completed an M.A. in traditional Irish music performance (1st class honours) at the University of Limerick.
My album “Mountain Air” with Mike Considine (bouzouki) won the ‘Tui’ for best Folk Album of 2003 (NZ music and entertainment awards). I’ve performed at numerous music festivals in Australia including Woodford Folk Festival and The National Folk festival in Canberra. Over the years I have also guested at Auckland Folk Festival, Wellington Folk Festival, Whare Flat folk festival and The Gaidhealtachd in New Zealand. I’m a frequent tutor at Ceol Aneas.
You can find me in sessions in Nelson regularly. I also teach sometimes (when I have time).
Web Designer (the day job)
Platforms: WordPress, Statamic
I consider myself a front end developer / designer. I have 15+ years experience with WordPress and recently have stepped into the Statamic world.
I’ve been building stuff on the web since the early 2000’s. As a musician, I couldn’t afford to pay others to do it for me so I started building sites for myself and was soon asked by friends to build things for their businesses.
I started out when Dreamweaver was considered “state of the art”. I graduated to into the CMS world with WordPress after a stint using Joomla.
After launching Avoca Web Design in Castle Hill Village in Canterbury, I moved to Nelson / Whakatū at the top of the south Island. I’ve been here ever since and the business has steadily grown.
We get to help great science, arts and education organisations as well funky local businesses solve their website challenges.
Running, hiking and fastpacking
I was brought up going “tramping” in the mountains of Otago and Southland. As an early thirty something, I discovered the joy of running and quickly transitioned to trail running. I’ve had the privilege of running in many beautiful places around Aotearoa. I have a couple of trail marathons and in 2023 I ran the magnificent Paparoa track on the West coast (53km). In the last few years I’ve started venturing on fastpacking overnight missions as well.
As the folks on Dirt Church Radio like to say; “running isn’t therapy but it sure helps”. Running helps balance me out and bring my out of my heady day job.
Fortunately for me, my family also loves tramping too and we get to spend a good amount of time away in the hills each year with them. It’s so delightful to share these beautiful places with them.
Besides, all of these activities give me an excuse to nerd out on gear, pore over YouTube videos and generally immerse my self in my favourite pass time, gear research 🧐.
If you want to seem some of that nerdery you can go to the gominimal.nz blog
