‘Nothing is impossible’: Māori-Pasifika choir takes gospel to the world and wins gold

A Māori-Pasifika choir has taken its gospel sound from Aotearoa New Zealand to the world stage and proved it did not need months of rehearsals together to compete with some of the world's biggest choirs.

The United Auckland Gospel Choir won Gold with a score of 93.5 at the 2026 World Choir Games in Helsingborg, Sweden, known as the “Choir Olympics”.

The 35-member group also finished runner-up in the Champions competition's gospel category, behind a veteran choir from Great Britain.

“Praise the Lord, we got a gold because of our high score of 93.5,” choir director Seumanu Seuoti Simon Matāfai tells PMN Sāmoa.

“That’s the blessing that we’ve come back with and we just hope to inspire others through this achievement for our community.”

The United choir was the only group representing Aotearoa and the wider Pacific at the competition, going up against choirs of up to 100 singers from Europe, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

Watch Seumanu Seuoti Simon Matāfai's full interview on PMN Sāmoa below.

But the group had an unusual challenge of its own.

The United Auckland Gospel Choir was formed by bringing together the Auckland Gospel Choir and Hamilton’s Temple View Gospel Choir.

Separated by the distance between Auckland and Hamilton and weekend commitments making rehearsals difficult, they did not sing together as one choir until they reached Sweden.

“We met for the first time over there,” Seumanu says. “So everything from voice matching and blending, polishing, choreography...we only finalised everything and refined it all in Sweden.”

For Seumanu, the group's strength was never about numbers. "Numbers is not quantity sometimes, it’s quality. We just wanted to showcase our version of gospel music. Our superpower as Pasifika is that no one can beat us at being ourselves."

That identity was front and centre in their 15-minute performance. They opened with the Māori hymn He Honore (a prayer of honour and peace) before moving through songs in Tongan, Fijian, and Sāmoan and blending with R&B and contemporary gospel.

Seumanu says the indigenous opening stood out with the judges and helped set the choir apart from more traditional American and European gospel styles.

Watch Seumanu's full interview on PMN Tuvalu below.

Amid global tensions that threatened to cancel the event, the group was one of just four choirs chosen from 160 to perform at the World Choir Games Peace Concert.

"We represented Oceania in that concert to tell the world that peace can be achieved if we all work together," Seumanu says. “We all unite each other, our hearts and our spirit, we can truly achieve peace for everyone.”

“It was a beautiful place and a beautiful experience. We hope that this opens the world view of anyone listening to that, man, if we could go over there and achieve this, then nothing is impossible.”

The choir’s success builds on its performance at the 2024 World Choir Games in Auckland, where it won gold in the gospel category and earned its place in the Champions competition.

Now, after taking its Māori and Pasifika gospel sound to Europe, the choir is looking towards the 2028 World Choir Games with a little more confidence in what it can achieve.