Trailblazing Cook Islands musician Will Crummer will receive the 2026 Ministry for Pacific Peoples Lifetime Achievement Award, recognising a career spanning more than six decades and a legacy that helped shape Pacific music in Aotearoa.
The Pacific Music Awards Trust announced the honour today, celebrating Crummer’s enduring contribution to Cook Islands music and his role in bringing the sounds and language of Te Reo Māori Kūki ‘Āirani to audiences across New Zealand and beyond.
Best known as the frontman of the Royal Rarotongans, alongside Pepe and the Rarotongans, Crummer became a central figure in Auckland’s thriving Polynesian music scene during the 1960s. His recordings, including Rarotonga, Romantic Rarotonga, Cook Islands Magic and Love Songs of Polynesia, helped preserve and promote Cook Islands musical traditions for future generations.
Born in the village of Turangi, Rarotonga, Crummer grew up speaking Cook Islands Māori as his first language. Inspired by church choirs, traditional Rarotongan string bands and international artists heard on the radio, he developed a distinctive musical style that would become synonymous with Pacific music in Aotearoa. At the age of 20, he moved to New Zealand carrying a shoebox filled with handwritten Rarotongan songs—determined they would never be lost.
Although he stepped away from professional music to raise his family, the passion never disappeared. His daughter, acclaimed singer Annie Crummer, and son David Crummer both forged successful musical careers, and it was through David’s recording studio that Will returned to recording the treasured songs he had carried with him for decades. Those sessions ultimately led to the acclaimed album Shoebox Lovesongs – The Rarotongan Music of Will Crummer and the documentary Songs for a Bigger Island, reigniting his performing career and introducing his music to a new generation.
The revival saw Crummer perform at major international festivals, including WOMAD, the World Music Festival in Penang, and the Ukulele Festival, while continuing to perform well into his later years.
The Pacific Music Awards Trust says Crummer’s contribution extends far beyond performance. His lifelong commitment to singing in the language of his homeland has helped preserve cultural knowledge and create a lasting musical legacy for Cook Islands communities throughout the Pacific diaspora. The Trust says his music represents treasured recordings from an earlier era that continue to inspire Pacific artists today.
The 2026 Pacific Music Awards will be held on Wednesday 12 August at the Due Drop Events Centre in Manukau, where Crummer will perform alongside this year’s finalists, including Sam V, A.R.T, Island Vibes, Kenzie from Welly, JAHBOY, Jaro Local and Wameblood. The ceremony will also be livestreamed across the Pacific via Tagata Pasifika and Pasifika TV.
Since their inception in 2005, the Pacific Music Awards have celebrated excellence in Pacific music while encouraging emerging artists and recognising those whose work has left a lasting mark on Aotearoa’s cultural landscape. Will Crummer’s Lifetime Achievement Award acknowledges not only a remarkable career, but a lifetime dedicated to preserving language, culture and Pacific identity through music.
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