Walking into a space of young musos, you may not expect generations before them to be echoing through their sound – but this is exactly what is heard in Papamoa College's music rooms.

Talk of student's inspirations include Red Hot Chili Peppers, Concrete Blonde, TLC, along with more contemporary guitar-strapped artists such as Taylor Swift and Olivia Rodrigo is enough evidence for one to believe in a resurgence of live instrumentation, and the students are thriving.

Papamoa College student Cybele Chapman performed an original song she wrote with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra on August 17. The young singer-songwriter won the opportunity as part of the Young Artists Showcase competition, and says the experience was nothing short of 'amazing”.

Entering in June, Cybele decided to 'freestyle” her song for the competition, coming up with lyrics off of the top of her head as she was recording. Fast-forward eight weeks, and she was on-stage performing with some of the best musicians in the country at Wellington Boys' College.

'It was so inspiring being in Wellington and seeing those musicians. The singers were amazing. 'There was one girl who had an insanely good voice. I really want to be like them one day, be that good and standing up in front of a crowd being that confident.”

'I practised with my teacher Kurt Somervell a lot after-school. He encouraged me to enter.”

Kurt encourages students as much as he can to perform. 'Seeing other students perform definitely encourages us,” says student James Frans.

Student Taylah Medeiros is also seeing success in the music class, with her recently-recorded song ‘Realistic Dreams' scored top 50 in the Lion Foundation Songwriting competition.

Students who enter the competition get a $50 Rockshop voucher and up to $750 worth of studio recording time. 'That's a good realistic amount for a song without drums. Taylah's song is just guitar and vocals, so she'll be able to really utilise the studio time to make that song sound awesome,” says Kurt.

Taylah has been playing acoustic guitar since in primary school, and is now looking to put her voucher towards getting an electric guitar for herself.

Her main inspirations come from artists like Taylor Swift and Billie Eilish, and she 'freestyles” at home until she comes up with something she likes.

Both Kurt and Katrina say they are looking forward to seeing their passion-filled students enter more competitions and seeing where they go next.