Meke: A Guide to Fiji's Traditional Dance & Performance

The sound reaches you before anything else. A deep, rhythmic knock of wood against wood, building in intensity until the air seems to pulse with it. Then the voices — a low, unified chant that rises and falls in a formal Fijian that bears little resemblance to everyday speech. And then the movement: a line of men advancing in absolute synchrony, carved war clubs raised, bare feet striking the ground with a force that you feel as much as hear. What is happening in front of you is not a performance in any casual sense of the word. It is something older and more purposeful than that.

A few minutes later, the men are replaced by a row of women seated in a precise line, their arms moving in formations of extraordinary delicacy — fans sweeping outward, hands turning in unison, flower garlands catching the light as their upper bodies sway in perfect time to the chant. The contrast with the war dance is total, and entirely deliberate. This is meke: the traditional performance art of Fiji, and it contains within it a complete picture of Fijian life — its history, its values, its relationship to the spiritual world, and its sense of what it means to belong to a community.

Most visitors who encounter meke at a resort cultural night or a village welcome ceremony understand that they are watching something significant. What they may not know is just how significant, and how much context enriches the experience. A meke is not entertainment first and cultural expression second. It is the reverse. Every song preserves a story. Every movement encodes a meaning. Every performance is an act of community — a reassertion of who these people are, where they came from, and what they value. Knowing this before you watch changes what you see.

What Is Meke?

Meke — pronounced “me-ke,” with equal stress on each syllable — is the traditional performance art of Fiji, combining song, dance, and percussion into a unified form that functions simultaneously as art, as history, and as ceremony. It is not one thing. It is a category of practice encompassing many different types of performance, each with its own rules, contexts, and meanings.

Historically, meke was the primary means by which Fijian communities preserved and transmitted their oral history. In a culture without a written tradition, the stories of battles fought, alliances made, chiefs honoured, and spirits appeased were carried in song and movement and passed down through performance. A meke composed to commemorate a military victory might be performed at the anniversary of that event for generations afterward, keeping the memory alive and the identity of the community connected to its past. This was not incidental to Fijian social life; it was foundational to it.

The performers in any meke are traditionally separated by gender. Men perform the war dances — the aggressive, physically demanding sequences that simulate battle and express martial prowess. Women perform the more refined seated and standing dances that emphasise precision, grace, and the beauty of coordinated movement. This is not a hierarchy but a division of distinct artistic traditions, each with its own technical demands and its own cultural weight. Children learn both from an early age, and in contemporary Fiji, the training of young performers in meke is considered an important part of cultural education.

The music of meke is percussion-based at its core. The principal instrument is the lali — a large slit wooden drum struck with padded wooden sticks — but meke performances also incorporate body percussion: the stamping of feet, the striking of the ground, the rhythmic clapping of hands. Voices carry the songs in unison, often in close harmonies that give the chant its characteristic resonance. There are no melody instruments in the traditional meke ensemble. The power of the sound comes from the precision of the rhythm and the collective force of voices singing together. The songs themselves are composed in a formal register of Fijian that differs significantly from everyday speech — archaic in phrasing, dense with allusion, and meaningless to many younger Fijians who speak the modern language fluently but have not been trained in the traditional poetic forms.

Types of Meke

Meke is not a single dance form but a family of related performance traditions, each with its own character, its own rules of performance, and its own cultural associations.

Meke wesi (spear dance / war dance) is the form that most visitors encounter first and remember longest. Performed by men, it involves ceremonial spears, war clubs — called i wau — or replica weapons that are handled with a precision that makes clear these movements were once entirely practical. The sequences simulate the reality of combat: advance, retreat, feint, strike. The performers move as a unit, with a synchrony that is the product of extensive rehearsal and genuine martial tradition. The drumming is intense, the chanting aggressive, and the overall effect is one of barely contained power. It is not performed to intimidate visitors; it is performed as an expression of warrior identity and community strength, with visitors as witnesses to that expression rather than its target.

Meke ni yaqona is performed in the context of yaqona — kava — ceremonies. It celebrates the preparation and serving of kava, which in Fijian tradition is one of the most spiritually significant acts in community life. The ceremony of kava and the ceremony of meke are deeply intertwined in Fijian culture; each elevates the significance of the other.

Vakamalolo is a seated women’s meke — perhaps the most technically demanding of the female forms. A row of women sits in a precise line and performs intricate arm and upper body movements to sung accompaniment, with no lower body movement at all. The discipline required is considerable: the formations must be exact, the timing absolute, and the quality of the movement derives entirely from the upper body, making any imprecision immediately visible. Watching a well-performed vakamalolo, particularly from a group that has been training together for years, is a lesson in what collective precision can express.

Seasea is a standing women’s dance, performed with flower garlands, fans, and natural props. It is more expansive and visually flowing than the vakamalolo, with performers moving through space rather than remaining in a fixed line. Flower garlands — typically made from frangipani, hibiscus, or the fragrant blooms that grow widely through Fiji — are integral to the seasea costume and to the aesthetic of the performance itself.

Cibi is among the most historically charged of all the meke forms. A victory and challenge dance, it was traditionally performed by warriors before and after battle — a declaration of strength before combat, and a celebration of survival after it. The cibi is loud, aggressive, and viscerally powerful: stamping feet, sharp vocalisations, and a collective energy that communicates unmistakable intent. It is the oldest and most directly martial of the meke forms, and it has had an unexpected afterlife in the modern world.

Meke and the Rugby Connection

Many visitors to Fiji arrive already familiar with one expression of meke without realising what they have been watching. The pre-match performance of the Fijian rugby sevens team — a fixture of international rugby tournaments and one of the most recognisable cultural displays in world sport — is a direct descendant of the cibi tradition. The stomping, the chanting, the collective physicality, the challenge directed at the opposition: these are not recent inventions or marketing devices. They are an evolution of the same warrior tradition that Fijian men have enacted before conflict for centuries.

The connection matters beyond the rugby context because it illustrates something that is easy to miss when encountering meke at a resort cultural evening: this is not a historical curiosity. It is a living tradition that has found expression in new contexts while maintaining the cultural logic of the original. The Fijian sevens players who perform before an international match are not performing nostalgia. They are performing identity — the same claim that a village meke wesi makes, expressed on an international stage in front of a global audience.

This parallel is worth holding in mind: the All Blacks’ haka, from the Maori tradition of New Zealand, and the Fijian cibi are both Pacific warrior traditions that have found authentic modern expression in rugby. They are often compared, and the comparison is valid — not because they are the same thing, but because they share the same cultural logic. Both are genuine. Both carry real cultural weight for the people performing them. Watching them as spectacle alone misses the point by a considerable distance.

Where to See Meke

Resort cultural evenings are the most accessible starting point for most visitors. The majority of larger resorts on the Coral Coast, at Denarau, and across the Mamanuca and Yasawa islands hold weekly or nightly cultural shows that include meke as their centrepiece. The quality varies more than tourism brochures suggest. At their best, resort meke evenings feature genuine Fijian performers — often village groups or hotel staff from Fijian backgrounds — giving a real performance in front of an audience that is genuinely engaged. At their worst, they are brief, perfunctory productions designed to satisfy a cultural programme checkbox before guests move on to dinner. The difference is usually apparent within the first five minutes: look for the quality of the percussion, the precision of the movement, and whether the performers seem invested in what they are doing. Real meke has a quality of attention to it that is unmistakable.

Village visits offer the most authentic meke you are likely to encounter as a visitor. When a Fijian village formally welcomes guests, a meke may be performed as part of the ceremony — not for entertainment, but as an act of community hospitality and cultural expression. This is a fundamentally different experience from a resort show. The performers are community members, not professionals. The audience is not composed of tourists but of the community itself, with visitors as honoured guests. The formality of the context — the preceding sevusevu ceremony, the protocol of the welcome, the physical setting of the village — frames the meke entirely differently, and the result is often deeply affecting in a way that no resort production can replicate. Village-based cultural tours from Nadi, the Navua River tours, and highland village excursions on Viti Levu frequently include meke as part of the welcome.

Cultural centres provide a more structured performance context. The Arts Village at Pacific Harbour — sometimes called the Damodar Arts Village — hosts organised cultural performances that include meke, presented with a level of contextualisation that helps visitors understand what they are seeing. For travellers who want to engage with meke thoughtfully rather than simply witness it, a cultural centre performance with an informed guide can be worth the additional engagement.

Festivals and competitions are where meke reaches its highest expression outside the village context. Fiji Day on the 10th of October, the national public holiday marking Fijian independence, features meke performances and competitions across the country. Regional festivals and school competition circuits produce meke of extraordinary quality — groups that have been preparing for months, performing with a collective precision and emotional investment that reflects what genuine competition culture can produce. If your trip coincides with a significant national or regional festival, attending a meke competition is one of the most rewarding cultural experiences available in Fiji.

The distinction that matters most — between a resort performance and a village or community meke — is one of intention. A resort show is entertainment, and there is nothing wrong with entertainment; a talented group performing a genuine war dance at a cultural evening is still performing a genuine war dance. But a village meke is community expression: an act performed by the community for itself, with visitors present as witnesses rather than as the primary audience. Both have real value. They are simply different experiences, and understanding the difference helps you receive each one for what it actually is.

The Performers and Their Training

Meke is not something that Fijian children encounter as an optional extracurricular activity. In most communities, it is part of the fabric of growing up. Young girls begin learning the arm movements and seated formations of vakamalolo from an early age; boys begin learning the footwork and formations of the war dances. The transmission is generational and largely informal — older performers teaching younger ones within the family and community structure — though in more recent decades, school-based and competition-based training programmes have added a more structured layer to what has always been a community practice.

Performance groups in Fiji are typically organised around village or school structures. Villages maintain their own meke groups, which practise regularly and perform at community events, welcomes, and ceremonies. Schools field competition teams that prepare for the regional and national meke competitions that form a significant part of the cultural calendar. These competitions are taken seriously. Preparation begins months in advance. The costumes, the choreography, the musical arrangements, and the selection of the meke to be performed are all considered carefully. The national competition level produces performances that represent the absolute pinnacle of the form.

The costumes worn in meke are themselves a significant undertaking to produce. Traditional meke costumes are made from masi — the Fijian name for tapa cloth, made from the beaten bark of the paper mulberry tree — alongside woven fibre skirts, headpieces constructed from natural materials, and extensive flower garlands. For women, frangipani and hibiscus flowers are woven into hair adornments and worn around the neck and wrists. For men in war dance meke, traditional body adornment involves blackened faces and bodies — achieved historically with charcoal and natural pigments — which contribute to the visual intensity of the performance and mark the dancer as occupying a warrior ceremonial role. The preparation of a full meke costume, particularly for a competition or formal ceremony, can take days.

The Lali — Fiji’s Essential Drum

At the centre of every meke performance — and at the centre of Fijian community life more broadly — is the lali: a slit wooden drum carved from a single log, struck with padded wooden sticks. If you have spent any time in Fiji, you have almost certainly heard one without necessarily knowing what you were hearing. The deep, carrying knock of a lali is one of the most characteristic sounds in the Fijian soundscape.

The lali’s role in Fijian culture extends well beyond music. Historically, lali were the primary communication technology for villages across the islands. Different rhythms carried different messages: a specific pattern announced that a chief was arriving; another called people to community assembly; another signalled danger or war. A skilled listener could understand what was being communicated across considerable distances, and the lali’s deep tone carries through forest and valley in a way that the human voice does not. Villages maintained lali of different sizes — larger drums for long-distance communication, smaller drums for ceremonies and performances — and the knowledge of the rhythmic codes was itself a form of cultural expertise.

The role of the lali as community communicator has not entirely disappeared. At many Fijian churches — particularly in rural areas — the lali replaces the church bell to call people to Sunday services. The rhythm is different, the message is Christian rather than pre-colonial, but the instrument and the logic are unchanged: a struck log announces that it is time to come together. You will also see lali drums at the entrance of many traditional Fijian villages, placed at the nakamal or in prominent communal areas, still available for use when the occasion demands it.

In meke, the lali provides the rhythmic foundation that everything else is built on. The drummer — a role that carries its own expertise and cultural weight — sets the pace and drives the transitions between sections of a performance. The precision of the percussion in a well-performed meke is striking: the variations in rhythm, the build and release of intensity, the way the drum signals to the performers what comes next. It is worth watching the lali player as well as the dancers during a meke performance. What they are doing is more complex and more demanding than it may initially appear.

How to Engage Respectfully

At a resort cultural show, participation is not just permitted — it is genuinely welcomed. These performances are designed with visitor engagement in mind, and if performers invite you to join in, accept the invitation. Attempting a few stamping steps alongside the war dancers or clapping along to the rhythm of the vakamalolo is appreciated rather than embarrassing, and it changes your relationship to what you are watching from observer to participant. Resort meke performers are accustomed to working with visitors of every level of cultural familiarity, and the invitation to join is made in good faith.

At a village meke, the dynamic is different. You are a guest at a community event, and the appropriate posture is one of attentive, respectful witnessing. Follow the lead of your host or guide entirely. Do not position yourself in front of the performers, do not move around the performance space during the meke, and do not join in uninvited. The performances are not choreographed to incorporate wandering guests.

Photography is worth addressing specifically. At resort shows, photography is generally expected and entirely fine — the productions are lit for it and the performers are accustomed to it. At village mekes and community ceremonies, the situation is more nuanced. Always ask your guide or host before photographing, and pay attention to the answer. In some contexts, photography during the performance itself is inappropriate; in others, it is perfectly acceptable. The moment of asking demonstrates the respect that makes a genuine difference to how you are received as a visitor.

The underlying principle is simple: what you are watching is a living tradition with genuine cultural depth, not an exhibit produced for your consumption. Resort meke exists in part for visitors; village meke exists for the community, with visitors as witnesses. Approaching both with genuine curiosity — wanting to understand what you are seeing, not just to photograph it or check it off a list — changes what you take away from the experience in ways that are difficult to overstate.

Final Thoughts

Meke is one of the most direct windows into Fijian culture available to a visitor, and it is available in some form to almost everyone who travels to the islands. Unlike kava — where the ceremony has a specific, participatory role for guests — meke is something you witness and receive. The experience of watching a properly performed cibi or war dance, or a women’s vakamalolo executed with collective precision, tends to stay with people in a way that more passive tourist experiences do not. There is something about watching a tradition that has been maintained across centuries, that carries the weight of actual history and actual meaning, that resonates beyond the moment itself.

What makes the difference between a memorable meke experience and a forgettable one is almost entirely context. If you know what you are watching — if you understand that the war dance is a direct expression of a warrior tradition that Fijian men still carry with genuine pride, that the women’s seated dance represents a form of collective discipline and beauty that communities invest real effort in maintaining, that the lali driving the rhythm has been the heartbeat of Fijian community life since long before European contact — then what you are watching becomes something more than spectacle. Look for context, not just entertainment, and meke will give you something that Fiji’s beaches and reefs, beautiful as they are, simply cannot.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is meke in Fiji?

Meke is the traditional performance art of Fiji, combining song, dance, and percussion into a unified form that functions as art, history, and ceremony. It encompasses several distinct types of performance — including men’s war dances, women’s seated and standing dances, and ceremonial kava dances — each with its own rules and cultural associations. Historically, meke was Fiji’s primary method of preserving and transmitting oral history, commemorating significant events, and expressing community identity. It remains a living tradition practised and taught throughout the islands today.

Where can you see a meke performance in Fiji?

Meke can be seen at resort cultural evenings across Viti Levu, the Coral Coast, Denarau, and the outer islands — most larger resorts include meke in their weekly or nightly cultural programmes. Village visits and community-based cultural tours offer a more authentic context, with meke sometimes performed as part of a formal welcome ceremony. The Arts Village at Pacific Harbour hosts organised cultural performances, and national festivals such as Fiji Day (10 October) feature meke competitions. For the highest quality performances, meke competitions at school and community level — if your timing aligns — are exceptional.

Is meke only for men in Fiji?

No. Meke is performed by both men and women, but in distinct forms. Men traditionally perform the war dances — the meke wesi — which involve ceremonial spears and clubs and simulate battle sequences. Women perform the vakamalolo (seated arm-and-upper-body dance) and seasea (standing dance with fans and flower garlands). Both traditions are technically demanding and culturally significant. In contemporary Fiji, children of all genders learn meke as part of their cultural education, and school competition groups often include mixed-gender ensembles performing the different forms.

Is the Fijian rugby team’s pre-match performance a meke?

Yes. The pre-match performance performed by the Fijian rugby sevens team before international matches is a direct descendant of the cibi — the traditional Fijian challenge and victory dance performed by warriors before and after battle. It is not a modern invention or a marketing construct; it is a genuine evolution of a pre-colonial warrior tradition, expressed in a contemporary sporting context. The parallel with the All Blacks’ haka — a Maori warrior tradition similarly adopted into rugby — is frequently drawn and is accurate: both are authentic Pacific warrior practices that carry real cultural weight for the people performing them.

What is a lali drum?

The lali is a slit wooden drum — carved from a single log, hollow in the centre, with a longitudinal slit along the top — that is struck with padded wooden sticks to produce a deep, resonant tone that carries over considerable distances. It is the central percussion instrument of meke and historically one of the most important communication tools in Fijian community life, with different rhythms carrying different messages between villages. Lali are still used at many Fijian churches in place of bells to call people to Sunday services, and you will see them at village entrances and communal areas across Fiji. In meke performance, the lali player sets the pace and drives the structure of the entire performance.

By: Sarika Nand