Dean was in the north for the annual Bay of Islands Country Music Festival, but the tourist – retired from engineering company Bosch – was in town and totally oblivious of the event. The ferry was near empty and Dean asked the man if he was enjoying the music. “What music?”
Donna Dean opened for American songwriter Don McLean at the Christchurch Town Hall the night before the 2011 Christchurch earthquake. The tour party departed Christchurch minutes before the disaster and learned of it after touching down in Wellington. The Town Hall suffered substantial damage but was rebuilt and partially reopened in 2019.