Unique Keoki Style Musical Evening
April 23, 2007, Island School

Keoki is quite a unique individual -- fisherman, taro farmer, wild pig hunter, storyteller, a fifth generation kiho'alu musician, entertainer, composer, promoter of music events on Big Island and much more. One of his many official tasks is to eradicate the wild pig population on the Big Island where he and his partner trapped over 300 pigs last year. Pigs fed on macadamia nuts, bread soaked in whiskey and li hing mui tequila is especially delicious. When he switches the pig pens into taro fields, everything he fed pigs starts growing out of the ground....squash, zucchini, tomatillo, etc....hence he is also into diversified agriculture.

Keoki walks off the plane with guitar in one hand and bags of homemade Portuguese sausage rich with garlic in his other hand. "I made you some fresh Portuguese sausage yesterday!" What a guy! (Thank you TSA for letting it through security even if the sausages were deadly)

Keoki appreciated getting a lei with no scent because when he had a gig in Seattle, a lady gave him a pikake lei which completely swelled up his eyes so he could not see the music. He quickly took some Benedryl to stop the allergy and soon found that he was playing the same verse three or four times.

Keoki opens with a passionate rendition of "Sweet Leilehua", a song about all the flowers of each Hawaiian island composed by his uncle Sol Ho'opi'i, one of the first songs that his Dad taught him. He follows with a beautiful inspirational hymn "He Aloha Mai" sung with such sensitivity and amazing picking on his guitar.

For introductions, he shared his lineage on his Dad's side back to Great Great Grandmother Tutu Koko'o of Kealia, Ho'okena, well known for her music, canoe builders, farmers fishermen. On his Mom's side, his Grandfather was the fire chief and after the 1946 tidal wave helped to implement the Tsunami Disaster Center on the Big Island used for nationwide training ... he remembers this Grandfather as the one taught him to swim by who throwing him into the water. He panicked until he found out he could stand up in two feet of water.

He learned many things the hard way working with his Dad. They used to live on the Big Island on a six-acre coffee farm. His Dad also had the Number One Hog Farm in the United States, receiving many awards for their organic pig farm. They had to play music on the side to support their farms so it was a hard but interesting life. When the Maunalani Hotel closed for renovations in 1991, their family moved to Maui so they could continue in the music industry. His Dad, George Kahumoku, Jr., now teaches art at Lahainaluna High School and coordinates the Hawaiian music program at Kapalua among a host of other ventures.

We have heard many stories of parent/child relationships in the mentoring of music from one generation to another, but Keoki's early career ordeals might be one of the most hilarious to those of us hearing it as stories in the past tense but certainly not to Keoki when it was happening to him.

One day his Dad asked Keoki to perform with him at a clam bake to fill in for his uncle who just quit. Being so nervous, Keoki's shirt and hands got soaking wet that when they began performing and his ukulele slipped out of his hands and landed in the front row of the audience. Both he and his Dad were stunned, but the show had to go on so George picked up the ukulele to continue. The audience clapped because they thought it was part of the act. At the first break, George asked Keoki to go and find some scotch tape from the concierge. Keoki asked, "Will that help me?" "Yes!" answered his Dad and he proceeded to cut the strings with his pliers and scotch-taped them at the bottom of the frets. George said, "Fake it!" so for two hours Keoki faked the strumming. As the evening progressed he noticed his microphone was losing volume so he had to yell to hear himself; his Dad looked at Keoki and said, "Son...LIP SYNC!" "I guess I must have really been throwing my Dad off."

At that time Keoki knew only one song, "Five Foot Two" so he played so many different versions of that song.

Keoki credits his Dad for having the patience to work with him, and like the Karate Kid, he was put through every preparatory phase .... wax on, wax off, picking coffee (which really helped him in guitar picking), painting fences and every kind of menial tasks. He had to learn to play with one string for three months at the gigs until his Dad felt that he had earned another string and finally by six months, he finally got four strings back. This really helped him to hear the notes.

When he was young, he used to go to parties to eat, but once he started playing music, he would sit right in front of the musicians and learn by closely watching all the fine musicians. Besides his Dad, he credits his Uncle Moses Kahumoku as his significant mentor. Moses had Keoki videotape the way he played the ukulele, and he still refers to this video fifteen years later. He also acknowledged his other mentors -- Herb Ohta, Jr., Herb Ohta, Sr., Dennis and David Kamakahi and Cyril Pahinui.

In 2004 when the album that he had recorded on received the first Hawaiian music Grammy, he was stunned because he got the phone call as he was building a pig trap. He did not know quite how to respond to the news. His Dad gave him a hard rub for a whole year following the announcement of the Grammy. He told Keoki "I've been in the music industry my whole life and here you come along and get a Grammy so easily." However, the next year his Dad produced a CD called "Masters of Hawaiian Slack Key" which was the second Hawaiian music album to receive the Grammy award.

The Grammy came at a most opportune time in his musical career because it gave him great encouragement. He was getting tired of playing "Tiny Bubbles", "Hawaiian Wedding Song", and "Five Foot Two" at parties.

This year when he learned that their CD had been nominated for the Grammy, he prayed and shortly after, when he was going to play music at a party, he stepped out of his truck and landed in the biggest pile of dog doo-doo; he looked up and thanked Akua for the quick answer. He wore the same boots to the Grammy awards where they announced that the CD he was on received the award.

Someone requested that Keoki sing his "Hunting Dog Song", the first song he composed for his black pitbull-lab-spaniel hunting dog. When he played it for his wife, she was indignant, "What? You wrote a song for your dog? Why don't you write a song for me!" so he did. She now works with Keoki in setting up the ukulele workshops and he finds great satisfaction in working with his wife on a joint project so he wrote an instrumental called "Rise and Shine".

As a tribute to Don Ho, Keoki sang the song that he had recorded on the third Grammy CD recording, Kui Lee's "I'll Remember You"; "Sweet Leilehua" was also on the same CD. Keoki sang one of his favorite songs about Punalu'u where the underground springs provide an abundance of fresh water and stones give birth to other stones.

Keoki invited his cousin Kaleo Na'ea visiting from the mainland to come up and jam with him. "He Pumehana I Ku'u Poli" written by this Dad was a beautiful song he shared for the audience to learn. In 1930 his Great Grandmother wrote about Kealia (salt of the Earth) where turtles go to lay their eggs, a song in the "Kai Malino" album recorded by his Dad. We also learned "Hale 'Olu" which George Kahumoku, Jr. wrote when he took his at-risk kids to visit the Fagen Ohana where the Fagen's Cross monument is located.

While traveling on the Big Island, he discovered that there are family songs in each district and feels that it is very important to preserve the family songs known only to the kupunas but being lost to younger generations. One of the songs was traditional "Kapa Pala" from the Kapapala Ranch where cattle are driven across Mauna Loa, across Hu'alalai and down to Kona to be shipped off to the mainland.

Keoki's life in music has had a number of musical mishaps so bizarre it sounds almost fictitious. They don't call Maui the wind surfing capital of the world for nothing. One such incident was at the Westin Maui where the wind picked up the speakers and amplifiers blew it into the waterfall, wasting $20,000 worth of fresh water koi and $60,000 worth of tropical birds. Keoki found out that Koi is a very bony fish to eat but goose is ono. Being a farmer, nothing edible goes to waste.

Probably the best-known story is about his fish catching/cleaning/drying/cooking adventure at Black Rock in Ka'anapali, a story in his Dad's book - A Hawaiian Life. I asked for a Reader's Digest version of the story, which was just as hilarious as the first time I heard it. Jodi Ascuena told me afterwards, "I'm glad you asked him to tell that story because last year I was laughing to myself over a week after hearing it." Keoki asked me, "Why did you ask for that story?" I told him I read it many times in his Dad's book, but it's a whole different thing to hear it from you with all the sound effects and facial expressions. "Yeah, people think it's a lie but it really happened." He reminded us that his family lived off the grid for many years so living in a hotel was a whole different thing for them. More about Keoki at http://www.keokikahumoku.com/

Final EKK Monday - April 30, we have the consummate storyteller singer Jerry Santos, Hoku Zuttermeister and his amazing voice, and the young phenomenal Barry Kimokeo. Their concert at the Kaua'i Community College Performing Arts Center on April 29 was quite special.

Carol Kouchi Yotsuda, E Kanikapila Kakou 2007
<www.gardenislandarts.org> (photos of evening)
Celebrating 30 years of "bringing ARTS to the people and people to the ARTS

E Kanikapila Kakou Hawaiian Music Program is funded in part by the Hawai'i Tourism Authority, the County of Kaua'i Office of Economic Development, and Garden Island Arts Council supporters. Space generously provided by Island School.

Garden Island Arts Council programs are supported in part by the State Foundation on Culture and the Arts through appropriations from the Legislature of the State of Hawai'i and grants from the National Endowment for the Arts.