Customer Reviews

Living In Hawai'i Style

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Review by Chris Roth
for Talking Leaves Magazine
Spring, 2002

Our friend Alicia Bay Laurel (author and illustrator of the 1971 bestselling book Living On The Earth) has put together an album of original and historic Hawai'ian songs, sung with slack key guitar. After more than twenty-five years living in Hawai'i, Alicia has obviously absorbed much of the spirit of her adopted home--a spirit she conveys with great respect and also an effervescent joy. Most of this is lovely music about what's good in life on an island where native culture and nature are still respected and honored by such "adopted natives" as Alicia. Just as important, several songs point to the threats and damage to Hawai'i's people and land done by less-respectful outsiders, and a call, gently and beautifully, for a return to balance and sovereignty.

In her first CD, Alicia Bay Laurel wrote and performed all of the songs, and it was a wonderful musical tour de force. In *Living in Hawaii Style*, other performers, writers and musicians make an appearance to excellent advantage. Alicia's liner notes are a virtual musical primer on Hawaii - it musical history, genres, culture, geography, flora and fauna, as well as some magical personal history on how she came to know these people and places and enter into their music and their lives.

Traditional Hawaiian songs are included here (Nanakuli, from the 1890's) as well as steel and nylon string guitars in standard and open tunings (known as Ki ho'alu or slack key) and "hapa ha'ole" (meaning half-foreign, one of a genre of swing tunes with tropical lyrics) as in "Moonlight and Shadows" with the smooth-voiced Sam Ahia.

Koa ukeleles, an ipu (gourd drum), pu'ili (bamboo rattles), pu (large conch shell used as a wind instrument), ti leaf rattles, slack key, steel and nylon string guitars, and ki ho'alu (open-tuned guitar, Hawai'ian style) are heard. Several songs, such as Kawailehua'a'alakahonua""Holua,""Kapalaoa," and "Paliku," are sung in Hawaiian. The second of these is introduced with an original chant in the ancient style created and sung by Lei'ohu Ryder. The liner notes define Hawaiian words, for instance,"Waikaloa" - "fresh water that is endless."

One of my favorites is written and performed by Alicia alone (harmonizing with herself), "Ukulele Hula" - a lilting sing-along kind of song that embodies the feeling and spirit of Hawai'i. Has the feel of a years-old traditional song. "In Paradise, everybody is a lover." Balmy, swaying, breezy, rolling - it's a "breezy afternoon and a sunset on the ocean."

But the song that tugs most at the heart, for me, is "Kanikau, Oh Hawai'i!," written by Ginni Clemmons and sung by Lei'ahu Ryder and Alicia. "Kanikau" means "a mournful cry."

"Oh Hawai'i, you've lost your innocence/ How can we get it back?/ Have we claimed you?/ Have we shamed you?/ Have we spoiled the prize we've won?/ By taking you against your will/ Like all greedy lovers do/ Oh Hawai'i, we're sorry/ Those who care are crying tears of shame/....Teach us the ways of nature/ So that peace can end this war. Oh Hawai'i"/

Lilting, haunting and lovely, the melody opens the heart to Hawai'i as she is - as she was.

This CD is pure pleasure. Just listen!

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