Customer Reviews

The Rough Guide to the Music of Hawaii

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The Rough Guide compilations to World Music are some of the most exuberant, danceable, reasonably-priced, and informative CDs available today. I am staggered at their apparent invisibility to people who purchase from Amazon.com. Is this due to flawed cataloging? To American indifference to World Music?

Jump up and buy this amazing Hawaiian album immediately! Not only does it catalog some of the classic tracks from the early part of this century but also it highlights the vital slack-key tradition as it continues to evolve today. Dancing Cat Records has a superb series of these master musicians' solo work, but here you can get a taste of the Polynesian mullagatawny all on one snazzy CD. Slice the pineapples and start the party!

he has been trying to shove this stuff down my throat for years, being the devoted hippie-grow-your-own-fresh-from-the-islands kind of dad. well, this cd kept getting great reviews and sounded kind of cool, so i chanced it. it grows on me (no pun intended) with each listening. i really love the sound, it really does evoke a wonderful feel of time and place (like old elvis movies, only less cheesy). what i particularly like is that this compilation relies less on glossy new songs like many rough guides do, but sticks with the more traditional. sorry dad, i still don't like the greatful dead, no, not even the bootlegs, but i might just learn to hula after all.

A longtime fan of classic Hawaiian music, I recently finally made it over to the islands for a bit of relaxation in what is affectionately known as "Hawaiian time." I brought along several CDs of classic Hawaiian music, including the super-mellow "slack key" guitar style (where the strings are tuned down to odd open tunings and played wither with a steel slide, or with complicated fingerpicking) as well as the older hot picking of the guitar and ukulele wizards of the 1920s and '30s, who brought Hawaiian music to vaudeville and made the style an international craze. This disc is an outstanding set of vintage Hawaiiania, ranging from languid slack key and trick guitar work to stellar examples of the distinctive "leo ki'eki'e" falsetto vocals (particularly a remarkable live performance by Genoa Keawe, who hits the heights of the style). This disc is thankfully slanted towards older material, and includes many giants of the island music scene: Gabby Pahinui, Ray Kane, Lena Machado, Sol Hoopii, Tau Moe and others. It's a great introduction to the music, and stacks up pretty well to other similar collections such as "TICKLING THE STRINGS" and "ON A COCONUT ISLAND" on other labels. Highly recommended... a perfect album for a drive by the beach or an afternoon at home.

I got this CD as an intro to some of the classic Hawaiian sounds, and it was a fun listen. Would be a great CD for a beach party, or preparation for a trip to Hawaii. I second the other reviewer's suggestion to check out other titles in the Rough Guide series.

For those who are longing for the "old" Hawaii music, this is a classic compilation of the best of the best. Thank you for making these recordings available on one CD, some of the renditions are comical, others brought tears to my eyes and memories from far away came flooding back.

My mom has a massive collention of Hawaiian music...There were items on here that was a new rendition for her and she really enjoyed it.

This album has a wide variety of traditional and classic Hawaiian music, English and Hawaiian lyrics, slack-key/steel guitar/ukelele. A great introduction to the genre!