Masters will join forces with the community for a special kanikapila Thursday at Kahilu Theatre to kick off the 13th annual Waimea Ukulele and Slack Key Guitar Festival.
Masters will join forces with the community for a special kanikapila Thursday at Kahilu Theatre to kick off the 13th annual Waimea Ukulele and Slack Key Guitar Festival.
Whether you’ve plucked or strummed for years — or just a few minutes in the Hawaiian section at a big box retailer — grab an ukulele or other instrument and join in the fun. At 7 p.m., master musicians Raiatea Helm, Paula Fuga, Ledward Kaapana, Jeff Peterson, Sonny Lim, Nathan Aweau and Benny Chong will get the show rolling.
At halftime, everyone is invited to join on stage for a real, ol’ fashioned kanikapila side-by-side with the musicians. Kanikapila, translated from Hawaiian, means to play music.
Also known as the Waimea Ukulele and Slack Key Guitar Institute, the festival since its inception has opened its first full night each year with a kanikapila, said Jay Junker, who helped found the event and is the artistic director for the institute. The opening kanikapila is dedicated to the late Clyde “Kindy” Sproat and Martin Purdy, community members who always supported and participated in the event before their passing.
It’s also a way to set the “mood” for the festivities to come, he said.
“It really sends a message that this music is on a very high professional level but is also on the amateur level for anybody who wants to do it,” Junker said. “It’s (ukulele and slack key guitar) not going to live as a tradition unless people of all kinds play the music.”
For those too chicken to take the stage and join in the “old way of doing things,” Junker has the following message: “I have people tell me, ‘I can’t sing,’ well, then I say, ‘sing with 300 people and then you’ll get confidence.’ And that’s really the great thing about the kanikapila — there’s people that know the songs well and some that don’t, but someone will always give you the chords. If you’re not confident don’t play too loud, but you’ll get the feel of it.”
Last year, about 100 people joined in the fun on stage inside Kahilu Theatre, said Tim Bostock, artistic director for Kahilu Theatre.
“This isn’t just about coming to watch guys play, but getting involved and picking up an instrument,” he said. “Everyone that comes with an instrument gets in free to jam — the only rule we have is you can’t plug in, it has to be acoustic.”
Cost for the kanikapila jam session is $16. However, those with an instrument who use promo code “JAM” when purchasing tickets will enter free. Info/tickets: www.kahilutheatre.org or call 885-6868.
The jam session kicks off the four-day festival highlighting the ukulele and slack key guitar at the Waimea venue. Now in its 13th year, the festival began at Kahilu with four artists — including a young Jake Shimabuku — as a means to showcase the slack key guitar (kihoalu), which is believed to have originated in Waimea, and ukulele; bring together professional musicians; and connect those artists, with students in the schools, Junker said.
In the years since it has grown, and this year will feature 10 musicians, also referred to as “Festival Faculty.”
“This is an opportunity for musicians who are very busy and often in the commercial music world forced to kind of go solo or in small groups to get together and interact with one another,” Junker explained. “It really is something that everybody enjoys — the audience, the theater, the musicians and it is a very rare thing. I give Kahilu Theatre very high marks for supporting this level of creative chaos for so long.”
Coming to the Big Island for this year’s event are 10 master musicians who will spend their time giving school shows, concerts, classes and workshops. This year’s “faculty” includes Helm, Fuga, Kaapana, Bobby Ingano, Peterson, Lim, Chong, Aweau, Mike Kaawa and Mike Love.
“This is a continued commitment of Kahilu to really showcase not only world-class artists on stage but the best of our local down the street and across the islands talent that is extraordinary,” Kahilu Theatre Executive Director Deborah Goodwin said.
On Nov. 20, at 7 p.m., five of the musicians will put on a full-length concert at Kahilu Theatre.
Opening the concert is Benny Chong, who combines the relaxing island sound of the ukulele with the rhythm of jazz to create a sound all his own. Chong was a guitarist for the Alii’s and backed up Don Ho in the 1960s. Finishing the first half of the evening are slack key legend Kaapana and 12-string guitar master Kaawa.
Next to take the stage is soulful singer-songwriter Fuga, who will play alongside singer-songwriter and guitarist Mike Love, a rising star in reggae music. Tickets range in price from $20 to $68. Info/tickets: www.kahilutheatre.org or call 885-6868.
Festivities continue Nov. 21, with a free Family Fun Day with live entertainment, hula, food, workshops and hands-on activities for the keiki, including makahiki games, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. at Kahilu Theatre. Aweau, Chong, Kaawa, Lim and Ingano are slated to perform and Halau o Poohala, Halau Waiau, and the Alohi Polynesian Dance Academy will dazzle the audience with hula.
Other events include workshops. Grammy Award-winner Peterson kicks off what Bostock described as the show all should attend if they have to choose just one. Peterson, a slack key guitarist from Maui whose latest album, “Oahu,” recently went on sale, takes the stage at 7 p.m. before bringing in guest performers three-time Na Hoku Hanohano Award-winner Aweau and Waimea’s own Lim and Ingano on steel guitar.
Tickets for the Nov. 21 concert range in price from $20 to $68. Info/tickets: www.kahilutheatre.org or call 885-6868.
The festival closes Nov. 22 at 1 p.m. with a round-robin jam led by Lim with Helm, Kaapana, Aweau, Peterson, Ingano and Chong. Tickets range in price from $20 to $68. Info/tickets: www.kahilutheatre.org or call 885-6868.
In addition to the concerts, the “festival faculty” members will visit about a dozen private and public schools in West Hawaii for educational youth presentations Thursday and Nov. 20. At 10:30 a.m. Nov. 20, Kahilu Theatre will host Peterson, Helm and Lim for a youth show in Waimea
Through Nov. 22, Kahilu Galleries will feature the exhibit “Luthiers!” displaying handmade ukulele and other instruments by the Big Island ‘Ukulele Guild. The guild provides a resource for members and visitors to learn about the art of building ukuleles on the Big Island.