Keola Beamer 'Ka Hikina O Ka Hau (The Coming of the Snow)' album

“In our family we’re taught to respect our kupuna (ancestors) and their legacy, but that it’s also important to look to the future. I never look at this as burdensome. It’s a natural state of affairs. Both perspectives increase my appreciation of life. They’re constant sources of inspiration.” - Keola Beamer

For over thirty years, Keola Beamer’s artistry has helped breathe new life into slack key guitar music while remaining true to the soul of its deeply Hawaiian roots. Born February 18, 1951, in Honolulu, Keola grew up in one of Hawai’i’s most famous music families. The Beamers can trace their involvement in Hawaiian music and hula at least as far as the 15th Century. Throughout the years, the Beamers have maintained a high level of artistic accomplishment. In the last several generations, important public figures include Keola’s great-grandmother, noted songwriter and hula teacher Helen Desha Beamer; his grandfather, composer Pono Beamer; his grandmother, hula teacher Louise Beamer; his cousin, falsetto great Mahi Beamer; his brother, guitarist and composer Kapono Beamer; and, of course, his mother, one of the leading figures in the Hawaiiana movement, chanter and teacher Nona Beamer.

In traditional Hawaiian society, sounded words possess mana (spiritual power) and music plays a significant role in all aspects of life. “I think that’s why we’re so serious about music,” Keola says. “We come from a history of oral tradition in which music played a big part. Our genealogies, land boundaries and navigational information are all in chants. In Hawai’i, music is more than personal expression, it keeps us connected to our history and culture.”

For Keola, Hawaiian music is also a way to express awareness of and appreciation for life in the Islands. “There’s a beautiful feeling, at least once a day when the curtain of every day activity lifts, when you stop whatever you’re doing, and see this place for its amazing beauty. The sun coming up, a gentle breeze, the mountains at sunset. It can’t be expressed in words, but in one’s heart there’s a feeling of thankfulness and pride. There’s a haunting sense of gratitude that you feel to be a part of this. It seems to me that this is what Hawaiian music is all about.” Many people who have never visited Hawai’i continue to relate to the universal sentiments expressed through Keola’s music.

Not surprisingly, Keola plunged into music early. “I got serious around age nine,” he says. His main instruments were guitar and piano, though he also mastered ‘ohe hano ihu, traditional bamboo nose flute. Glee club and hula came with his studies at Kamehameha Schools in Honolulu, which began in kindergarten and first grade, then resumed from sixth grade through graduation in 1969. Knowledge and experience were also gained from playing at family gatherings, jamming with friends and providing the music at the Beamer family hula studio.

In 1973, Keola recorded the groundbreaking solo slack key album HAWAIIAN SLACK KEY IN THE REAL OLD STYLE (Music of Polynesia 22000). In many ways, this release, along with the early Sunday Manoa albums, represented a movement of Hawai’i’s young, rock-era guitarists to investigate the work of older, more traditional masters, like Pops Gabby Pahinui, Atta Isaacs, Leonard Kwan and Sonny Chillingworth. Naturally, the youth reinvigorated the form with their own ideas, just as every generation had done before. From the beginning, Keola has sought to expand the music. “I don’t feel that culture’s just some natural phenomenon,” he says. “We all have a responsibility to help guide it in a good way that keeps things pono.”

Reflecting both continuity and innovation, Keola incorporates traditional forms in his music, including chant and ancient instruments, multi-track recording and complex chord progressions. He was also one of the first slack key masters to teach public classes. “In my early twenties, I was making guitars with George Gilmore and Donald Marienthal,” he says. “People came in to our shop asking about slack key. There were very few teachers back then, so I agreed to try it.” Soon, teaching became his main job until he turned to full time performing and composing.

In the mid-1970s, Keola and his brother, Kapono, formed the Beamer Brothers, mixing Hawaiian and pop to create many Island standards. Throughout the 1980s, Keola turned increasingly to a solo career, which by the 1990s included recording for Dancing Cat. WOODEN BOAT, his first Dancing Cat album, appeared in 1994. Each Dancing Cat release has focused on a different aspect of his art.

Keola’s sixth Dancing Cat album, KA HIKINA O KA HAU (THE COMING OF THE SNOW), is not a traditional slack key recording. “It poses a simple question,” he says. “Can the palette, coloration and tonality of Ki ho'alu add an indefinable something to the interpretation of songs written by truly great composers?” The answer is a wonderful surprise.

The album features eighteen arrangements of classical compositions by Satie, Ravel, Stravinsky, Mendelssohn, Ravel, Rimsky-Korsakov, Dowland, Piazzolla and others, as well as two more Hawaiian inspired pieces. For the first time Hawaiian Slack Key guitar tunings have been used to interpret the works of classical composers, resulting in a romantic, winter oriented album that uniquely blends both the Hawaiian Slack Key and classical music traditions.

Arranged for two or three guitars, specifically for Keola by musicologist, guitarist, and linguist Daniel O’Donoghue, KA HIKINA O KA HAU (THE COMING OF THE SNOW) highlights Keola on acoustic nylon string, acoustic steel-string, and electric guitars, overdubbing multiple tracks to create a truly unique sound.

A recognized master of Hawaiian artistic expression, Keola’s music is a blending of the modern and ancient, the urban and rural and the traditional and contemporary. He established himself in the vanguard of contemporary Hawaiian music when he wrote one of Hawai’i’s best selling songs, “Honolulu City Lights”, in 1978. Honolulu Magazine recently voted the album by the same name the number 1 recording of the top 50 recordings in the history of Hawaiian Music.

Over the past 33 years since his first recording, Keola has produced many CD’s which have garnered him numerous awards. He won a Na Hoku Award for best instrumental release in 1997 with “Mauna Kea – White Mountain Journal.” In 2003 his DVD release of “Ki Hoÿalu (Loosen the Key)” which featured his performances earned him multiple awards which included “Best Documentary” by the New York International Film Festival, “Best Cinematography” by the Los Angeles Independent Film Festival and the “Gold Remi Award” at the Houston International Film Festival. In addition, film critics praised the feature length movie as “the best slack key documentary ever made.” Keola’s release entitled, “Mohala Hou- Music Of The Hawaiian Renaissance”, won the 2004 Na Hoku Hanohano award for “Best Contemporary Hawaiian Album”.

Keola performs for standing room audiences in the US, Asia and Europe. His wife, Moanalani, who shares her knowledge and talent in teaching hula, assumes a vital role in his performances by dancing, chanting, playing several ancient Hawaiian percussive instruments and singing background vocals.

Keola has also played an important role in the creation of Hawaiian stage productions, elaborating on the rich mythology of the Hawaiian people. These productions have included “Here is Hawaiÿi” at the Maui Surf Hotel (now the Westin, Maui) and “Ulalena”, at the Maui Theatre in Keola’s home town of Lahaina, Maui.

In response to increased interest locally, nationally and globally, Keola recently expanded his teaching methodology for the slack key guitar. He launched a website to allow greater access to himself and on-line slack key guitar lessons as well as his musical releases by offering books, CDs, DVDs and instructional videos. Further instruction in hula, oli, language and culture is provided in person by him and others of the Beamer ‘ohana at their Aloha Music Camp held several times a year at Kaupoa Beach, Moloka’i. These events expanded to include online, streaming video content for long distance learning.

Keola continues to author books and DVD’s in the art of Hawaiian slack key guitar. His talents extended to writing a book of Island stories, The Shimmering – Ka ‘Olili, voted one of the top ten books of 2002 by the Honolulu Advertiser. His short story in the book, “It Swims When You Sleep” was optioned by Industry Standard Entertainment and produced as a movie, entitled “ The Shimmering”, produced by Darius Shahmir. Keola also composed the original score for the film, mixed at George Lucas’ Skywalker Ranch. “The Shimmering” opens the 2006 Hawai’i International Film Festival on the islands of Maui and ‘Oahu.

“In our family we’re taught to respect our kupuna and their legacy, but that it’s also important to look to the future. I never look at this as burdensome. It’s a natural state of affairs. Having these two perspectives increases my appreciation of life. They’re constant sources of inspiration.” Keola artistic and educational contributions, his support and creation of economic opportunities in the field of music and entertainment help to further Princess Bernice Pauahi Bishop’s legacy to educate her people (na pua) to succeed and survive in a westernized world.

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Keola Beamer - Ka Hikina O Ka Hau (The Coming of the Snow)