This past Tuesday was a pretty good day. It didn’t rank in my Top 10 all-time days–not that I even keep such a list. It doesn’t approach the day I got married, the day our children were born, or when they graduated from high school, or when my son returned home safe from Iraq, or when I watched my daughter bungee jump in New Zealand. But it was still pretty darn good. The final ballot for the 2011 Nā Hōkū Hanohano Awards were announced that day, and I was humbled to learn that I had two nominations, and my dear…
Peeking Ahead To the 2012 Grammy Awards
I found my preliminary ballots for the 2009 and 2010 Grammy Awards. Here’s a breakdown of the entries in the three primary categories that will compete for the “Best Regional Roots Music Album” Grammy in 2012 : Best Zydeco Or Cajun Music Album 2009: 30 entries, 2010: 34 entries Best Native American Music Album 26 entries, 2010: 32 entries Best Hawaiian Music Album 20 entries, 2010: 32 entries I should note that the Board of Governors of the Hawai‘i Academy of Recording arts went to extraordinary lengths to get entries in 2010. I personally entered half of the 32 entries…
The Hawaiian Grammy Is No More
Today The Recording Academy, bestowers of the annual Grammy Awards, announced a major restructuring of the awards that reduces the number of awards from 109 to 78. This change will be implemented in next years awards–the 54th Annual Grammy Awards. One of the categories affected by this adjustment is the Grammy Award for Best Hawaiian Album–it has been eliminated. However, releases that would have been eligible in this category will now be eligible in the new “Best Regional Roots Music Album” at the 54th Grammy Awards. Other genre that previously had their own categories and will be entered in this category…
March Madness, Music Awards, Awareness Campaigns, and a Promise
March has arrived, and with it comes the preparation, printing and mailing of the preliminary ballot for the 2011 Nā Hōkū Hanohano Awards. Like many, I was oblivious to the amount of work, consideration and communication that goes into this process until I joined the HARA Board of Governors four years ago and subsequently became a member of the selection committee. The amount of work is tremendous, the rewards few, and the consternation is sometimes overhwelming. It’s impossible to please everybody, and the job of finding the appropriate category for many releases is challenging, particulary when the majority are based on…
Hawai‘i Has No Beer?
The folks at the Aloha IBU blog have an interesting post with links to videos of people in Germany during Octoberfest, and they are lamenting the lack of beer in Hawai‘i. Not only ignorant but insulting. They asked for a Hawai‘i version to respond to it, so I offer a verse: Updated: Verse: He Guiness ko ka ‘Ailiki The Irish have Guiness No Holani ka Heineken And Heineken is from Holland He pua Tahiti ka Hinano Hinano is a Tahitian flower He aha ko Hawai’i nei? What does Hawai’i have to offer? Chorus He mau pia no ko Hawai‘i …
Kaua‘i Music Festival Was Outstanding
I had the privilege of being one of the instructors at the Kaua‘i Music Festival last week. The five day event brought together instructors from Hawai‘i and the mainland to talk about songwriting, the business of the music industry and related topics. Some big-name composers included Jason Blume, David Pack (at left with me), Kevin Griffin, Marti Frederiksen, Jeff Dayton, Shelly Peiken; Hawai‘i representatives included yours truly, Kenneth Makuak?ne, Keale, Charles Michael Brotman, Jake Shimabukuro and Paula Fuga. Mahalo to BMI and the KMF staff for pulling off such an outstanding event. I can’t begin to tell you how valuable…
Memories of Musicians Institute
In spring 1985 I moved to Hollywood to attend Musicians Institute. On the first day of instruction all of us students (@500) gathered in the school’s performance auditorium for orientation. As a “getting to know you” exercise they had all of us in odd number rows (I was in row 1) turn around and introduce ourselves to the person directly behind us, then stand up and introduce that person to the rest of the class. Yes it took a while. The fellow sitting behind me was a guitar student named Nick Nolan, about 19 years old. He was also the…
Memories of K?ke‘e
Last weekend my wife and I traveled to Kaua‘i to participate in the K?ke‘e Hawaiian Music Songwriters Camp. Kenneth Makuak?ne, Puakea Nogelmeier, Kaliko Beamer-Trapp, Walter Keale and I taught workshops on haku mele and other aspects of songwriting. The camp was held at some cabins deep in K?ke‘e State Park, where I had never gone to before, and it was a very inspiring setting. I did two workshops – one was an overview of some of the more common and essential elements of mele, and to demonstrate the composition and editing process, explained how my mele Facebook Hula came about.…
Curbing The Clutter
view original Originally uploaded by lylamerle I thought we did a really good job of cleaning house and getting rid of a lot of things that we’d likely never use again before taking off for Aotearoa in January. We sold a lot of things in a garage sale, some went to the Salvation Army, and anything left over was taken to the dump. Our perspective on clutter changed a bit after our experience in New Zealand. We only brought those things that we felt we needed to survive, and likewise we bought few things that would need to be sold…
The End of Toto
view original Originally uploaded by LittleO2 I was saddened to hear that Steve Lukather officially disbanded the group Toto last month. They were on my list of acts that I hoped to see at some point. Luke explains the reasoning behind the end of the group pretty clearly. Toto was him, the Porcaro Brothers and David Paich. Singers and other band members came and went. Steve was the last man standing, and it must have been tough going out on tour without any of the other original band members. Toto was ripped to shreds by critics in their day for…