Kekuku fabricated a steel bar and finger picks to pluck the strings and run a bar over the strings as well, developing a style of playing that could translate to other guitars and genres of music.Īnd Kekuku did most of this as a high school student at Kamehameha Schools in Honolulu. Courtesy: AlyssaBeth Archambault and Family Samuel K Nainoa was Joseph Kekuku’s cousin, and grew up playing music with him in Laie. They grew up together playing music in Laie. Her great-grandfather was first cousins with Joseph Kekuku. “He leaned over to pick up his guitar and it fell out of his pocket and hit the strings on the neck of his guitar and created different sounds that he hadn’t heard before,” says AlyssaBeth Archambault. There are a few legends about how Kekuku first created this new sound, but the story told in his family involves a metal comb that Kekuku carried in his pocket. No one knows for sure how the Hawaiian steel guitar was invented, but many credit a Native Hawaiian from Oahu named Joseph Kekuku. “People were remarking left and right all day long about how this is an entirely new concept for playing the guitar, how it sounded unlike any other guitar playing they’d ever heard in their lives.” His book, “ Kika Kila: How the Hawaiian Steel Guitar Changed the Sound of Modern Music,” was published in 2016. “It was a very new modern style,” says John Troutman, curator of American music at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History.
The steel guitar was a big part of what made Hawaiian music so popular. In the early 20th century, Hawaiian music - or a kind of anglicized version of Hawaiian music - was the most popular music in America. Kahalehili and Duff’s dream of striking it big as a vaudeville act wasn’t entirely outlandish. They would star in Broadway shows, play grand concert halls in New York, and make their way through a busy circuit of theaters and juke joints across the American South.Īlong the way, they would change American music forever. Some, like Kahalehili, would die in poverty and obscurity, thousands of miles away from their island homes. Hundreds of ukulele and steel guitar players and hula dancers in search of adventure or just a chance to make a decent living. The stories running on Civil Beat’s site will accompany - but not mirror - the audio stories, so be sure to check out both.Īfter the overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom, Hawaiian musicians journeyed to the United States in droves. In Season 4 of Offshore, host Kuʻu Kauanoe takes a hard look at why Hawaiians are leaving the islands today and tells surprising stories from history about Hawaiians who left long ago.įrom now until June 18, we’ll be posting weekly episodes, along with written articles.
#Popular hawaii music series
This article is part of a special podcast series on the Hawaiian diaspora. Their story - or as much of it as we can piece together from old newspaper articles and historical documents - is part of a long-erased chapter of American musical and pop culture history. They had run up against society’s conventions, Duff lamented. The fates - and Philadelphia society - were not kind.īy 1915, the couple’s life had become fodder for melodramatic newspaper articles soliciting donations to send the family to Hawaii - a place where their marriage might be more accepted. Once they got married, the couple thought they could earn fame and fortune on the stage.
Hawaiian music was on its way to becoming the most popular music in America, and Hawaiian performers were in high demand on the vaudeville circuit. Hundreds of Hawaiian performers made a living in vaudeville in the 20th century. Making ends meet was harder than they expected, but the young lovers had a plan. Kahalehili got work as a hotel porter and picked up a few gigs with local bands. They fell in love and he followed her home to Philadelphia. Duff was a model from the mainland - 10 years his senior - touring the world as a magician’s assistant.
Kahelehili was a dashing young musician playing in an orchestra. The young couple met at a theater in Honolulu in 1902. Philadelphia was no place for an interracial couple in 1915. Kale Kahalehili and Jean Duff needed to get home to Hawaii.
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