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Ewing resident sings ‘Hula’
SCOTT FROST , Staff Writer 09/13/2004

EWING -- Bill Wynne never mastered the Pacific island language, but doesn’t get in the way of his dreams.

Wynne, a Philadelphia-born Hawaii music expert now living in Ewing Township, headed off to the islands this weekend in a hunt for a record contract singing music he doesn’t even know how to speak.

The 25-year-old, who is not of Hawaiian descent, learned almost everything he knows about Hawaiian music by collecting and studying standard folk tunes.

He’s amassed more than 2,000 LPs, 78s and original reels of Hawaiian music and has been obsessed with the art ever since its sweet sounds hit his ears.

"Not only would it be weird for a guy from New Jersey to have a collection like mine, it’s weird to find anyone off the island with that kind of a collection," Wynne said, as he enjoyed a partly overcast 84-degree afternoon in Hawaii Saturday.

"It’s very difficult to amass a collection like mine from New Jersey, on the mainland or elsewhere."

Wynne knows hundreds of Hawaiian songs -- mostly traditional folk songs -- even their hidden poetic meanings.

He phonetically writes down the lyrics, uses sometime 15 different versions of the same Hawaiian standards, and then seeks out Hawaiian music composers to learn what the words mean.

"I would call it an obsession if I was being really honest," said Wynne, a project director for higher education testing with ETS in Princeton. "A spade is never a spade in a Hawaiian song."

Wynne was invited by the Aloha Festival to compete in two Hawaiian falsetto singing contests this weekend on the big island and as a guest steel guitarist in the Aloha Festivals Steel Guitar Week at the Halekulani Hotel on Waikiki Beach Thursday.

The Aloha Festivals contests provide a platform for the preservation and perpetuation of the unique tradition of Hawaiian falsetto singing, he said.

It’s all sung in the native Hawaiian language, said to be a dying prose nowadays.

Wynne was one of 10 finalists in last year’s competition on Oahu, where he was dubbed a fan favorite because it was so rare to see a guy from the mainland singing traditional Hawaiian music.

He didn’t place, but plans on following his dream this time around.

The first prize is a recording deal with Hula Records -- one of the Island’s longest established and most well-respected record labels.

Wynne first started learning the ukulele when his preoccupation with Hawaiian music began.

His father and grandfather, although not Hawaiian natives, played the music quite a bit when Wynne was growing up.

Wynne’s grandfather started listening to the music during his travels to United States after World War II from The Philippines.

He used the records left over from his father to teach himself to play slack key guitar as a teenager, then picked up the steel guitar in his 20s.

Wynne’s first love, however, is Hawaiian falsetto singing.

It’s a dying art said to have started in Europe, but introduced to Hawaiian culture at a time when it was forbidden for women to sing in public.

Wynne chose a song called "Ida’s Hula" for this weekend’s competition because it was a song made famous by a woman who wasn’t born on the island.

"I thought I’d honor her by bringing that song back," Wynne said.

"It would be groundbreaking (to win) in some respect. Certainly I’m father from Hawaii then anyone else in the competition."

Wynne wouldn’t be the first mainlander to win the contract.

A singer from Japan won the event in 1997.


©The Trentonian 2004

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