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Pupule
USA
4551 Posts |
 Posted - 01/19/2005 : 1:57:20 PM
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I grew up with the Superfriends, the League of Justice vs. the Legion of Doom. You know, Superman vs. Lex Luthor?
You think ki ho`alu has an arch enemy? Heavy metal vs. Nahenahe? Metallica, maybe? Nah, I recall reading somewhere that Uncle Dennis Kamakahi likes Metallica. Heck, I like Metallica (well the old one, pre-Black album).
So far, in my relatively short time as a slack key student, I've concluded the main adversary to my fingerpicking is... BOWLING. 
Despite hearing the horror stories and heeding the warnings, I've still nearly ripped my thumb nail off - twice. Bowled this weekend and didn't even score well. It was fun but scary... and now you've been warned. 
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Andy |
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Mika ele
Ha`aha`a
USA
1493 Posts |
Posted - 01/19/2005 : 2:03:26 PM
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I think the arch enemy is what some hawaiian keiki call
ME NO KEA (i don't care) |
E nana, e ho'olohe. E pa'a ka waha, e hana ka lima. |
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Bruddah Chrispy
Lokahi
USA
164 Posts |
Posted - 01/19/2005 : 2:35:17 PM
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| I'm with Andy. I lost two finger nails to bowling last Friday night. Evil, evil, sport. |
Aloha a hui hou,
Chris P.
There's no regrets; only good times. |
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Auntie Nancy
`Olu`olu
USA
593 Posts |
Posted - 01/19/2005 : 3:55:42 PM
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Do you think if the keiki hear it at home, reject it when they're mean-agers, that when they pass 40 they will listen again? Oh, probably not if they've lost their hearing to boom-boxes and electic guitars w/ amp all the way up...
I think strings do their darndest to devil the guitar, but they're fighting a losing battle.
I guess bowling is one activity where it's difficult to wear gloves.
It made me sad when someone, maybe Reid said, eventually our bodies get the best of us and we have to quit playing. If it wasn't you who said it Reid, I apologize.
auntie
(getting old and having hard time learning new things) |
nancy cook |
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Lawrence
Ha`aha`a
USA
1597 Posts |
Posted - 01/19/2005 : 6:35:10 PM
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OK - I am going to get a little bit serious:
The Arch-Enemy of Kihoalu?
That is pretty easy to determine if you can follow a logical progression...
The arch-enemy of slack key music is THE SAME arch enemy as the arch-enemy of the Hawaiian Culture.
And what/who is that, pray tell?
Why, the people who tried to surpress the entire culture for almost 100 years, that's who! (and they still exist, and still have great power) So who is that?
Well, the ones who tried to portray the culture as an inferior one that needed enlightenment, and by using this guise, were able to acquire most of the property and resources of the (former) Nation.
(does that sound the least bit familiar?)
I know an aging child of a Hawaiian Plantation Manager who is (still) demeaning of the native Hawiian Culture and even goes out of their way to miss-pronounce proper nouns (like Caaow-why for Kauai)
You COULD say that the enemy became the domination of Corporations, both religious and secular (after all, the structure of the corporation was invented by Cardinal Richelieu - of the Spanish inquisition), but that would be failing to look past the corporate facade. Who controls the corporations and who, in turn, do they control? What political partie(s) represent these folks that control the corporations? I know someone who's job it was to make a database of all the board members of top corporations. Guess what they discovered? That each person sat on an average of 8 to 10 corporate boards (and with each board being 8 to 10 persons) and the same persons kept showing up on board after board of these big companies. That means that a little more than 1000 people control the boards of the top 1000 WORLD-WIDE corporations. This is fact, not fiction. Now, do you think these people have ANY OVERRIDING considerations about what they want the world to be like?
You bet they do !
(I am not talking about conspiracy here, but there are always overriding "business" considerations that powerful people want to "manage")
So the Hawaiian Keiki mentioned above are thinking/doing just what these arch-enemy's of Slack Key (and the culture) want them to think and do. (I just wish it was not true)
Think about it...
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Mahope Kākou...
...El Lorenzo de Ondas Sonoras |
Edited by - Lawrence on 01/27/2005 07:28:43 AM |
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hapakid
Luna Ho`omalu
USA
1533 Posts |
Posted - 01/19/2005 : 7:05:33 PM
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All this talk reminded me of the military helicopter, following the tsunami, checking on the fate of the primitive peoples who live on isolated islands off the coast of India. A man from one of the Stone Age tribes walked out of the bush and shot an arrow at the military chopper.
At least he knew who the enemy was!
Jesse Tinsley |
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Reid
Ha`aha`a
Andorra
1526 Posts |
Posted - 01/20/2005 : 03:36:06 AM
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Lawrence,
That is just what I gave examples of in another thread and context.
But,Andy, once you get one of those flashy polyester bowling shirts in bright yellow and black with white piping and your name embroidered on the front and your team's name embroidered on the back and a pair of shoes that are both red and cream, you will be enticed to reconsider and take up Duck Pins (no holes), and suck Budweiser. Then you can play slack key in between sets - bowling alleys are fairly quiet and have bright acoustics.
...Reid |
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Stringbreaker
Akahai
USA
62 Posts |
Posted - 01/20/2005 : 09:24:57 AM
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Actually, I suspect the real enemy of slack key is Muzak - you know, the piped in pseudo music played in airports and waiting rooms, where you might hear anything from Nat King Cole to Nirvana all rearranged for lite strings and sounding so bland you don't care what tune it is. I lost it completely when trapped on hold with this innocuous sounding lite orchestral piece playing and I recognised it at "Enter Sandman" by Metallica. Seriously, this stuff could put you off music. People who take high energy music (or any music for that matter) and turn it into syrup and fill the air with it need to be arrested for musical corruption and spend their time in a cell with nothing but muzak piped in. With no off switch. Better to listen to anything real, even collections of Polka tunes on accordion, than fake music. The enemy of real music is fake music of course, and Slack Key is very real.
Stringbreaker |
Crazy Man Tuning |
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Lawrence
Ha`aha`a
USA
1597 Posts |
Posted - 01/20/2005 : 11:08:47 AM
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Yes - Reid, same story with a different into and slighly different angle.
BUT ! .....
Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition !! 
Yes- and guess where that Muzak comes from? Same folks I was talking about.
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Mahope Kākou...
...El Lorenzo de Ondas Sonoras |
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hapakid
Luna Ho`omalu
USA
1533 Posts |
Posted - 01/20/2005 : 7:50:22 PM
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Although there has been talk of corporate ownership and conspiracies to keep the brown man down, but I think slack key belongs in the category of organic, authentic music. Real music is made by people, anyone and not just a designated professional, holding wind, string and percussion instruments and playing for the sheer joy of it, solo or in small groups. It's recorded with microphones and minimal processing. In the music is the skill, or lack of skill, of the player, as well as whatever emotion the player can put into it.
"Fake music", the other side of the coin, might take in the field of programmed computer music, electronically enhanced instruments and mass groupings where players are highly skilled but anonymous participants. Or the players are humans rendered large by a distorion pedal and stack of amps and speakers. Those types of music are valid for some, but the difference is what makes us fans of Hawaiian music and why many of us play blues, bluegrass, folk or other acoustic music.
Perhaps slack key is a sign of maturity. Perhaps it's just called "getting old." Did I just say that?
Jesse Tinsley
Gray hair and all... |
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cpatch
Ahonui
USA
2187 Posts |
Posted - 01/21/2005 : 07:44:24 AM
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| Lets see, that would make Ashley Simpson the arch-enemy of ki ho`alu then. |
Craig
My goal is to be able to play as well as people think I can. |
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Ianui
Lokahi
USA
298 Posts |
Posted - 01/21/2005 : 08:03:45 AM
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Jessse you are not far from actuality. My real job involves demographic studies and I have run demographics on the addresses of ticket buyers to my concerts.
The profile is a male caucasian over 45, living in an upper middle or upper income area, that goes to Hawaii occassionally, and his wife. I see a good percentage of tickets sold to those considered to be in professional vocations. While this area has a large Hawaiian population most do not support Slack Key. Commercial Hawaiian music, like Maka Sons, Hapa yes they do. Pure slack key they don't.
To me the enemy is apathy on the part of the Hawaiian population and a lack of support from media of all types. We have never had a concert where someone has not told me this was the first time they heard this music and just loved it. The enemy is mainlanders don't know what slack key is.
In 2006 some of that may change as Disney will be releasing the new Lelo and Stitch movie. Uncle Dennis has written and performs slack key songs for this movie. He sings the songs a well. We will get an exposure by millions to this music style, and will have to see what happens then.
In the meantime we just have to keep plugging away and making those one at a time converts. |
Edited by - Ianui on 01/21/2005 08:06:56 AM |
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Reid
Ha`aha`a
Andorra
1526 Posts |
Posted - 01/21/2005 : 09:31:52 AM
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Don,
Demographics is something I find fascinating (so do businesses and politicians, of course). What sort of persons do what is really a kind of anthropological study. There was an informal survey on rmmga a few years ago, and the kind of person who had custom made guitars turned out to be just about the same kind of person in your profile (except for going to Hawai`i).
I was really really happy when I learned that Dennis was going to do the music for the Lilo and Stitch sequel, just as I was so sad that Iz and his music only became cross-over famous posthumously. Let's hope that Dennis' music wins an Oscar.
...Reid |
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islandboo
Lokahi
USA
237 Posts |
Posted - 01/21/2005 : 5:11:44 PM
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quote:
The profile is a male caucasian over 45, living in an upper middle or upper income area, that goes to Hawaii occassionally, and his wife.
Hmmm.. are you sure it isn't middle-aged, middle/upper income female Caucasians and their husbands? 
Also, I agree with Craig about slack key's arch enemy - Muzak comes from music that has been robbed of its soul (hideous enough), whereas Ashlee Simpson and her ilk make music that never had any soul to begin with. Yuck! |
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Kapila Kane
Ha`aha`a
USA
1051 Posts |
Posted - 01/22/2005 : 4:33:06 PM
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Ah, but ART will find a way...
Jurassic theory.
All the bunk does not stand the test of time.
But as long as good things are created, shared, "put out there", and all that--then we will survive, and thrive.
Sure there will be bad stuff...but ya can't kill Spirit Stuff.
I was just watchin' a PBS fundraiser--Ed Sullivan music acts of the 60's...
Not everybody was pretty either...
Janis Joplin and some others were DIGGING DEEP! I mean, we're making snide remarks about the possibilities of altered states...but then we go--hey man, she's really musically On and Diggin' DEEP...
When artists are goin' deep, OUR STATES GET ALTERED!
And the BIG BAD WOLVES will be trying to get "a piece of the action"...
Their heads may be big, but NOT their ears, brains, hearts etc...
"So Herr Frankenstien, their spirit would be...proportionate... Yah?"
They can't buy what we've got.
Only the tab.
We just need an occassional Ed Sullivan, internet forum or whatever...to spread our Aloha.
Preacher G |
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RJS
Ha`aha`a
1635 Posts |
Posted - 01/22/2005 : 9:31:29 PM
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Interesting demographics, Don, -- would you say that the same demogs apply to Taropatch readers and/or posters? (I certainly fit into that realm.)
Andy, this is an interesting question, and I have been stuck for a few days on how to respond. Maybe 'cause I don't see the need for "slack key" to become mainstream. In general, I sort of get really suspicious of any "missionary" efforts. Slack key, to me, is the patrimony of the Hawaiian people. These people have generously shared it with the world in general, and with us in particular. For that I am thankful. I'm not sure the value of "commercial success," is really that much part of the tradition. (I don't mean to play on a "country bumpkin" stereotype either.)
So... maybe the enemy of slack key is the complex of commercially-driven values which turn our, and especially our children, away from family, time spent with friends and family, the ability to open to nature, respect for our ancestors and history, and somehow integrate all of that into our daily lives. Indeed, doesn't matter what people you come from, we're all being pressed hard by this greed. (And to the extent that I own stock, 401k's and want to make a nice living, I am a "perpetrator, too -- and that's where I think I expand on Larry's comments.)
Sorry for ramble -- I shouldn't go on line so late. |
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