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Admin
Pupule
USA
4551 Posts |
 Posted - 06/02/2003 : 12:06:20 AM
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Not a review, not yet. But I asked Keola if he had any comments to share about his upcoming release titled "Mohala Hou - Music of the Hawaiian Renaissance" and was pleased to receive the following note.
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Please feel free to share this with our friends on taropatch.net.
I've just finished my latest CD, called "Mohala Hou - Music of the Hawaiian Renaissance". It is my attempt to honor and share my aloha for the great musicians I grew up with, during the period that later became known as the Renaissance of Hawaiian Music.
Just as my recent album, Island Born, expressed aloha for Hawai’i as “ku’u home,” my beloved home, Mohala Hou – Music of the Hawaiian Renaissance is rooted in another sense of place just as important, but more subtle and fleeting: a person’s many relationships with other people. All of the songs on this album are by the special people who helped shape the local music scene in the 1970s. Olomana, C & K, Country Comfort, Kalapana. We also can’t forget the kupuna (elders) who set us on the path in the 1960s, like the Sons of Hawai'i, Gabby Pahinui, the Kahauanu Lake Trio and, above all, my mom, Nona Beamer.
This was quite an emotional journey for me because many of these folks are around no longer. Despite the promise of their youth, some of my friends from that era were claimed by alcohol, drug abuse and just plain bad luck. Immersing myself in their music bought me closer to them again and I was reacquainted with the aloha I held in my heart in new and powerful ways.
I had the opportunity to work with some really great musicians, including jazz pianist Geoffrey Keezer, who I soon grew to love. (We had so much fun, that I ended up being a sideman on his record for MaxJazz. But that's a story for another time...)
I don't consider consider "Mohala Hou - Music of the Hawaiian Renaissance" as a "slack key Record" in the strictest sense of the word. Instead, I think of it as part of my path to expand Ki Ho'alu. There was a wonderful irony in the thing, because even though the journey took me through some old, familiar currents, I discovered a beautiful new dawn at the end of it. For me, thats kind of what music is all about.
Moanalani and I send aloha to you and our many friends on taropatch.net,
keola beamer
FYI, Keola's website indicates that, "The street date for this project is July 15, 2003."
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Andy |
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cpatch
Ahonui
USA
2187 Posts |
Posted - 06/02/2003 : 12:36:15 AM
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| I've heard that this is more of a "new age" record than it is slack key, very different from anything else Keola has done. (Not saying that this is bad or good, just that it's not slack key.) I think Keola's term for it is "Dream Guitar". |
Craig
My goal is to be able to play as well as people think I can. |
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Admin
Pupule
USA
4551 Posts |
Posted - 06/02/2003 : 10:42:07 AM
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Another FYI... coincidentally, it looks like info on "Mohala Hou" has been added at www.kbeamer.com today. Here's a graphic.
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Andy |
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cmdrpiffle
`Olu`olu
USA
553 Posts |
Posted - 06/04/2003 : 10:08:48 PM
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New Age or whatever!, Keola can play Hammond organ and a Les Paul, and I will listen very carefully to what he is saying, anytime.
Huzzah! to any musician who is not afraid to expound on what is in their head.
I would never classify Keola Beamer as just slack key.
When things are not so well, and life is hard, there is always one of Keolas albums to spin.
Then, things are okay in my little world for a time.
For that, I am eternally grateful.
Mike |
my Poodle is smarter than your honor student |
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marzullo
`Olu`olu
USA
923 Posts |
Posted - 06/04/2003 : 10:27:46 PM
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mike, what you said. there's a place for traditional music, but it's all about the creative spirit.
aloha, |
Keith |
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RJS
Ha`aha`a
1635 Posts |
Posted - 06/04/2003 : 11:54:38 PM
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Craig,
based upon a conversation with Keola a little less than a year ago...
I don't think Keola is using the term "Dream Guitar" to define his style as something different from slack key. Keola is on "... my path to EXPAND Ki Ho'alu." (Quote from above, my emphasis.) I for one am greatly thankful that someone with his pedigree and stature is doing so. Too many of us are repeating Gabby, Sonny, etc etc. As I see it, slack key came into being 'cause the paniolo took the Spanish tradition and modified it to fit their world. World is different now, and, in fact, slack key has expanded to many "worlds." I hope Keola's example inspires others to try letting the creative spirit play through them. All of us can only be richer for that happening.
as to Keola -- many years now I've listened to his playing, and there is no musician outside of "Classical music" that continues to inspire, refresh, heal and delight me as does Keola. E ola mau Keola.
Raymond Stovich
San Jose |
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javeiro
Lokahi
USA
459 Posts |
Posted - 06/24/2003 : 10:43:09 PM
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Raymond,
I like your comments .... especially the "EXPAND Ki'hoalu" part. Along the same lines, I am in e-mail contact with a person in the United Kingdom who has been playing the guitar for about 30 years, has never been to the US or Hawaii and only recently heard of slack key. It seems that while he was playing with some jazz musicians who were familiar with slack key, he was told that the style he was playing in sounded like slack key. His verbal descriptions of his music say that his music uses various open tunings and has a melody with a base line. He only a couple of days ago mailed me a CD recording of some of his music. I haven't received it yet but it should be really interesting to listen to. I have to admit that I'm very curious to hear it.
Aloha,
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Aloha,
John A. |
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Admin
Pupule
USA
4551 Posts |
Posted - 07/13/2003 : 12:05:06 PM
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FYI, Wayne Harada's review can be found here: Renaissance revisited with master's touch
If you're planning to order this CD, just reminder to preorder on or before 7/15 for the reduced price of $10.00 per copy (retail 15.98). |
Andy |
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cpatch
Ahonui
USA
2187 Posts |
Posted - 07/14/2003 : 03:18:54 AM
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Hey, I was just passing on some info I had heard from someone close to Keola...no personal judgements added. I haven't even heard the CD yet. (Although the Ku'u Home O Kahalu'u sample accompanying the Honolulu Advertiser only alludes to slack key to my admittedly haole ear. On the other hand, it's not new age either.)
With respect to whether or not a song can be classified as slack key, we got into that a while back in the What defines slack key? topic. |
Craig
My goal is to be able to play as well as people think I can. |
Edited by - cpatch on 07/14/2003 3:10:09 PM |
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Reid
Ha`aha`a
Andorra
1526 Posts |
Posted - 07/14/2003 : 3:35:30 PM
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The more I learn, the more I appreciate Keola and understand better what he is trying to do and and where he puts slack key vocabulary in a piece and where it comes from. I can also mostly tell, now, those measures, sounds and patterns that are pure Keola. And, I have been totally won over, as has Sarah.
(Although, I still think he is a Standard Tuning (AKA Keola's C and down-tuned variants such as Bflat Wahine) bigot and expects his students - us - to be as quick fingered and talented as he is. He doesn't spend much effort, even in his simple arrangements, putting the fingering in places that are easy to shift to.)
When I first heard him, I was dismissive. I used to call "Slack Key in The Real Old Style" "Slack Key in The Real Old Arlo Guthrie Style". Then, I was totally unable to listen to "Wooden Boat" and agreed with a poster on a.m.h. who called it (expletive deleted) New Age (expletive deleted). In general, New Age is a code phrase for wimpy, environmental, impressionist dithering.
However, to paraphrase an old saw, it is amazing how good he gets the older I get and the more I listen to him. Part of this is that he has paid his dues. I am a great believer in learning from primary sources and Keola did just that. I can pick out Aunty Alice's figures and his variants of them quite easily, now. Then he will put in a meaure or four of pure Keola and then, maybe, quote somebody like Sonny or Ray (as he does in Kalena Kai). He could probably play just like any other slack key player of note, if he chose to.
Keola doesn't often use the strictly alternating bass that many do. Neither did Aunty Alice. Neither do lots of people who play in C. Usually there is a leading bass note and then other stuff will happen. Sometimes he will put in 2 or 3 bass notes. He doesn't feel restricted about that stuff. You just gotta get used to it and then you start noticing all the *real* slack key idiom that is the heart of it.
More listening and learning, coming up.
...Reid
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RJS
Ha`aha`a
1635 Posts |
Posted - 07/14/2003 : 8:10:32 PM
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I will repeat again: You can play a lot of ornaments that are typically slack key, add an alternating bass, and sound like every other slack key player out there. Or you can so thoroughly immerse yourself in the realities of slack key that they become part of your soul, then you can forget about the rules and details and really create. The two people who are at this level on a consistent basis and whom I admire most, are Keola and Ozzie. And I think the more I know and the longer I play, the more I apreciate what both of them are doing.
Raymond
San Jose |
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oaklandslacker
Aloha
China
47 Posts |
Posted - 07/15/2003 : 12:14:09 AM
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| What do you mean by "immerse yourself in the realities of slack key"? |
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RJS
Ha`aha`a
1635 Posts |
Posted - 07/15/2003 : 01:03:24 AM
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Let me try to give you the best answer I can, and try to avoid jargon in the process. This is a very difficult thing to describe - I have 3.5 shelves filled with books on the creative process and I haven't found a clear & concise definition that I really like. It's something that I think happens in a lot of different areas as part of the process of "mastery," that is, becoming a master at something. Let me give you three examples and hopefully you can intuit the beginnings of an understanding of what I mean.
1)I have a friend who is a world class painter - judging from the fact that he has the respect of other artists and that he is in very pretigious galleries and sells well. When we get together and talk about the artistic process, he says that he no longer thinks about things like color, form, value, draftsmanship. He has gotten to such a level of proficiency that "it just happens" while he is focusing on trying to convey an inner image or feeling in paint on canvas. My friend paints at least 8 hours 6 days a week and has done so since 1969 - and before that he was in school and drew and painted, as he calls is, "onsessively."
2) My next door neighbor is about 60 years old and an absolute genius at car repair. He's literally listens to an engine and can tell what's wrong. I asked him how he does it - he said it's no big deal, his grandfather and father were mechanics and maintanance men - from kid on he hung out with them and worked on cars from as soon as he could hold a wrench. He knows it so well that he doesn't have to use protocols to figure out what's wrong. Ok, occasionally he gets stumped and turns to the computers and manuals - but mostly for the computerized electronics as opposed to physical mechanics - he is 60something and most of his life is spent on with the physical mechanics stuff.
3)-- Not to brag but to give another example -- I've been honored a couple of times by my colleagues as a "master therapist" and I frequently get other therapists coming to me for consultation. (I am a psychologist.) When I'm working with a patient, I no longer think about diagnoses, interventions, tracking what someone is saying, etc. At some point a few years ago, I got to where that stuff is like a reflex. Now for me it is more like I just sit there and be present to my patient and the therapy sort of happens. When I look at tapes I can analyse what's going on. It has taken my over 25 years of daily working with anywhere from 6 - 10 patients a day, lots of study, an incredible amount of supervision and consultation with superb clinicians. Now all that stuff is really just a part of me.
So what I mean with Keola and Ozzie is that the deep traditions and the essential realities of slack key are so much a part of them that they are able to play to please and express themselves without caring or focusing on or thinking about what is or isn't slack key - and without just repeating things they have learned -- and in doing so they are actually making huge contributions to the art form. ( (Note: This level doesn't come easy. Peter Medeiros is certainly attested to the work Ozzie put it to get to that point. Keola once told me that for much of his life he "ate, slept and lived guitar.")
I hope this makes some sense to you.
Raymond Stovich
San Jose |
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cpatch
Ahonui
USA
2187 Posts |
Posted - 07/15/2003 : 01:29:21 AM
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| Makes perfect sense to me. The point you neglect, however, is that the ability to express yourself without thinking about the process doesn't necessarily guarantee the form of your expression. Keola and Ozzie both express themselves very differently musically and I think most people here would agree that Ozzie's form of expression holds more tightly to a more traditional slack key style. So the question at hand is whether or not a piece can be considered slack key because of the background of the artist who created it, or because of how well it conforms to the basic elements of the style. For example, at what point in the process of individual expression did paniolo-style guitar music become slack key? Most forms of music that we listen to evolved from other forms through individual expressions that went off on different tangents from each other. At some point each form was different enough from its original form that it took on its own identity. So at what point does the form of music that an artist like Keola creates differ enough from the slack key form that it becomes "dream guitar" or whatever you choose to label it? |
Craig
My goal is to be able to play as well as people think I can. |
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RJS
Ha`aha`a
1635 Posts |
Posted - 07/15/2003 : 5:20:34 PM
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I don't call Keola's playing slack key because it comes from Keola. (Nor do I call a toilet seat art because it came from Duchamps.) I am aware, however, that there is a lot of dispute about this point.
On the other hand, I don't think that slack key should be so narrowly defined as to only allow "traditional" slack key into the club. When I look at the history of art (which includes music) this type of approach is the most direct way to ensure a style of art's sterility and unlitmately its demise. How many terible paintings were displayed in the salons - all of which conformed to the academic standards of the day - while Impressionism (which is one of our "tradoitional styles" today was, by some important critics, not even allowed to be defined as fine art. How many bad sonatas are found in libraries of music which were considered good examples of music that conformed to the norms of the day.
Within the slack key tradition itself we have enough material to support my point. After all, everything after the paniolo music shouldn't be called slack key. Or everything after Autie Alice is no longer slack key. Or everything beyond a strict application of alternating bass, with simple major triads, parallel sixths and a turnaround after each verse is not slack key.
My point is that we are arguanbly now in a renewal of interest in slack key, (or maybe just an increasing interest in slack key on the mainland - not sure, not worth arguing -- the point is that lots of people are now playing it, playing it in public.)In addition, some great players are pushing the edges in various ways. This can be the time of a tremendous flowering or development of the art form. You want to play more a traditional style slack key, wonderful! Don't, however, damn the artform by cutting off significant sources of renewal - sources which may not conform to a strict traditional definition.
To reply to your question, at what point does one say that what Keola, or anyone, is doing is or is not slack key. I see no need to make this kind of judgement at this point. Wait 50 or so years and see how things have developed. Trust that the strengths of the tradition will guide its future development. In the short turn, play what moves your heart and soul. Don't worry about the other stuff. Whatever moves enough people's hearts and souls will pervail in the long run.
Raymond
San Jose |
Edited by - RJS on 07/15/2003 5:26:27 PM |
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cpatch
Ahonui
USA
2187 Posts |
Posted - 07/15/2003 : 7:40:19 PM
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I am by no means attempting to place any type of restrictions on how anyone plays. I'd much rather listen to someone playing from their heart and pushing the edges than someone playing methodically in a traditional style. My point had nothing to do with how people play, but rather how you classify what they play. And I would argue very strongly that unless you apply some type of definition to what constitutes a style, you end up diluting that style. (You wouldn't want to classify rock and roll as the blues, even though that's where it evolved from...you pay a disservice to both by doing so.)
With respect to your art analogy, there are terrible slack key songs written in the traditional style. That has nothing to do with the definition of the style, it has to do with the abilities of the artist. And there are plenty of "impressionistic" songs that may not fit the style but which are certainly still defined as good music. A more appropriate analogy would be that Impressionistic painters moved art into a whole new realm, a style related to but different from its predecessors. To group Impressionism with Realism would do more to ensure its demise than to define it as its own style. My argument is that the same holds true for slack key and the styles that evolve from it. And, to me at least, to wait 50 years or so to define new styles is one way to ensure their sterility. Impressionism, in fact, was defined very early in the style's existence. (And by a negative critic at that!)
Having said all that, I fully agree with the last three sentences of your post:
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In the short turn, play what moves your heart and soul. Don't worry about the other stuff. Whatever moves enough people's hearts and souls will prevail in the long run.
The rest is academic. |
Craig
My goal is to be able to play as well as people think I can. |
Edited by - cpatch on 07/15/2003 7:40:49 PM |
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