A Prairie Home Companion with Garrison Keillor

Ledward Kaapana

LEDWARD KAAPANA grew up in the village of Kalapana; his was a big family in a small place on the Big Island, and they all played music. They had no electricity, which meant no television and only battery radio. "So we entertained ourselves," he said, "You could go to any house and everybody was playing music." Parties in that village went on for days. "People played in shifts, taking over when somebody went to bed. You'd fall asleep to the music, wake up and the music was still playing. The best alarm clock I ever had. Even today when I play, I still picture all the family getting together and sharing their songs..."

He plays the slack key guitar in at least eight tunings, as well as ukulele, bass, and steel guitar, and sings baritone and falsetto. He's has recorded over 50 albums in his 37 years as a musician.

He learned to play at an early age by watching, listening and imitating, and he practiced hard. He says that, from the beginning, improvisation came natural to him. "I was doing it before I knew what it was," he says. "Everything you play, every time you play, there's a mood, an energy. If you plug into it, the music just flows. Even in a simple song, there are so many different ways to play the melody, the rhythm, the harmony. It never stops if you stay open to it."

For more information, visit www.dancingcat.com

George Kahumoku, Jr.

GEORGE KAHUMOKU, JR. is by background and breeding a farmer and a fisherman; his family held 6,000 acres of land in Kona, on the south part of Big Island. He once won the Hawaii State All-Pork Award and often speaks at ag conferences. But well before that, as a young man, he won a scholarship to the Honolulu Academy of the Arts, and an example of his work hangs in the Governor of Hawaii's office, a piece entitled "Puhi the Eel."

He also teaches school, a course at Lahainaluna High School in Maui for special students, a course for which one has to qualify by flunking at least five of six classes and missing 23 of 44 days of a school term. He tries to make it possible for these kids to no longer qualify for his Special Motivation Program, as they call it, and apparently he's good at it.

What brings him to us is that he also sings and plays slack key guitar, and does it so beautifully that he has been paid to entertain the Prince of Thailand, the Baron of Tonga, the Premier of China and the Queen of England, and he has played in nearly every state and on every continent.

If our show has ever entertained the Baron of Tonga he never wrote and told us so; so we are of course honored to have with us a man who has.

For more information, visit www.kahumoku.com.

The LEO NAHENAHE SINGERS were formed in 1962 by NOELANI MAHOE - who at the time was a hula and music instructor in Honolulu. After being asked to perform for a number of functions on the islands, Noelani decided she needed to put a group together, and called on some of her former students. She met Ethelynne and Mona Teves while teaching them hula at the Manoa Recreation Center, and Lynette Paglinawan at the University of Hawaii - while she was teaching Hawaiian singing. The group sang together as a quartet for several years, and became known for their beautiful singing, Island friendliness, and charm. They recorded their first album "Folk Songs of Hawai'i" in 1962, "Hawai'i's Folk Singers" in 1963, and their classic Christmas album, "Hawaiian Christmas," in 1968. In recent years, the women have been singing with others, and in various combinations, but in 2001 they reunited as a quartet, and plan to sing together more in the coming years.