In 1986, a vedic astrologer said to me, “Hawaii is the best place on the planet for you”. I was unimpressed. In the cult-like organization to which Elandra and I belonged at the time, Hawaii was considered the place to which organization members, who could not handle the intense discipline, would run away. They would spend their lives laying on the beach and smoking dope. That was not what I wanted to do with my life.

“Isn’t there anywhere else that’s good?” I asked. “Well, anywhere near the Pacific Ocean is good but Hawaii is far and away the best for you”.

I had been to Hawaii four times already and would return again briefly twice in 1988. Yet, in all of those times, I had never spent overnight there. I soon forgot about the whole incident. Interestingly, since 1968, other than a short and unhappy stint when I tried to return to London, I have never lived more than ten miles from the Pacific. It wasn’t until 1989 that a generous gift from a friend sent me back to Hawaii, this time for a week’s vacation.

The beautiful, mystical, magical Hawaiian Islands are alive with divine sound. Billowing waves breaking on white, golden, red and black sandy beaches, the trade winds softly rippling through the fronds of swaying coconut trees, hundreds of tropical birds singing their songs, the roar and hiss as molten lava meets the ocean currents. All of these make up the soundscape of an isolated and idyllic tropical paradise.

Over centuries, the native people of Hawaii created another soundscape, complementing the natural cacophony of their homeland. Like many other lands on this Earth, Hawaii is a land of the voice. Here the human voice is given huge respect. A common name to give a child, male or female is Kaleonani – Beautiful Voice. For a man or a woman to have an outstanding, even world class voice is considered to be normal and natural.

How did this come about? No one knows. Certainly the beautiful environment is an inspiration. But there are other places, Tahiti, for example; an equally beautiful island paradise, where people sing as naturally as breathing. Yet, in my admittedly biased opinion, the power and beauty of Hawaiian singing and chanting stand out above all others.

Hawaiian culture was held, until comparatively recently, by oral tradition. I have been told by those who know that there was, and still is, a written language in Hawaii. This is, of course, contrary to what the books and scholars will tell you. The knowledge of this script is being held kapu – in secret, until such time as those that hold it feel that the world is ready to receive its ike (wisdom).

Some hundred and fifty years ago, the missionaries established a way to write the Hawaiian language with the sole intent of spreading Christianity. As an unintended consequence of this action, all that is now known to the world of ancient Hawaiian tradition was then transmitted to Caucasians, who committed what they garnered to paper. Many of these Caucasians found within themselves a deep respect for Hawaiian culture and felt a responsibility to preserve as much as they were able.

As Hawaiian culture was systematically suppressed by missionaries and government, the old ones died along with their memories and their wisdom. It was, in effect, cultural genocide. Huge sections of cultural knowledge and tradition simply disappeared. Yet much still remains.

In spite of the proscriptions of the missionaries, and later the State Legislature which banned the Hawaiian language, both language and culture have survived. The culture has experienced resurgence in the last thirty years and is continuing to grow. The Hawaiian language, if not exactly flourishing, is being nurtured and kept alive by immersion schools and by those who stubbornly refuse to allow this most beautiful and mellifluous of languages to die.

To go deep into Hawaiian culture, you have to go deep into hula. Hula is the very soul of Hawaii. It is indeed tragic that so few people, even within Hawaii itself, have managed to go beyond the 1930’s movie image of hula, promulgated by Hollywood. The image of brown skinned women (hardly ever Hawaiian) in grass skirts (definitely not Hawaiian) swaying their hips to a song by Bing Crosby or Elvis still reigns throughout the world as the accepted depiction of hula, indeed of Hawaii itself. I was once part of a Hawaiian cultural show in Germany where a few people came and asked for their money back because there were no brown skinned women in grass skirts.

Hula involves the movement of the hips, both for men and for women. It is a sensual dance and, on occasion, blatantly sexual in a manner that is both ribald and hilarious. But the context is always that sex is a natural part of life and not any big deal.

Hula is about life because it is life. All aspects of Hawaiian life are reflected therein. Birth and death, farming and fishing, love and war, spiritual tradition, navigation by the stars, history and legend, all these and much more can be found in this ancient dance.

In hula, the dance and the voice are ineluctably linked. Even in its modern form, dancing hula to instrumental music without a singer is all but unthinkable. The dance is a vital adjunct to the story being told in the song. Dance and voice are inseparable, no matter how profound the lyric, no matter how trite.

In this day and age, modern hula (hula auwana) is associated with the guitar and particularly the ukulele, but always as instruments to accompany a singer. In ancient times, the old hula (hula kahiko) was danced to the voice; to a chant called mele. The voice was accompanied by either the pahu drum or a percussion instrument created from two gourds called the ipu heke. But these were only there to accentuate the rhythm by which the dancers kept time. The voice was that which gave the narrative and melody to the dance.

The other vital aspect of the Hawaiian voice in ancient times was oli. Oli means chant. This is an extract from an excellent article in Spirit of Aloha (Aloha Airlines magazine) called The Art of Oli by Joan Conrow.

A sound has largely disappeared from Hawai‘i’s valleys and forests, a sound other than the songs of now-extinct native birds. It’s the sound of the human voice raised in oli, in chant, speaking words thoughtfully chosen by the composer, carefully memorized and delivered by the orator.

Hawaiian culture was traditionally imbued with oli, as chants were a part of every aspect of daily life. Whether it was a fisherman offering a chant before setting out to fish or a kahuna, priest, chanting within the context of a sacred ritual, oli were ubiquitous. Indeed, even the Hawaiian creation story, the Kumulipo, is presented as a 2,102-line chant.

It was frequent, in pre-Western-contact Hawai‘i, to hear women chanting as they pounded tapa cloth or cleaned hala leaves alongside the ocean or a stream; to hear men chanting before planting taro in the fields; to hear families chanting to greet the dawn and the dusk, to acknowledge all the ancestors.

Chant was also used to pay homage to the recently dead. As Lili‘uokalani, Hawai‘i’s last queen, lay in state in 1917, according to S.M. Kamakau’s Ruling Chiefs of Hawai‘i: “… the body was view­ed by a vast procession of people … the natives venting their sorrow in the oldtime oli or the uwe helu (lamentations.) … devoted at­tendants and loyal subjects [mourn­ed] in song, chant recitations, oli or the weird, soul-piercing disconsolate wail of a grief-stricken heart.”

Chanting was a way of expressing grati­tude, focusing intention, asking permission, acknowledging the gods, calling upon the forces of nature, seek­ing protection in short, oli were the utterances of a profoundly spiritual people who were deeply interactive with their environment.

Since they were human, with all the accompanying emotions, chant was used for more mundane purposes, too: professing feelings of love and admiration, asking for a favor or delivering a scolding, expressing praise or despair.

But with the arrival of the missionaries and new ways of doing things, oli began to rapidly subside from its once prominent role in daily life.

In normal times, there are plenty of cultural events on each of the main Hawaiian islands. They are the life blood of the community. But Kauai was in a state of shock. Thus it was some time before the cultural calendar there started filling up again. We made it a priority to attend any cultural event that was held and, as the number of events began to increase, we found ourselves out more and more.

The first Hawaiian concert we attended was in April of that year at Vidhina Stadium in Lihue. The community was still under enormous stress and, even seven months after the hurricane, destruction was evident everywhere. The concert offered welcome relief and a chance to have much needed fun.

During one of the performances, it was announced that there would be a special guest dancer. A tall, slim figure came to center stage. Clean shaven with soft features that were refined, yet unmistakably Polynesian, his graying hair was pulled back into a pony tail. His clothes were unique. They looked more like something from India than Hawaii with a long kurta-like shirt and slightly baggy pants, also made from soft material, that were gathered at the ankles. His long sleeves were rolled up revealing tattooed rings in Polynesian designs down the length of each forearm.

Even to my inexperienced eye, his style of dance seemed different and unique. His movements were graceful and deliberate yet sparing. His dance, telling the story of the beauty of the island of Kauai, was entrancing and easy to understand. He had a look of sheer ecstasy on his face. He was introduced as Frank Hewitt, although he now prefers to be known as Kawaikapu Hewitt. (His full Hawaiian name is Kawaikapuokalani – The Sacred Water of the Heavens).

As soon as he began to dance, I noticed that Elandra rushed to sit in front of the stage. I was impressed, but did not fell the need to move from my seat. Once again, I was getting my first sight of another musical virtuoso who would have a profound influence on my life, although I had no idea at the time.

In my hunger for Hawaiian music, I would try to listen to it on the radio as I drove to and from work (or anywhere else, for that matter). Incredibly, there was no regular Hawaiian music being programmed on Kauai. I was able to tune into a station from Honolulu but only on the parts of Kauai that were closest to O’ahu.

Nevertheless, began to find out more about the music and the artists. I found out that most of the songs that I found the most moving and entrancing, were written by the same man. His name: Kawaikapu Hewitt.

By 1996, things were close enough to normal that Elandra and I began to seriously consider finding ourselves a teacher. We had learned enough to know that everything cultural in Hawaii revolved around hula so the obvious thing to do would be to join a hula halau (dance troupe). Elandra wanted to be a dancer; I wanted to be a musician and chanter.

Every major island has a number of hula halau. As we familiarized ourselves with the way things happen in Hawaii, we found out that you cannot just walk into any hula halau and expect to be accepted. Things have eased somewhat over the last fifteen years but, in 1993, there were plenty of halau that would not accept white people. Even if you were able to get into a halau, there was often racism and cliquism within the halau. I also found out that hula is very political. This kumu (hula teacher), for example, would not associate with that kumu, if you had been with this halau you could not associate with that halau. Though after twenty years of Sikh politics, it all seemed pretty tame to me.

Still, we were invited to join a halau that accepted white people. After just a couple of weeks, I was castigated by one of the senior disciples (white) who accused me of flagrantly disregarding the traditions and protocol of the halau. I was deeply hurt since everything I had done had been under the direction of her husband who was also a senior member of the halau and Hawaiian to boot. I retired into myself and decided that I would just give up on the whole process.

A few weeks later, Elandra said, “There’s a new kumu who’s coming over from O’ahu every week to teach. He says that anyone can join his halau”.

“No”, I said, “I’ve had enough.”

“Well, I’m going even if you’re not”, she said.

When Elandra returned from the class she said to me, “Look, I talked to him. He says he’ll teach you to chant and how to accompany hula”.

“No”, I said.

“Well, at least come by and meet him”.

The next Thursday I showed up at the Outrigger Hotel at the end of class. The kumu’s name was Blaine Kia, a strikingly handsome Hawaiian with more than a touch of Chinese in his makeup. At the time, he was thirty one, exactly twenty years younger than me.

“Oh, yes,’ he said in what seemed to me to be rather too enthusiastic and jocular a tone, “I’ll teach you how to chant and how to play ipu heke”.

I looked into his eyes and I could see what he was thinking. “This funny looking haole (white) guy won’t last more than two weeks”.

I dutifully showed up for class the following Thursday. Blaine said “Hi” and went on to teach the class. I sat and watched. And observed. At the end of the class Blaine said “Goodnight”. This went on for six weeks.

And the end of that time, I suppose I must have convinced him I was serious, because he started to teach me.

Around that same time, he said to me “Bring your guitar next week, we’re going to do auwana (modern) hula”.

“OK”, I said “what are we going to do?”

“Kalihiwai, a song from my CD” he said.

I went home, got hold of the CD and thoroughly learned the first two verses of the song, knowing that he would not teach the dancers more than that during class. I memorized the Hawaiian words and the harmonies.

The next week at class, Blaine handed out the words to the song as he always did before teaching it. “Would you like a songsheet?” he asked me.

“No thanks”, I replied. He gave me a funny look.

In Hawaiian singing, the norm is for one person to sing a verse and then for everyone to join in for the second time through singing harmonies. That night, every time Blaine sang the verse for the second time, I joined in, word and harmony perfect. After that, he started treating me with much more respect.

Blaine was young for a kumu hula. His hula lineage was from a legendary teacher named Darryl Lupenui, who brought about a revolution in men’s hula in the early eighties but then died young. Blaine had also learned from the late Uncle John Ka’imikaua, about whom, more later. His other kumu was Kawaikapu Hewitt. This was great for me. I felt like a circle was being closed, bringing me back in touch with a man who had been such an inspiration to me.

Blaine had started teaching to propagate the lineage of ‘Ihi’ihilauakea (Darryl Lupenui). Over time, he began to introduce more and more of Kawaikapu Hewitt’s material, both songs and choreography, into his repertoire. I received a very thorough education in song, chant, cultural tradition and, even though I never danced, in hula itself. Even though I was mostly learning in the tradition of Kawaikapu, I began to feel the huge presence of ‘Ihi’ihilauakea. Which is why, even though I never met him, I always honor ‘Ihi’ihilauakea ‘o Kapuwailani ‘o Noenoe’ula as one of my Hawaiian teachers.

Blaine gave me the Hawaiian name of Pu’ukani o Ka Lani (the sweet voiced singer of the heavens).

Blaine stuck his neck out for me in many areas. He never said anything to me but I think he copped a lot of flack for giving such an unusual looking haole guy a prominent role in his halau. He was a dedicated and devoted man and I felt privileged to learn from him. It wasn’t long before I was playing guitar and singing with him for rehearsals and public performances of the halau.

My first public oli was at Ka Hula Piko on Molokai in 1998. Ka Hula Piko is an annual festival founded by the late Uncle John Ka’imikaua to celebrate the birthplace of hula according to Moloka’I legend.

Uncle John was an extraordinary man. Discouraged from learning about his Hawaiian heritage when he showed an interest as a young boy by his parents, he began to learn from his grandmothers. He was then taught by a 92-year-old woman named Kawahinekapuheleikapokane (Sacred Woman Traveling on the Night of Kane), who began mentoring him at age 14. The Molokai kupuna (elder) taught him 156 Molokai chants, ranging in length up to 928 lines – ‘an unbroken oral history of our people for 1,000 years,’ he once explained.”

His teacher assured him that his generation would fulfill the prophecy of a Moloka‘i chant from 1819, when Hawai‘i’s royal leaders ordered the destruction of the temples of the ancient Hawaiian religion and overturned the kapu system of rules that controlled Hawaiian culture. The Hawaiian people would be brought low to the earth, the prophecy warned, losing everything. But in time, there would be a resurgence of the culture. Uncle John felt that now is that time.. And Kawahinekapuheleikapokane told him that he and those who came after him would not have to live the kapu.

“All the knowledge I give you will be free of kapu,” she told him. “It will be taken at my time of death. There is no kapu, but there is a great kuleana (responsibility).”

Only after his teacher’s death when he was 16 years old did Uncle John understand that kuleana. In 1977, at age 19, he opened his own halau. “The night I opened it, I understood,” he said. “That first practice, I realized the kuleana: to educate and enlighten all people about our ancestral past.”

The event at the heart of the festival, takes place in the mountainous area known as Ka’ana, located on the heights of Mount Maunaloa, in the arid area of West Moloka’i. At around three am on Saturday morning, hula halau and committed spectators gather on the windy and often bitterly cold heights of Ka’ana. Sometimes there is a moon: sometimes not. Without a moon, there is no light to even see the dancers until the sky lightens in the East. That is not considered important. Each participant considers it an honor just to be there. The whole event is considered kapu (sacred).

Each halau is allowed one oli and one hula; there is to be no talking. The discipline is strong and strict, the respect palpable. It was in this pressure cooker that I performed my first public oli and I was very nervous.

As we sat back down on the dirt after our hula, I felt a huge whack on my back. I turned round and there was Blaine beaming at me.

“Good job” he whispered.

Later, at the day long ho’olaulea (festival) that follows, Uncle John was kind enough to congratulate me on my oli. That meant a lot to me.