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Beamer and kapono12/2/2023 ![]() In January of 2018, Keola was appointed Board Chair of Aloha Kuamoʻo ʻĀina, a 501c3 non-profit formed for the protection and preservation of the Kuamoʻo Battlefield and Burial Grounds in Kona, Hawaii. He is an Award-Winning Author and Artistic Director of The Mohala Hou Foundation, which presents Aloha Music Camp. Keola was also the author of the first written instruction book for the Hawaiian Slack Guitar, published in 1972. Keola established himself early as a leader of the wave of contemporary Hawaiian music when he wrote the classic Honolulu City Lights – which is still one of the absolute all-time best-selling recordings in the history of Hawaiian music. So Keola's talent is in his blood, inherited from over five generations of musical and artistic lineage. The Beamers trace their roots to royal families of the 14th century and have been cultural practitioners through generations. Keola’s mother, Aunty Nona Beamer, continues to be revered as a Hawaiian cultural treasure and his great-grandmother was one of Hawaiʻi’s most illustrious composers, Helen Desha Beamer. His wife Moanalani Beamer joins Keola in performances with her beautiful hula and the exquisite sounds of traditional Hawaiian instruments. Keola was one of the first to use the Hawaiian slack-key technique to create contemporary music at home on jazz or classical stages. He is a Hawaiian legend: singer-songwriter, composer, guitar master, with an impeccable, gorgeous style featured on The Descendants soundtrack and his 17 CDs. Keola Beamer has breathed new life into slack-key guitar music yet stays true to its deeply Hawaiian roots. Kapono is one of the great island songwriters of his generation.“Keola Beamer’s style is the best there is on the planet,” says Willie Nelson. Keola Beamer and Henry Kapono will each perform a set, and then come together onstage to celebrate their original songs that have become beloved classics of contemporary Hawaiian music. ![]() Today, as a solo artist, Kapono is a Grammy-nominated and award-winning singer and songwriter. They helped forge the sound of 1970s Hawaiian music, with laid-back contemporary rock that voiced the feelings of an entire generation in Hawaii. Henry Kapono and Cecilio Rodriguez joined together to become the wildly popular phenomenon Cecilio & Kapono (aka C&K). Today, he is one of Hawaii’s premier singer-songwriters, arrangers, composers, and masters of the Hawaiian slack-key guitar. Find information on all of Henry Kapono’s upcoming concerts, tour dates and ticket information for 2022-2023. This launched a statewide revival of the tradition, and his 1978 release, Honolulu City Lights, is the largest-selling recording in the history of Hawaiian music. ![]() Keola Beamer’s contributions to slack-key guitar during the 1970s began to spark public interest in kī-hō’alu (literally, “loosen the key,” referring to the Hawaiian playing style in which standard guitar tuning is altered by slackening the strings). This wildly successful show featured Hawaii’s musical greats who shaped Hawaiian music from the 1970s on, part of the “Hawaiian Renaissance”-the seminal movement in Hawaii’s cultural history that brought language, music, hula, art, and all aspects of Hawaiian culture back to their central place in the life of the Islands. Despite their common history, the two living legends only performed together for the first time in 2014, when Henry Kapono invited Keola and Moanalani Beamer to be part of his concert, Back in the Day.
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