Name: David Nye: Lau Puka
Channel: David Nye
Description: Free MP3 download. An inspired and upbeat original that draws from a variety of musical styles.

Free download

An inspired and upbeat original that draws from a variety of musical styles.

slack keyki hoalukanekwan

TaroPatch

Hawaiian slack key guitar (ki ho`alu) from members of TaroPatch.net

Original Hawaiian (ki hoalu) songs and arrangements from members of ...the online ohana (family) for anyone interested in learning to play this beautiful guitar style. (Slack key is traditional Hawaiian "back porch" music and has recently received more widespread exposure through George Winston's label.) The songs posted here are neither polished nor intended for commercial release; they are simply examples of slack key guitar played by regular people (both Hawaiian and haole) who love the style and want to share their learning experience with others. If you're not currently a member of , please feel free to visit us at ...we have a wealth of resources for anyone interested in playing (or just listening to) slack key guitar and a great bunch of people to make it feel like home.

Song Info

Genre

World • Traditional Hawaiian

Charts

Peak #203

Peak in subgenre #3

Author

David Nye

Rights

2004 David Nye

Uploaded

September 26, 2004

Track Files

MP3

MP3 3.1 MB • 128 kbps • 0:00

Story behind the song

This is the first song I wrote in slack. Although I’d been playing guitar since I was 13, my first encounter with slack key was the 2001 Aloha Music Camp. I’d had Keola’s video for a couple of months, but I had no clue what I was getting into. By the end of the week I was hanging in there and had been practicing Keola’s version of Sanoe (F Wahine) for the student concert; a song that was way over my head, but what the heck did I know?

Prior to the concert I was on my porch having a cigarette, looking at the large heart-shaped leaves of the vines that were growing around the hale. It began to rain and the gutter was forcing a huge torrent right into the middle of the largest leaf. It kept withstanding the blow, but I wondered for how long. I headed off to the concert.

I started my piece very well, then about halfway through a difficult passage I made a mistake, got lost, spiraled a little, and then recovered by moving to the ending. I was devastated. But, to my amazement, the audience applauded and throughout the rest of the evening, people came up to me and gave me hugs. The aloha was immense. Given human nature, I still felt like a failure.

When I got back to my hale, I lit another cigarette and remembered the leaf. To my surprise, the leaf was in the same place, standing tall, with the exception of a large hole in the middle where the rain was passing through. It had a hole in its heart, but had found a way to carry on with the nature of things. That’s exactly how I felt. I walked into the hale, took out my guitar and allowed the leaf to teach me the song: Lau Puka.

Tuning: Taro Patch