![]() ![]() A regular client had called on behalf of Kamakawiwo'ole, who had an idea he desperately wanted to see through. In 1988, recording studio manager Milan Bertosa was wrapping a long day at 3 a.m. ![]() The acoustic version, with Kamakawiwo'ole on vocals and ukelele, was recorded a few years prior and kept in a recording studio's archives until the release of his 1993 follow-up, Facing Future. Jon De Mello "One Take, and It Was Over"Īlthough Kamakawiwo'ole's 1990 solo album included "Over the Rainbow/What a Wonderful World," it's not the version that most people remember. Israel "Iz" Kamakawiwo'ole, with his ukelele. Track seven on the album is the upbeat Jawaiian track, "Over the Rainbow/What a Wonderful World," a medley combining the songs "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" and "What a Wonderful World," made famous by Louis Armstrong in 1967. After years of popularizing Hawaiian music, Kamakawiwo'ole recorded his solo album Ka 'Ano'iin 1990. Kamakawiwo'ole's music career took off from there, forming the band Mākaha Sons with his brother Skippy in 1976. And that thing just cut right through the air, stopped everybody in their tracks." "Every great singer has something special. "As soon as Israel Kamakawiwo'ole opened his mouth and sang, that whole place went quiet," Beazley remembered. In a 2011 interview with NPR, musician and friend Del Beazley said the first time people heard Kamakawiwo'ole sing, which happened at a graduation party, the room "stopped." Because of his musical family - who were friends with legends like Peter Moon and Don Ho - Kamakawiwo'ole was exposed to music at an early age. His uncle was Moe Keale, himself a musician and actor who starred as Detective Truck Kealoha in the original version of the CBS cop drama Hawaii Five-O. It was here, where Kamakawiwo'ole spent summers with his grandparents, grew deeply connected to his Hawaiian heritage. He grew up on the island Ni'ihau, which to this day remains the only island with a 100 percent Hawaiian population and cannot be visited without an invitation from a resident. Israel Kamakawiwo'ole was a Hawaiian singer born in Honolulu in 1959. While Kamakawiwo'ole remains an icon for Hawaiians and Hawaiian music, the story of how he recorded his most popular song - over 147 million streams on Spotify - is nothing short of legendary. On Wednesday, May 20, 2020, Google celebrated Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, on what would have been his 61st birthday, with a two-minute animated music video (directed by Sophie Diao) set to Kamakawiwo'ole's most famous song: A ukelele cover of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow," first made famous by Judy Garland for the 1938 movie The Wizard of Oz. Israel "Iz" Kamakawiwoʻole was a singer and activist of Hawaiian ancestry who embodied the words "gentle giant." Remembered as a "really sweet man" by those who knew him, Kamakawiwo'ole died in 1997, at the age of 38. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |