Kumu Pua Case

Pualani Case is a 43 years old descendant of Hawaiian, Puerto Rican, Portuguese and Caucasian ancestors. Born and raised in Hawaii immersed in Hula traditions, has been a hula teacher of traditional hula since 1985.  She was a huge part of the inception, creation, birth and launch of the Makali'i canoe, which, after the Hokule'a, helped further strengthen the Hawaiian's pride in their native gift of deep-sea navagation/wayfinding by the stars. She spent much time with Papa 'Mau' Piailug in the later years of his life.

With the deep cultural need to learn her language and culture, she is a graduate of the University of Hawaii at Hilo with a degree in Hawaiian Language and a Social Studies Teaching Certificate. With the Department of Education, she has been a District Resource Teacher for the Kupuna Program, a middle school Hawaiian Studies and Hula classroom teacher and is currently the ‘Ike Hawai’i Resource Teacher specializing in connecting culture to curriculum in the middle school that she attended as a student in her community. With a deep sense of cultural obligation to her community, she is active in native and community cultural issues.  With her Halau of hula, she is learning as a member of native Hawaiian cultural groups all of which focus on sharing with all youth the practice and perpetuation of Hawaiian and local island traditions. As a member of the global community, she is currently a doula and a member of several universal healing oriented learning circles dedicated to self and world healing.

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Hawane Rios

Reported from Hawaii 24/7:  Hawane Rios, an upcoming Hawaiian recording artist has just released her first CD single entitled “Poliahu i ke kapu.” She wrote and arranged this mele (song) as a tribute to Poliahu, the divine snow goddess of Mauna Kea. Its words speak of the natural beauty of the mountain and compares the snowfall, bright stars, soft clouds, cool mist, and mountain itself to sacred Poliahu.

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“My connection to the Earth Mother is deep and true as my family has raised me to know that the Earth is as much a part of us as we are a part of it. The beautiful power of the elements has served as inspiration for my musical compositions strengthening my connection and respect for this land as I continue to sing my praises for this world,” Rios said.

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Rios comes from the small country town of Waimea, nestled in the protection of the majestic and sacred Mauna Kea, also referred to as Mauna a Wakea. Her roots stretch from the rolling hills of Kohala to the sandy beaches of Anaehoomalu.  She is a graduate of the Kamehameha Schools – Kapalama Campus and Ka Haka Ula O Keelikolani, College of Hawaiian Language – University of Hawaii at Hilo. In 2009, she was privileged to receive the Na Hoku Hanohano – Bill Murata Memorial Scholarship which inspired her to share her passion for Hawaiian music through compositions that reflect the love she has for her island home and especially for all sacred places. The aloha she feels for Mauna Kea led to this original composition.Rios sends her deepest gratitude to everyone for their unwavering support and beautiful responses to her composition. A special mahalo is extended to Sonny Lim for engineering and mastering this song, with assistance from his daughter, Anuhea Lim. Sonny also provided the musical accompaniment on this CD single.

 

“Poliahu i ke kapu” is available on iTunes and other online music stores with proceeds from sales being donated to the KAHEA Hawaiian-Environmental Alliance Mauna Kea Legal Defense Fund for the protection of Hawaiian cultural practices as well as the sacred sites and landscape on Mauna Kea.

Sonny Lim

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Elmer Lim Jr.,

Elmer Lim Jr., better known as "Sonny" was born and raised in Kohala on the Island of Hawai’i.  Music came to him naturally at a young age playing ‘ukulele, guitar, upright bass, vibraphone and steel guitar.  The family was just Sonny's father, Elmer Lim Sr., who was a Paniolo (Hawaiian cowboy) and worked on the famed Parker ranch. In this respect, Sonny carries on the slack key tradition born amongst Waimea Cowboys over a hundred years earlier. Sonny, influence by Fred Punahoa and Gabby Pahinui, he learned slack key guitar primarily from Kalapana slack key master Fred Punahoa and steel from Uncle Sonny Alapai of Pu’uanahulu. In addition to playing with the famed Lim Family, who has garnered two Na Hoku Hanohano awards for best Hawaiian Album, Sonny played with the Makaha Sons of Ni’ihau from 1975-1978 and has shared the stage with many other Hawaiian artists such as Cyril Pahinui, Ledward Kaapana and Amy Hanaiali’i.

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He can be heard on the Grammy Award-winning anthology album, "Slack Key Guitar Volume 2", as well as his solo debut album in 2006, Grammy nominated "Slack Key Guitar: The Artistry of Sonny Lim"  On May 29, 2010 he received the Nā Hoku Hanohano’s Lifetime Achievement Award with the Makaha Sons of Niʻihau, May 30th Received the NāHoku Hanohano Slack Key Legacy Award and on May 5, 2012, he received the Nā Hoku Hanohano’s with The Lim Family.

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Kumu Kau`i Peralto

Kumu Kau`i Peralto is of Hawaiian, Chinese, and Caucasian ancestry who was born and raised on Hawai`i-island.  She has taught Hawaiian language (`ōlelo Hawai`i) to the Northern California community since 2000 including classes at Stanford University and Menlo College.  She is also the Kumu Hula of Hālau o Kawainuhi, a lifetime cultural practitioner, and an advocate of all things Hawaii.

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Kahu Keli`i Lindo

Jason Keli’inohokula Lindo was born in Honolulu, O’ahu on September 12, 1959 in a Portuguese and Native Hawaiian family. Keli’i, as he is known to family and friends, was particularly close to his maternal grandparents and was fortunate to have grown up listening to his maternal grandfather, a fluent Native speaker of Hawaiian and with the family traditions and stories handed down from his great grandmother who served as an attendant and seamstress to Queen Lili’uokalani.

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Keli’i attended Catholic grade schools and graduate from Punahou School in 1977. He moved to Sacramento, California in the Fall of 1978 to attend California State University Sacramento, where graduated with a BA in Humanities, with a concentration in religious studies and a double minor in Spanish and Portuguese language. Keli’i continued on to receive his Master of Social Work (MSW) from CSUS in 1994. Keli’i has had a long career in social services since 1984, where he has worked as a chemical dependency counselor, transitional housing coordinator, hospice social worker and Child Protective Services worker for Sacramento County. For the past 14 years Keli’i has worked as a service coordinator and currently a supervisor at Alta California Regional Center with the developmentally disabled, where he currently supervises a children’s services unit in the Sacramento office.

An active member of the Native Hawaiian community in both the Sacramento and Northern California region, Keali’i has sat on various NHPI community boards and forums, participated in the perpetuation of the art of kapa making and shared the knowledge taught to him by his kupuna in the area of Native Hawaiian spirituality. Keli’i serves the Native Hawaiian community as a kahu, or spiritual and cultural advisor, where he is frequently called upon to do blessings for homes, halau wa’a and cultural events. Keli’i is also a frequent participant in annual Makahiki celebrations in Northern California and recently acted as master of ceremonies for the Northern California Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander protocols to welcome the arrival of the fleet of Pacific Islander voyaging canoes in 2011. Keli’i is also an active member of his Reform synagogue in Sacramento, where he frequently teaches adult education classes on the history and culinary traditions of the Spanish and Portuguese Jews; Keli’i is a descendant of Portuguese Jews. When not being working or being involved in the NHPI or Jewish communities in Sacramento, Keli’i spends time with his husband Michael, their 3 dogs and visiting his extended family throughout California and Hawai’i.

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Wendeanne Ke`aka Stitt

Wendeanne Ke`aka Stitt, a resident of Santa Cruz, is a mother, award-winning quilt maker and a Hawaiian kapa maker who has a 28 year history in the San Francisco Bay Area as a visual display artist. A life-long student of quilts and their makers, especially the Amish, she developed a respect for women whose lives were spent working long days, caring for their families, and creating beautiful quilts. Her children grown, she now pursues quilt making full time.

Stitt is also one of the original members of “Kuku I Ka Pono – The Kapa Project,” a group of Hawaiians and Hawaiians-at-heart who accepted a two-year apprenticeship under the tutelage of Kumu Kapa Dalani Tanahy (Makaha, HI) to learn the ancient art of Hawaiian kapa making with the purpose of creating kapa cloth to use in the traditional Hawaiian burial of ‘iwi [bones] disturbed in construction and repatriated from museums worldwide. Upon completing her two year kapa making apprenticeship, she continued her learning with Kumu Dalani  so that she may share her knowledge and kapa lineage with Hawaiians and Hawaiians-at-heart in California.

Over the past 30 years, her work has been shown nationwide including the De Young Museum-San Francisco, the Museum of Contemporary Crafts-NYC and the Oakland Museum of California. In 2009, Stitt, along with Kumu Hula Kau`i Peralto, was a recipient of an Alliance for California Traditional Arts Living Cultures grant. In Summer 2010, she was a participant in `Imiakea: Navigating Polynesian Art and Science at the Exploratorium in San Francisco. Stitt is currently being represented by Snyderman/works Gallery in Philadelphia, PA. More Info: www.wkstitt.com