Isa Lei - Hawaiian Slack Key Guitar

One of the many haunting songs of the Pacific is the plaintive "Isa Lei," a song of love and farewell from Fiji. My version is one of the first arrangements I developed from a vocal. "Isa Lei" was part of Gabby Pahinui's "Farewell Medley" but my arrangement is based on the soulful singing of his son, "Bla," who performed the song on the Pahinui Brothers album.

I never play the song without a thought for our friends Vili and Koto. If you're cruising YouTube I hope you see this, it's for you.

I included "Isa Lei" on my "Kaleponi" CD, and recently returned the song to my active repertoire thanks to a request by a friend. I played the song when I opened for Led Kaapana on his January 2010 tour of Northern California. This video is from the show at the beautiful new Freight and Salvage Coffeehouse, now transformed into a luxurious 400 seat theater in downtown Berkeley, CA. Led and I played the last week of the old Freight so it was quite a thrill to put our names on the wall of the green room at the new space. http://www.thefreight.org

This video is comprised of shots from three cameras and an audio track kindly provided by Allen Lam, the FOH engineer from heaven who often works at the Freight. http://www.allenlam.com I placed the Kodak Zi8 on the stage for the back and audience shot. The Sanyo Xacti HD2000 was halfway back in the house, at the mixing desk. And Tony Yamamoto http://www.yamamotoguitar.com/ shot my Lumix TS1 handheld from the front row. This is the first clip I've edited in the wonderful Edius Neo Booster NLE. It's handling the heavy compression of Panasonic AVCHD on my Lenovo X200 laptop with barely a stutter. I still have a lot to learn in all directions, but it's a lot more fun exploring in this environment than my previous PE7.

The guitar is my faithful Kathy Wingert Model E http://www.wingertguitars.com , with a B-Band AST pickup straight into the Freight's DI. The echo on the track was provided by the board and the room. The tuning is taropatch, or open G.

From low strings to high: D G D G B D

Please stop by http://www.kaleponi.com for news, links, and free music downloads.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• slack
• key
• guitar
• hawaiian
• music
• kaleponi
• acoustic
• kathy
• wingert
• Panasonic
• Lumix
• TS1
• Sanyo
• Xacti
• HD2000
• Kodak
• Zi8
• Edius
• Neo

[LammaDogLover]

Fiji is no part of Polynesia hence it is not a Polynesian song. Try Melanesia.

[franguidry]

@LammaDogLover Man, do I feel dumb. Thanks for this info.

Fran

[erikahpolly1]

Bless! that was beautiful! from Christchurch, New Zealand.

[franguidry]

@erikahpolly1 I really appreciate your visiting and commenting. Thank you.

Fran

[dalesmth1]

Fran, I had to come back here to see, and hear you play again. If you are Ever in Houston, Tx, please let me know..

[franguidry]

@dalesmth1 Thanks, Dale, that's very kind of you. If I make it to TX I'll be in touch.

Fran

[olu143]

Very smooth and easy on the ears. =)

[franguidry]

@limerot Oh, but the way, I much prefer the Baggs Anthem dual source that I recently installed in another guitar. It is my favorite of all the pickups I've ever used.

Fran

[franguidry]

@limerot Thanks very much, all the best to you. Any of my videos with the sunburst guitar plugged in is showing off the same pickup, especially those from the "Aloha Friday" series.

Fran

[limerot]

This was nice! Very pleasing sound and playing. And thanks for informing on the pickup you used. I was searching for a recording with this mic, and I must say, your post is a blueprint on how people should use youtube. Very best regards from Norway!