Images of Old Hawaiʻi

  • Home
  • About
  • Archive
    • Ali’i / Chiefs / Governance
    • Buildings
    • Economy
    • Missionaries / Churches / Religious Buildings
    • General
    • Hawaiian Traditions
    • Military
    • Place Names
    • Prominent People
    • Schools
    • Sailing, Shipping & Shipwrecks
  • Contact
  • Subscribe

August 11, 2018 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

‘Door to the Heart of the People’

“One turns from the study of old genealogies, myths, and traditions of the Hawaiians with a hungry despair at finding in them means so small for picturing the people themselves, their human interests and passions …”

“… but when it comes to the hula and the whole train of feelings and sentiments that made their entrances and exits in the halau (the hall of the hula) one perceives that in this he has found the door to the heart of the people.”

“So intimate and of so simple confidence are the revelations the people make of themselves in their songs and prattlings that when one undertakes to report what he has heard and to translate into the terms of modern speech what he has received in confidence, as it were, he almost blushes, as if he had been guilty of spying on Adam and Eve in their nuptial bower.”

“Alas, if one could but muffle his speech with the unconscious lisp of infancy, or veil and tone his picture to correspond to the perspective of antiquity, he might feel at least that, like Watteau, he had dealt worthily, if not truly, with that ideal age which we ever think of as the world’s garden period.”

“For an account of the first hula we may look to the story of Pele. On one occasion that goddess begged her sisters to dance and sing before her, but they all excused themselves, saying they did not know the art.”

“At that moment in came little Hiiaka, the youngest and the favorite. Unknown to her sisters, the little maiden had practised the dance under the tuition of her friend, the beautiful but ill-fated Hopoe.”

“When banteringly invited to dance, to the surprise of all, Hiiaka modestly complied. The wave-beaten sand-beach was her floor, the open air her hall; Feet and hands and swaying form kept time to her improvisation:”

“Look, Puna is a dance in the wind;
The palm groves of Kea-au shaken.
Haena and the woman Hopoe dance and sing
On the beach Nana-huki,
A dance of purest delight,
Down by the sea Nana-huki.”

“The most telling record of a people’s intimate life is the record which it unconsciously makes in its songs. This record which the Hawaiian people have left of themselves is full and specific.”

“When, therefore, we ask what emotions stirred the heart of the old-time Hawaiian as he approached the great themes of life and death, of ambition and jealousy, of sexual passion, of romantic love, of conjugal love, and parental love …”

“… what his attitude toward nature and the dread forces of earthquake and storm, and the mysteries of spirit and the hereafter, we shall find our answer in the songs and prayers and recitations of the hula.”

“The hula, it is true, has been unfortunate in the mode and manner of its introduction to us moderns.”

“An institution of divine, that is, religious, origin, the hula in modern times has wandered so far and fallen so low that foreign and critical esteem has come to associate it with the riotous and passionate ebullitions of Polynesian kings and the amorous posturing of their voluptuaries.”

“We must make a just distinction, however, between the gestures and bodily contortions presented by the men and women, the actors in the hula, and their uttered words. ‘The voice is Jacob’s voice, but the hands are the hands of Esau.’”

“In truth, the actors in the hula no longer suit the action to the word.”

“The utterance harks back to the golden age; the gesture is trumped up by the passion of the hour, or dictated by the master of the hula, to whom the real meaning of the old bards is ofttimes a sealed casket.”

“Whatever indelicacy attaches in modern times to some of the gestures and contortions of the hula dancers, the old-time hula songs in large measure were untainted with grossness.”

“If there ever were a Polynesian Arcadia, and if it were possible for true reports of the doings and sayings of the Polynesians to reach us from that happy land …”

“… reports of their joys and sorrows, their love-makings and their jealousies, their family spats and reconciliations, their worship of beauty and of the gods and goddesses who walked in the garden of beauty …”

“… we may say, I think, that such a report would be in substantial agreement with the report that is here offered; but, if one’s virtue will not endure the love-making of Arcadia, let him banish the myth from his imagination and hue to a convent or a nunnery.” (All here is from Nathaniel Bright Emerson, a son of missionaries.)

Follow Peter T Young on Facebook 

Follow Peter T Young on Google+ 

Follow Peter T Young on LinkedIn  

Follow Peter T Young on Blogger

© 2018 Hoʻokuleana LLC

Danse_des_femmes_dans_les_iles_Sandwich._Dess._et_lith._par_Choris._Lith._de_Langlume-1816
Danse_des_femmes_dans_les_iles_Sandwich._Dess._et_lith._par_Choris._Lith._de_Langlume-1816
Danse_des_hommes_dans_les_iles_Sandwich._Lith.e_par_Franquelin_d'apres_Choris._Lith._de_Langlume_i_de_l'Abbaye._Paris,_1822
Danse_des_hommes_dans_les_iles_Sandwich._Lith.e_par_Franquelin_d’apres_Choris._Lith._de_Langlume_i_de_l’Abbaye._Paris,_1822
Jean_Augustin_Franquelin_(after_Louis_Choris),_Danse_des_femmes_dans_les_iles_Sandwich_(1822)
Jean_Augustin_Franquelin_(after_Louis_Choris),_Danse_des_femmes_dans_les_iles_Sandwich_(1822)

Filed Under: Hawaiian Traditions, Missionaries / Churches / Religious Buildings Tagged With: Hawaii, Hula, Nathaniel Bright Emerson, Nathaniel Emerson

June 28, 2016 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Muses of Hawai‘i

Hawaiian Mission Houses Historic Site and Archives recently produced another Cemetery Pupu Theatre event at Oʻahu Cemetery – Muses of Hawai‘i.

It’s a unique dinner theatre experience where history comes alive for the evening, brought to you by Mission Houses and Oʻahu Cemetery.

Mission Houses discovers stories from the lives of prominent Hawaiʻi residents and brings those stories back to life – in the cemetery, at the place where that person is buried.

Muses of Hawai‘i – the current version of ‘dinner theatre in a cemetery’ is focused on a small sample of people – historians and authors, a dramatist and actor, a museum curator, and a musician – who have contributed to the humanities in the history of Hawai‘i.

These characters all speak from their own perspectives about the same place and approximate time. These people all knew one another, or at least knew about one another, and often had something to say about each other.

See if you can catch their references to each other during their performances.

Standing at five different headstones, actors perform a monologue of the lives of the people buried at Oʻahu Cemetery.

Actors are dressed in period costume, telling the life events of select individuals, at their respective grave sites.

There was nothing ghoulish about it; rather, it was very effective storytelling.

Johnny Noble (Portrayed by Zach Thomas Woods)

Johnny Noble (1892-1944,) who took his inspiration from Sonny Cunha, who created hapa haole music in 1900 by mixing traditional Hawaiian music with American ragtime. Noble took Cunha’s idea a step further and mixed Hawaiian music with jazz and blues with for a new style of hapa haole music.

Critics said it degraded and commercialized Hawaiian music, but audiences loved it. “Sing Me a Song of Hawaii,” “My Little Grass Shack,” “Hula Blues,” and “Hawaiian War Chant” are among some of his most recognizable songs. He also recorded hundreds of traditional Hawaiian songs. (Wayne Paakaula is the Ukulele player.)

Ethel Damon (Portrayed by Alicia Rice)

Ethel Moseley Damon (1883 – 1965) authored several plays including Punahou’s 75th Anniversary Pageant and The Romance of Reality: A Historical Play in Two Acts, a centennial missionary memorial play.

She also authored Samuel Chenery Damon (a biography of her grandfather), Early Hawaiian Churches and Their Manner of Building, and her seminal history of Kaua‘i Koamalu: A Story of Pioneers on Kauai.

Thomas Thrum (Portrayed by Eli Foster)

Thomas Thrum (1842 – 1932) operated a book and stationery store. In 1875 he produced the first issue of Hawaiian Almanac and Annual which is commonly referred to as Thrum’s Annual.

He was the first editor of Paradise of the Pacific in 1888 and published several collections of Hawaiian legends and several publications on Hawaiian heiau.

Emma Nakuina (Portrayed by Kahana Ho)

Emma Nakuina (1847 – 1929) was the first woman curator of a museum in Hawai‘i. She became curatrix of the Hawaiian National Museum in the Judicial Building during Kalakaua’s reign and authored Hawaii: Its People and Their Legends and Ancient Hawaiian Water Rights and Some Customs Pertaining to Them, among many others.

Nathaniel Emerson (Portrayed by Christopher Denton)

Nathaniel B. Emerson (1839 – 1915) was a physician, author, and husband of Dr. Sarah Emerson. He was the author of The Unwritten Literature of Hawaii: the Sacred Songs of the Hula; and Pele and Hiʻiaka: A Myth from Hawai‘i.

This Cemetery Pupu Theatre was researched by Mike Smola, script was written by Zach Thomas Woods, wardrobe by Peggy Krock and directed by William Haʻo.

The next Mission Houses program, 5:30 – 8 pm, Saturday, July 16, 2016, will be the ‘Aloha Ho‘oipoipo’ portion of Mission Houses ‘Na Mele Aloha’ series ($30 each in advance, or $35 at door.) (To be held at Mission Houses.)

This performance will explore romantic love through songs, mele ho‘oipoipo, both those which openly reveal the individuals in such a relationship and those songs which use kaona or hidden meanings to obscure the specific relationships.

Click HERE to make your reservation for 5:30 – 8 pm, Saturday, July 16, 2016,  ‘Na Mele Aloha’ series ‘Aloha Ho‘oipoipo’:

Check out the Mission Houses website for future programs and events, as well as the many other activities at the historic site on King and Kawaiahaʻo Streets. Click HERE.

Follow Peter T Young on Facebook 

Follow Peter T Young on Google+ 

Follow Peter T Young on LinkedIn  

Follow Peter T Young on Blogger

© 2016 Hoʻokuleana LLC

Mission Houses Museum - Cemetery Pupu Theatre - Muses of Hawaii
Mission Houses Museum – Cemetery Pupu Theatre – Muses of Hawaii
Johnny Noble (Portrayed by Zach Thomas Woods-Wayne Paakaula on Ukulele)
Johnny Noble (Portrayed by Zach Thomas Woods-Wayne Paakaula on Ukulele)
Ethel Damon (Portrayed by Alicia Rice)
Ethel Damon (Portrayed by Alicia Rice)
Thomas Thrum (Portrayed by Eli Foster)
Thomas Thrum (Portrayed by Eli Foster)
Emma Nakuina (Portrayed by Kahana Ho)
Emma Nakuina (Portrayed by Kahana Ho)
Nathaniel Emerson (Portrayed by Christopher Denton)
Nathaniel Emerson (Portrayed by Christopher Denton)

Filed Under: Prominent People Tagged With: Cemetery Pupu Theatre, Emma Nakuina, Ethel Damon, Hawaii, Hawaiian Mission Houses Historic Site and Archives, Johnny Noble, Nathaniel Emerson, Thomas Thrum

Images of Old Hawaiʻi

People, places, and events in Hawaiʻi’s past come alive through text and media in “Images of Old Hawaiʻi.” These posts are informal historic summaries presented for personal, non-commercial, and educational purposes.

Info@Hookuleana.com

Connect with Us

  • Email
  • Facebook
  • Google+
  • LinkedIn
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

Recent Posts

  • Pau …
  • Missionary Period
  • Transformation of Waimea, South Kohala, Hawaiʻi
  • St. Andrew’s Priory
  • Kewalo Basin
  • Kamehameha’s Haoles
  • Kolo Wharf

Categories

  • Ali'i / Chiefs / Governance
  • Buildings
  • Economy
  • General
  • Hawaiian Traditions
  • Military
  • Missionaries / Churches / Religious Buildings
  • Place Names
  • Prominent People
  • Sailing, Shipping & Shipwrecks
  • Schools
  • Voyage of the Thaddeus

Tags

American Board of Commissioners of Foreign Missions American Board of Commissioners of Foreign Missions American Protestant Missionaries Bernice Pauahi Bishop Captain Cook Downtown Honolulu Hawaii Hawaii Island Henry Opukahaia Hilo Hiram Bingham Hiram Bingham Honolulu Honolulu Harbor Iolani Palace Kaahumanu Kailua Kailua-Kona Kalakaua Kalanimoku Kamehameha Kamehameha Kamehameha III Kamehameha IV Kauai Kauikeaouli Keopuolani King Kalakaua Kona Lahaina Lahainaluna Lanai Liholiho Liliuokalani Maui Missionaries Oahu Pearl Harbor Punahou Queen Emma Queen Liliuokalani Sugar thevoyageofthethaddeus Volcano Waikiki

Hoʻokuleana LLC

Hoʻokuleana LLC is a Planning and Consulting firm assisting property owners with Land Use Planning efforts, including Environmental Review, Entitlement Process, Permitting, Community Outreach, etc. We are uniquely positioned to assist you in a variety of needs.

Info@Hookuleana.com

Never miss a post

Get future posts straight to your inbox by subscribing below.

Copyright © 2012-2016 Peter T Young, Hoʻokuleana LLC