All That Jazz… And Scholarships, Too
by John Burnett
as printed in the Hawai'i Island Journal of May 1-16 2004
It's been a busy
spring for the good folks at the Hamakua Music Festival. The
festival's inaugural jazz weekend - and a four-day weekend at that -
is Thursday through Sunday, May 13-16, 2004.
There are so many
great things about HMF, including the concerts, the music teaching
position funded at Pa'auilo and Honoka'a Elementary Schools and, of
course, the scholarships for talented Big Island high school
musicians. But another major plus is the fact that the young
scholarship applicants not only play a public recital for the
scholarship committee judges, the winners also have the opportunity to
play a song or two to open the HMF's concerts, gaining valuable
onstage experience and reaching audiences that most would normally
have no access to.
This year's
first-place winner is 'ukulele/guitar player Brittni Paiva, who
received a $1,500 HMF scholarship. Pianist Felix Ko and vocalist
Juliana Greenlaw took the second place $900 check. Third place and
$500 went to pianist Tito Jankowski and guitarist/vocalist Alicia
Maher. Runners-up, who received $200 each, were flutist Lauren
Carvalho, xylophonist Erika Ichihara and vocalist Augusto Gancinia II.
Trumpeter Natasha Taketa received a $100 honorable mention.
For Paiva, a
15-year-old home-schooled 10th grader and the daughter of LeAnn and
Gerald Paiva of Hilo, this is nothing new. She has been a musician
since age four and has studied both piano and opera vocals in addition
to her current string instruments. She won the Fearless Hawaiian
Enterprises Jumping Flea 'Ukulele Competition a couple of years ago.
Her current guitar instructor is slack-key master Keoki Kahumoku, who
accompanied Paiva during her performance of "He Aloha No O Honolulu,"
"Tico Tico" and "Malaguena" on ukulele. She started "Ewalu" on 'uke
and then switched over to guitar during the piece and finished her set
with "Slack Key No. 1."
"Her work was so
accurate, so fluid and precise, that she's going to be a virtuoso if
she keeps it up," said soprano and UH-Hilo vocal instructor Melanie
Robinson, one of this year's judges. "I don't remember exactly what it
was she said when she was asked how much she practiced, but it was
either four or six hours a day. Everybody laughed. She's so young. I
think that really stood out.
"One of the very
impressive pieces she played, she had made her own arrangement of it.
The thing that impressed me about it was how serious she was. And
then, when she smiled at one point, her face just lit up. It was a
delightful thing to see this brilliant smile on a young woman who is
very serious. She has to be serious to practice as much as she does,
but she still seemed to have a lot of fun with her stuff." Robinson,
by the way, was Paiva's opera teacher. "That was fun, too," she said.
"Brittni is such a good musician and she has a beautiful, sweet little
voice. Again, she was a serious student. When I would tell her
something, she would really listen. I think there were possibilities
there for her as a singer, but I think she's made her choice, that she
wanted to go with the stringed instruments."
It appears to be a
good choice. Paiva, who hopes to land a recording deal in the next
year or so, will open the Caymmi-Lettau show. Setting the stage for
international acts may be something new, but she's no stranger to Big
Island audiences, having played the Big Island Hawaiian Music Festival
last year at the Hilo Civic Auditorium (she'll play there again in
mid-July). She has also opened for a number of top Hawai'i performers,
most recently at the George Kahumoku, Jr.-Daniel Ho concert at Aloha
Theatre that also featured veteran Kona slack-key guitarist Chris
Yeaton.
"It's so nice,
because all of these performers have been so gracious to her," LeAnn
Paiva said. "Just to be backstage with all these other performers and
see how they go about their business has been really good for her.
She's also attended a lot of slack key camps where she was the only
child. All the rest are adults. I just sit back and marvel."
Copyright © 2004 Hawaii Island Publishing, Ltd. All rights
reserved.
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