Daniel "Kika Kila" Tremblay Is "Passionate" About the Hawaiian Guitar

August 22, 2024 • Gustav Larsson • News

A lovely swaying Hawaiian electric guitar sound in the middle of Waikīkī beach in Honolulu. That makes Kvällsstunden's reporter stop. Daniel Tremblay offers a free quick lesson and we get the history of the Hawaiian guitar in the bargain.

It is wonderfully nice at Waikīkī in Honolulu, O‘ahu. 25 degrees and a light breeze that cools. The water is crystal clear and many young people are out surfing the famous waves. In this setting are heard the notes of Aloha ‘Oe – an old Hawaiian classic; a folk song that was written by Princess Lili‘uokalani in the 1870s and that we have heard both with and without lyrics in the recording of many dance orchestras here in Sweden.

But now it's Daniel Tremblay in Waikīkī who plays.

"I am not Hawaiian by birth, but in my heart I feel like one! Hawai‘i has an ability to penetrate your soul," he says.

Daniel says that he and his wife were married here in Hawai‘i twenty years ago, in connection with a cruise to all the islands; O‘ahu, Maui, Hawai‘i, Kaua‘i, Molokai and Lana‘i.

"And we said 'wow!, we loved it."

So Mr. and Mrs. Tremblay started coming here on vacation for two weeks. It soon became four weeks at a time, and finally three months. Now it's nine months of the year. They are only back in New Hampshire three months a year, to visit children and grandchildren.

"I am a born-again Hawaiian!"

Daniel Tremblay knows the world like a Hawaiian, but is from New Hampshire

Daniel Tremblay spends almost the entire year on Waikīkī beach in Hawaii

Daniel Tremblay has been playing and playing Hawaiian guitar here in Waikīkī for seven years.

"Many people think of country & western when they hear steel guitar, but steel guitar actually comes from Hawai‘i from the beginning," he says.

He claims that "Kīkā Kila" is the Hawaiian word for hawaiigitarr/Hawaiian steel guitar. And that is also what Daniel is called by many. His Hawaiian name is thus Kika Kila, for his great contribution in spreading the interest in Hawaiian guitar. He is a real ambassador and he also manufactures these – from ordinary guitars.

Hawaiian guitar is also called lap steel guitar "and is a form of steel guitar that does not have pedals and it is played in a horizontal position in the musician's lap," Daniel shows. The guitar is played with the help of a playing steel, which he takes out and places across the strings and pulls along them. That's how the special steplessly sliding, singing sound – that so many people love – arises, and the reason why it's called steel guitar.

Many of us probably associate Hawaiian guitar with the Swede Yngve Stoor, so it's no wonder that you think of Sailor's Christmas in Hawai‘i when you try to play a little, here in Waikīkī.

"In 1885, the Hawaiian guitar was invented when an eleven-year-old boy named Joseph Kekuku was playing an ordinary guitar while walking along a railway track and happened to see a piece of metal on the ground, perhaps a railway nail," says Daniel.

He tells the family that little Joseph put the piece of metal on the guitar and then got that swaying sound, and so he shows.

At this time there were no metal strings, so little Jospeh put piano strings on the guitar. It was very inventive. He used the back of a pocketknife and sometimes a steel comb. And got such a nice sound. He eventually went to his school, Kamehameha School for Boys, and their machine shop, making game steels.

"It's the playing steel that makes us call it a steel guitar, that's the only reason," says Daniel Tremblay.

Many of us probably associate Hawaiian guitar with the Swede Yngve Stoor, so it's no wonder that you think of Sailor's Christmas in Hawai‘i when you try to play a little, here in Honolulu.

All over Waikīkī people were playing this instrument – Hawaiian lap steel guitar – at the turn of the century 1900. Thanks to Joseph Kekuku that is. In 1904, the then 30-year-old Kekuku brought the Hawaiian guitar to the mainland and toured the United States. When he came to the south and hillbilly areas with a lot of country & western, people loved this instrument! So he taught them to play the Hawaiian guitar.

"Hawaiians are generous. It's the Aloha spirit. They don't expect anything in return," says Daniel and goes on to tell us that in the interwar period, Joseph Kekuku took it with him to the world: Australia, Germany, Russia… But the guitar was not yet electrified. The Hawaiian guitar was actually a bit too quiet, which is why it was later electrified. In fact, the first electrified instrument in the entire world was just a Hawaiian guitar. Indeed. The year was 1934.

Daniel Tremblay is not so much for the most touristy Hawaiian music, but loves the authentic.

"True Hawaiians play their music in the background. They play it for their own pleasure and not for the tourists.

"But there are some wonderful Hawaiian 'steelguitarists' who also play for the tourists but still manage to keep it authentic," says Daniel.

"One of them is Bobby Ingano. He is a real honest guy, and the most beautiful Hawaiian guitar player you will ever hear. And he has a heart as big as the whole world!

Daniel ranks "'Steel Reflections' as one of Ingano's best CDs, and 'Sleepwalk' is the favorite song.

"Bobby always takes the time to talk to someone and says that we have to play from the heart. If you do, people will love your music. And it is so true as it is said!" he says and smiles.

We leave Daniel "Kika Kila" Tremblay who once again plays Aloha ‘Oe who after a while fades into the crowd here in Waikīkī.