Kaleiu’i Hosaka said she’s not sure which will be more amazing: sharing the culture of her beloved island home with her fellow Kamehameha Concert Glee Club members, or learning about their homelands. Both will be happening at the Kauai Community
Kaleiu’i Hosaka said she’s not sure which will be more amazing: sharing the culture of her beloved island home with her fellow Kamehameha Concert Glee Club members, or learning about their homelands.
Both will be happening at the Kauai Community College Performing Arts Center on April 9, where the glee club will be presenting “Kulaiwi: Our Home,” a multi-faceted performance experience showcasing Hawaii’s culture.
“There will be dancing, storytelling, narration and everything in between,” Hosaka said. “We’re all from different islands, and you’re going to hear stories of what our homes mean to us.”
Hosaka, who is this year’s president of the 80-member strong Kamehameha Concert Glee Club, said the group has been working on the show since the beginning of the 2015 school year.
“Everyone has been teaching us about certain songs that will benefit our concert and now, in this last month, we’re blocking our whole show,” Hosaka said. “It’s taken the whole school year to put this together.”
Within the concert glee club, there are roughly eight kids that are from Kauai and each of those kids will have a piece of the spotlight.
“We’ll feature a few of our own island kids and that’ll be pretty fun,” Hosaka said. “The whole thing is songs of our homeland and the concert is interactive — the audience will get a sense of every island.”
Hosaka has been part of the glee club for the past five years and said usually students audition for the group at the end of their freshman year. Then those students that are accepted are in the group throughout the rest of their time in high school.
Involvement in the club actually comes with a performing arts credit, so those who get into the group take glee club as a class. Girls and boys take separate classes, Hosaka said, which makes learning complicated choral pieces a challenge.
“We all learn our music separately in our own respective classes and then we put it together in rehearsals once a week,” Hosaka said. “So it’s unique because of all of our choral arrangements.”
Kamehameha Concert Glee Club travels annually throughout the globe on tours and Hosaka has performed in places like New Zealand during her involvement in the group.
“It’s been a while since Concert Glee came to Kauai for a tour,” Hosaka said. “It’s really exciting.”
