Every year, halau from throughout the isles converge on Moanalua Gardens for the Prince Lot Hula Festival, the largest noncompetitive hula event in the state.

At the opening ceremonies this year, the Moanalua Gardens Foundation will give out the Kukui o Lota award to three respected kupuna in recognition of their contributions to the perpetuation of hula.

The recipients are kumu hula and Hawaiian language specialist Edith Kawelohea McKinzie, 86, kumu hula Pat Namaka Bacon, 92, and master Hawaiian chanter James Ka‘upena Wong, 82.

Kumu hula Manu Boyd has composed a special mele hula as a tribute to the three honorees, which will be performed at the festival for the first time ever.

The Kukui o Lota award — a hand-polished kukui nut pendant — has been given out to only nine individuals: Herman von Holt, Beatrice Krauss, Lokomaika‘iokalani Snakenberg, Saul Price, Lorin Gill, sisters Harriet "Haku" Damon Baldwin and Frances "Patches" Damon, Stephen Harris and Nalani Olds.

The Star-Advertiser chatted with all three kupuna, who will be present at the festival this year to receive their awards.

PAT NAMAKA BACON

Though Auntie Pat Namaka Bacon, 92, is known as a source of knowledge for Hawaiian language and culture, few may know she was put up for adoption by the Hawaiian Humane Society.

Yet that very adoption would set her on a lifetime path of hula.

Bacon’s mother died two months after she was born in February 1920 in Waimea, Kauai. At the time, the Humane Society in Hono­lulu handled the adoption of children as well as animals, and an ad was placed in the Pacific Commercial Advertiser seeking a home for the infant.

Hawaiian history scholar Mary Kawena Pukui was the only one who answered the ad, and her family adopted the baby girl.

Bacon is of Japanese ancestry but exhibited a natural talent and fondness for hula at an early age. She was trained by Pukui as well as noted Kauai hula master Keahi Luahine Gomes, Joseph Ilalaole and Hattie McFarlane.

Bacon never had a formal halau, but has taught hula workshops both here and abroad and judged the Merrie Monarch Festival and other competitions. As a cultural resource specialist for the Bishop Museum, she spent years transcribing and translating oral histories recorded by Pukui. She is still sought out for her encyclopedic knowledge of Hawaiian language, culture, hula and chant.

Today Bacon is still happy to share her hula knowledge with those who seek her out. She last judged Merrie Monarch in 2010 and spends most of her time in the garden and with family.

Bacon said judging is not easy because different hula schools have their own traditions and styles, and there is no right or wrong. But the meaning behind the mele must not get lost, she said.

"Sometimes they are dancing about beautiful flowers but doing something else with their hands," she said.

Though Bacon no longer performs or judges, her daughter Mary "Dodie" Browne said she sometimes catches her mother humming and moving her hands in hula gestures at the dinner table.

EDITH KAWELOHEA MCKINZIE

Edith Kawelohea McKinzie, 86, is an author, respected expert in Hawaiian genealogy and oli (chant), and former director of Bishop Museum’s Hawaiian Language Newspaper Indexing and Cataloging Project who still gets up to dance hula from time to time at family birthday parties.

She was born on Fort Street in Hono­lulu to a close-knit Hawaiian and Portuguese family keen on Hawaiian-style hospitality, food and music.

The McKinley High School graduate went on to get a bachelor’s degree in Hawaiian studies and a master’s in education, curriculum and instruction from the University of Hawaii. She was the first Hawaiian studies professor at Hono­lulu Community College, a post she held from 1978 to 1997.

McKinzie is the author of "Hawaiian Genealogies," volumes 1 and 2. Volume 3 is being edited.

As a kumu hula, she began her formal training with Joseph Ilalaole and later studied and performed with Eleanor Hiram Hoke and Hoakalei Kamau‘u. McKinzie studied chant and oli under Edith Kanaka‘ole and Pele Pukui Suganuma (Mary Kawena Pukui’s daughter).

She taught hula throughout Hawaii, Midway Island, Guam, Alaska and western Massachusetts and has judged many competitions including the Merrie Monarch Festival.

The meaning behind the words in a mele must not get lost, said McKinzie, who emphasized Hawaiian language as the foundation of hula.

"You want the meaning of the words that you are dancing," she said.

JAMES KA‘UPENA WONG

At 82, James Ka‘upena Wong Jr. is still out and about. He takes a walk twice a day from his beachside cottage in Makaha and loves to talk story and tell jokes.

Wong, one of Hawaii’s most revered chanters and master of ancient Hawaiian instruments, still has a voice that is clear and strong.

He grew up in Kaimuki and Kapahulu. His father was Hawaiian-Chinese and his mother Hawaiian-Caucasian. He describes the family of five as a Christian, middle-class family that loved American popular tunes, classic Hawaiian songs and hymns.

After graduating from Kamehameha School for Boys, Wong earned a bachelor’s degree in political sciences from Coe College in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, which later bestowed him with an honorary doctoral degree.

He studied chant with Mary Kawena Pukui and called her "Puna" (a spring, or water source) because she was his spring of knowledge.

"The range of insights into the Hawaiian culture she shared with me were breathtaking and awe-inspiring," he said. "Our conversations were just wonderful."

Later he became a chanter and drummer for Pukui’s daughter, Pele Pukui Suganuma, and learned hula from Tom Hiona.

He’s been the narrator for many films and a judge for the Merrie Monarch Festival and other hula competitions. He still composes Hawaiian chants and songs.

"In kahiko (ancient-style hula) the more important thing is the mele itself," he said. "The hula is a vehicle to help you understand that mele."

What strikes him these days, he says, is the universality of Hawaiian chant and hula. The mele today are more beautiful than when he first learned them, he said, revealing messages that transcend cultural boundaries.

When he listens to Bach, he gets the same feeling.

"I think I’ve concluded that hula is still evolving and it is a motivating force that inspires the creativity in all humankind," said Wong.