Studio transformed into base to share local music online

What to do with an unused production studio?

Jon Brekke was asking himself that several months ago as he looked at the Island Film Group studio in Halawa. Maybe the space could be used for something music-related, given his experience in producing and directing the "Hawaiian Classics" music series for Oceanic Time Warner Cable’s OC16 channel and the Kokua for Japan telethon concert held on the grounds of the Hilton Hawaiian Village in April 2011.

"And then an idea came quickly to me," he said. "How about giving indie singer-songwriters an opportunity to show what they could do in an intimate setting? I had a feeling that this ‘blank’ studio would be good for sound."

Brekke’s first test involved Melanie Blades, the girlfriend of fellow filmmaker and friend Andrew Magpoc, who sang an original song of Brekke’s — "Lullaby" — accompanied by acoustic guitarist Michael Tanenbaum and violinist Leslie Kline. The somber tune has a solid and flattering sound mix, something that can be said for the additional acts that have followed and are part of the Soul Sessions USA channel on YouTube, available today via HonoluluPulse.com.

New videos are added weekly.

The impressive lineup of artists who have stopped by the studio so far include Makana, Sing the Body, the Erika Elona Band, Ginai, Johnny Helm, Siaosi and Christina Gomes.

The launch of the channel in October coincided with three shows aired on KITV.

"The shows were to help boost the online effort," said local radio host and recording artist Kevin Jones, who co-hosted the program with fellow radio personality Kathy "with a K" Nakagawa.

"I’m a general freak for local music, and what Jon is doing is a visual confirmation of the music that I’m hearing," Jones said. "The paradigm has changed from just Hawaiian music. I like what Leah Bernstein of Mountain Apple Co. recently said, that the music of Hawaii is more inclusive of different genres. Songs talk more about the emotions and experiences of living here in the islands.

"Hawaii has always been this bedrock of talent — from the punk and New Wave years of the Squids, Hat Makes the Man and Oriental Love Ring, to the advent of the singer-songwriters like Cecilio & Kapono, which was massive here.

"The current groundswell of talent doesn’t fit within the regular box of Hawaiian music," Jones said. "It’s not just palm trees and slide guitar."

Now in a business partnership with Blades, Brekke said that "in the first several months of the channel’s launch, we’ve landed roughly 11,500 hits with viewership in 90 countries." The channel’s online reach is expected to expand with Soul Sessions USA’s partnership with Honolulu Pulse, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser’s entertainment website and a two-time finalist in Editor and Publisher’s international EPPY Awards contest for best media-affiliated websites.

The videos don’t advertise that they are shot in Hawaii.

"It’s meant to look like it could’ve come from anywhere. It’s a multiple-camera setup using an intimate microphone system, using boom and wireless. This is a better setting to present the music, rather than depending on noisy bar performances. It just shows what a little bit of TLC can do to make the music that much better," Brekke said.

And Brekke is hoping to spread that tender loving care to the rest of the country — the channel isn’t called Soul Sessions USA for nothing.

Also starting today, Brekke and Blades will launch a Kickstarter online crowd-funding project with a $100,000 goal, hoping to attract the involvement of musicians from 10 U.S. cities and "build an independent grass-roots movement," according to Brekke.

"We hope to raise $10,000 per city from places like Nashville, Austin, New York, Los Angeles and Portland. Our production crew will go to the cities and work with 10 musicians, each doing 10 tunes, and gathering 100 new songs for the channel. We hope that within a couple of months of reaching our funding goal, we can start sometime in March.

"We want to see artists glow and come alive under this format," Brekke said.