Island Mele: Kane follows in teachers’ footsteps on ‘Old Soul’

Valley Island born and raised, Mika Kane discovered the ukulele when he was 13; he embraced it with such commitment that his father bought him his first Kamaka less than a year later.

Kane’s interest in music took him from Maui to the University of Hawaii-Manoa, where he majored in music, studied topics ranging from classical music theory to musical analysis, and became a student of Byron Yasui — a UH professor who is a master of both the ukulele and the acoustic bass.

With “Old Soul,” Kane displays his confidence as a solo instrumentalist and the breadth of his musical horizons. The 10 songs he chose for his musical calling card represent several eras in American music, and draw on the works of English and Japanese song writers as well. Most quickly register as well-loved standards.

“Misty,” first recorded as an instrumental by composer Erroll Garner before lyrics were added, has been a pop standard for more than 60 years. Kane does a beautiful job with the familiar melody but breaks with tradition by adding a decidedly uptempo passage in the middle.

Two Beatles songs, “Something” and “Yesterday,” written by George Harrison and Lennon-McCartney respectively, are also instantly recognizable, and nicely personalized.

Kane expands the song list to include 20th century hapa-haole music with a nicely played arrangement of Andy Cummings’ musical signature, “Waikiki.” In view of the ukulele’s Hawaiian’s origins, it’s appropriate for Kane to include an island standard.

The most challenging choice in terms of being farthest removed from the original hit version is Kane’s one-man arrangement of “Bohemian Rhapsody,” Freddie Mercury’s best-known contribution to the Queen songbook. Queen’s original will always be definitive, but Kane makes the melody work for him as an acoustic instrumental. He creeps softly into the familiar melody, takes a detour or two from Mercury’s musical road map, and then fires it up as expected.

The least familiar choice for most Americans is “Tsunami,” written by Keisuke Kawata for his group, the Southern All-Stars, one of the supergroups of Japanese rock.

One of the most noteworthy “behind the scenes” things about the album is Kane’s decision to have five men who inspired his interest in the instrument do the arrangements. Jake Shimabukuro was Kane’s arranger on four songs, Yasui on three, and Benny Chong, Herb Ohta Jr., and Kalei Gamiao did one each. Perhaps it’s indicative of his arrangers’ diverse interests that Shimabukuro did the arrangements for “Something” and “Bohemian Rhapsody,” Ohta did “Tsunami,” the only Japanese song on the album, and Gamiao, the youngest of the five arrangers, arranged “Kiss From A Rose,” the American pop hit that is of the most recent vintage.

Visit mikakane.com.

“OLD SOUL”

Mika Kane (The Oasis Studios)