KFC, the popular Hawaiian music trio of Keith and Carmen U’ilani Haugen and Hawaii pakini master Frank Uehara, will perform a free concert at 7 p.m. Friday, July 20, at the Banyan Drive Cafe in Uncle Billy’s Hilo Bay Hotel. They will be joined by steel guitarist Dwight Tokumoto of Laupahoehoe.
KFC, the popular Hawaiian music trio of Keith and Carmen U‘ilani Haugen and Hawaii pakini master Frank Uehara, will perform a free concert at 7 p.m. Friday, July 20, at the Banyan Drive Cafe in Uncle Billy’s Hilo Bay Hotel. They will be joined by steel guitarist Dwight Tokumoto of Laupahoehoe.
The concert is open to the public on a first-come, first-seated basis.
The Haugens, who performed 35 years in Waikiki, including 17 years at the prestigious Royal Hawaiian Hotel, will be in Hilo for the biennial reunion of Carmen’s ohana Kauaua, which will be held Saturday and Sunday, July 21-22, at Wailoa State Park.
“We decided that, since we were going to be in Hilo, we might as well do a concert for our family, friends and fans in East Hawaii,” said Carmen, who traces her ancestry to Liloa, a Hawaii alii in the days before Kamehameha the Great. Carmen is noted hula dancer and teacher; Keith, a composer and language teacher.
Uehara has been in the fore in the renaissance of the pakini (washtub bass) for more than 30 years. He has conducted workshops teaching musicians how to make and play the pakini.