Sweet Hollywaiians European Tour January 2010

Sweet Hollywaiians: European Tour January 2010 ( English) Sweet Hollywaiians: Europese Tournee Januari 2010 (Nederlands)

Japanese stringband visits for the first time Holland, Belgium and France.
SWEET HOLLYWAIIANS: EUROPEAN TOUR JANUARY 2010
Hans Koert

The Sweet Hollywaiians is a Japanese string band that plays, as they label it: authentic Hawaiian, swing, ragtime, blues, calypso and Italian music. They will visit this month Europe for the very first time and they will perform in Amsterdam (The Netherlands), Belsele ( near Sint-Niklaas) (Belgium), Lille and Paris (France).

The four members of the band became fascinated collecting recordings made by musicians like Sol Hoopii, King Nawahi, Eddie Lang and Carl Kress. Sol Hoopii and Bennie Nawahi were both Hawaiian born musicians. Sol Hoopii became famous on the lap steel guitar and Nawahi played the slide guitar ( Hawaiian guitar). They moved to California in the 1920s and became famous in the 1930s when the Hawaiian styled music became popular.
Eddie Lang is often labeled as the first jazz guitar player and known for his duets with Joe Venuti and Lonnie Johnson. He passed away in the early 1930s. Carl Kress, together with guitar player Dick McDonough became famous in the 1930s as studio musicians. The Sweet Hollywaiians were fascinated to this easy accesable music: The sounds were so easily to accept and so relaxing, Nobumasa said in an interview. The four members of the band: Tomotaka Matsui, Nobumasa Takada, Takashi Nakayama and Kohichi Tsutsumishita were all individual street musicians in the streets of Osaka when they decided to found the Sweet Hollywaiians, to share their common fascination for this kind of music. The name of the band means "Hollywood styled Hawaiian", Tomotaka explains.

The first year they played together was very hard: It was terrible, Nobumasa sighs, Japanese audiences were not interested in our music at all. The Sweet Hollywaiians in concert with Tom Marion.

Its first recordings were titled Sweet Hollywaiians: 30s Style of Hawaiian Music and Sweet Strings presents the Sweet Hollywaiians; two EP's made for the Japanese market.

In the US the Sweet Hollywaiians were welcome with their music and they performed in numerous meetings, most at the west coast, where they found kindred spirits like Janet Klein (and her Parlor Boys); Robert Armstrong ( from the R. Crumb's Cheap Suit Serenaders); Craig Ventresco; Bill Tapia, the nestor of all Hawaiian musicians and Tom Marion. With the latter they recorded one of their first albums, with the weird and mysterious name: "'Osurdato 'nnammurato", which is, in fact, a Neapolitan song about a soldier in World War I.

The next two records are titled Hula Girl and Maile Swing. The latter has a professional singer, Yumi Ishikawa and was titled Yumi Ishikawa and her Sweet Hollywaiians - unfortunately I've never heard it. Last year the Sweet Hollywaiians released its latest album Ticklin' The Strings, an album with 16 tracks dedicated to the musicians that inspired them to make this kind music: Eddie Lang and Joe Venuti (in Doing Things) and King Nawahi (in My Girl from the South Sea Isles and the title song Ticklin' The Strings). On this album some guest musicians from the Cheap Suit Serenaders, like Robert Armstrong and Tony Marcus, are present in an Italian song Nostalgia.

The Sweet Hollywaiians together with 100+ Bill Tapia.

It is a great pleasure to inform you that these four talented young boys will perform now in Europe for the very first time and I’m sure their music and joy will inspire and fascinate the audience, as this kind of music is not often heard in our regions. Hope to meet you at Belsele or at one of the concerts in Holland or France.

* 21st of January, 2010: Hawaiian Luau by Miss Poodle Wah-Wah
Maison Des Etudiants Campus Universite Lille 1/ Villeneuve d'Ascq, France ( 8:00 pm)
* 22nd of January, 2010 Palm Guitars Presents / Amsterdam, Netherlands ( 8:00 pm)
* 23rd of January, 2010 't Ey / Belsele, Belgium ( 9:00 pm)
* 24th of January, 2010 Dominique Cravic Presents Aux Petits Joueurs (Paris) ( 8:00 pm)

Tell your friends ............

Hans Koert

keepswinging@live.nl

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