Ledward Kaapana will headline the free 33rd Annual Ki Ho‘alu Festival at the Maui Arts & Cultural Center on June 30. Courtesy photo

Acclaimed as one of the Hawaii’s greatest slack key guitarists, Ledward Kaapana will headline the free 33rd Annual Ki Ho’alu Festival at the Maui Arts & Cultural Center on June 30.

The line-up also includes John Cruz, Darrell Aquino, Kevin Brown & Friends, Stephen Inglis, Kamuela Kahoano, Dwight Kanae, Kahiau Lam-Ho, Ian O’Sullivan, Anthony Pfluke, LT Smooth, and Namaka Cosma-White.

One of Hawaii’s most influential musicians, nominated four times for a Grammy Award, Kaapana has won many Na Hoku Hanaohano Awards as a solo artist and as a member of the legendary groups Hui Ohana and I Kona. In 2011, he received the National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage Fellowship for his commitment to revitalizing traditional Hawaiian music.

At 75, he is one of the last of the Hawaiian music greats, still carrying the torch for the culture. “It feels great because I learned from all the ones before me,” says Kaapana. “And now I’m like the last one that’s still alive and passing this on down to the next generation. Every June we have a workshop in Napili, and we teach music, the language, hula, steel guitar, slack key and ukulele. So for me, it’s awesome, and that way I can pass it on. All my nephews, they all play music now. I get some good ones that play and carry on to the next generation.”

Growing up in rural Kalapana on Hawaii Island, he learned music from his parents and uncle Fred Punahoa. “My mom, my dad, uncles, aunties, grandmas, they all played as I was a young child growing up. As I got older and I moved away, I found out that was paradise. I always wanted to get into the big city, because living in Kalapana was the old Hawaiian style of growing up and learning how to live off the land, and everything was hard work. No electricity. So we work every day. We raise animals and music was the important thing for us. That’s all we had besides working every day with the animals and go swimming and cleaning around the house.”

As teenagers, Ledward and his twin brother Nedward with their cousin Dennis Pavao formed Hui Ohana, which was part of the blossoming of the Hawaiian Renaissance in music and culture in the 1970s.

“We all grew up together and played music together growing up in Kalapana,” he continues. “We used to get kanikapila, all the families used to come together and play music. We all kept the tradition going.”

He later formed the trio, I Kona, releasing albums such as the Hoku winning “Jus’ Press.” His acclaimed solo albums included the Hoku Instrumental Album of the Year winners, “Lima Wela” and “Black Sand.” Other albums included “Grandmaster Slack Key” “Jus’ Cruzin’,” where he played autoharp, and “Jus’ Press Vol. 2,” which won a Hoku in 2016 for Ukulele Album of the Year.

Kaapana most recently he played autoharp on Raiatea Helm’s “A Legacy Of Hawaiian Song & String Volume One,” which celebrated Hawaiian music and poetry from the turn of the 19th century, and was nominated for eight Hoku awards.

Among some of his career highlights, he cites the Masters of the Steel String tour which combined blues, Appalachian flat-picking, Hawaiian slack key, dobro, jazz, and rockabilly guitar styles. “I performed with Jerry Douglas, John Cephas, jazz guitar player Tal Farlow, rockabilly Albert Lee, and Wayne Henderson,” he explains. “We did it three years in a row. We traveled all over sharing the culture.”

Loving playing Hawaiian slack key guitar, he enjoys how “it brings a lot of love and feelings to everyone, the music itself. Every time I travel, when I’m at the airport I always take my guitar out while waiting for my flight. All the people in the airport, they’re so overwhelmed, but they come up to me and thank me for the music just made them feel so good. So I do that all the time, just to relax.

“When I’m playing slack key, it takes me back to the old days. I still remember listening to my mom and them playing music and. I wish back in those days we had a tape recorder where people could hear what they were doing. For us, it’s only in our memories. I remember all the good stuff.”

The 33rd Annual Ki Ho’alu Festival is presented free on June 30 in the MACC’s A&B Amphitheater starting at 3 p.m. Gates open at 2:30. It will be livestreamed on the MACC’s website and its Facebook and YouTube pages. Festival-goers are encouraged to bring their own low back beach chairs, blankets, or mats. Shaded seating will be provided for kupuna. No large bags, umbrellas, or outside food and beverage is allowed. The festival is sponsored by the County of Maui and Office of Economic Development, Hawaii Tourism Authority, and Kilohana by CNHA with additional support from The Maui News, the Ki Ho’alu Foundation, Ka-Hoku Productions and KPOA.

On July 3 at 6:30 p.m., Kaapana plays the Masters of Hawaiian Music show with George Kahumoku Jr. at the Napili Kai Beach Resort’s Aloha Pavilion. Tickets are available online at SlackKeyShow.com or by phone at 808-669-3858.