Kainani Kahaunaele

Name Kainani Kahaunaele

social media @kainanimusic

Age 47

Town/Moku Anahola

Island Kauaʻi

Leadership Category Culture

Nominated by Malia Nobrega-Olivera

Share with us a little about yourself and what you do.

I am an advocate for ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi, mele Hawaiʻi (performance, creation, and documentation), and community networking for cultural practices

Why is the work that you do important to you? The community?

My ʻohana and I are able to contribute to the legacy of music, language, and culture while working with our multigenerational Hawaiian ʻohana and communities. We can tap into many areas of cultural and community work via mele to bring mele and its contents to life.

Share with us the qualities of leadership you admire and how you express those in your life.

kuleana - understanding your kuleana and how it evolves over the years through experience

networking - working with like minded individuals with different capacities who get the job done, connection

alakaʻi - being grounded in your work and able to inspire others to enhance their work, effective communication

I express these qualities in different levels with the various people I work with. I am surrounded by those who are effective in all of these areas and I strive daily because of them.

Some of the things I do is run a mele camp bringing in fellow musicians to focus on a curated collection of mele of a particular place and perform these mele at those areas to further connect. Another thing is running a haku mele camp to promote haku mele resources, inspiration, creation, and delivery. Another thing is singing for my community in private and public functions to bring the importance of live mele to an occasion to fill the space with the wisdom and knowledge of our ancestral and modern day composers.

Who has inspired you to do the work that you are doing?

My talented musician friends, the musicians of my ʻohana and of all Hawaiian music, my children, our nation, our aliʻi, our mānaleo resources, kumu hula and their hālau, and my best friends. They continue to inspire me.

What is one word that describes something you are excited about for the lāhui?

mele

What is one word that describes a pressing issue that is facing our lāhui?

kuleana