Somewhere Over The Rainbow, ukulele

A few moments of beauty, of hope, of humanity, and a very nice song too!

Linked to YouTube
Via: VideoSift

Memorial to Israel Kamakawiwo`ole, a very big man (600 pounds) with an aching beautiful voice. It can be found on two CDs: “Facing Forward” (mostly Hawaiian language songs with ukulele), and on the soundtrack to “Meet Joe Black”, where it played in the credits. Guitar tabs here

Kamakawiwo’ole sort of kept his manager on “stand-by”….to be able to respond whenever he was inspired to record. Kamakawiwo’ole was a perfectionist and wouldn’t record something until it was just right.

One night his manager had to get a guy to open up the recording studio because Kamakawiwo’ole had been up working on something and wanted to record it right away.

That night he recorded this song one take and he was done. He never sang the arrangement again.

I don’t know if it’s true or not, but I liked the story. Sad to know he’s gone.

Iz lay in state at the Capitol building in Honolulu. He was only the third person in Hawaiian history to have this honor bestowed, and the only non-politician… wikipedia