The Best Flight Ever - Remembering Brother Willie K.
As seen in Neighbors of Wailea & Makena, August 2020
Photo by Allan B. Cool, Wikipedia Commons
As the sun sets on the sheltered days of May, stay home orders are lifting ever so slowly. Restored are our hopes for pa’u hana with friends, live music on Aloha Fridays, and even inter-island travel. But for Ronnie V., Kona-
based musician and head of the American Roots Music group The Family Band, no flight to another island or even the mainland can compare to his flight to Maui, eighteen years ago.
Headed from Hawai’i Island to Maui for a week-long union confer- ence at the Ritz Carlton, Ronnie and his guitar were waiting to board the plane when a man that Ronnie describes as having “more Aloha Spirit than most” approached him. “He came up to me while waiting to board, his ‘ukulele in hand,” Ronnie recalls. “No suitcase. No case. Just a ‘ukulele. I didn’t know who he was. He was just a guy with a ‘ukulele.” And Ronnie was the guy with the 3/4 size classical guitar. No case.
“He said he liked my guitar and asked me what kind of music I liked to play,” says Ronnie, who responded that he enjoyed everything. This pleased the guy with a ‘ukulele, no case.
“Me too,” he replied, explaining to Ronnie that he was yet to find a music genre that he couldn’t connect with. Growing up as part of a fam- ily band consisting of nine boys and four girls, the guy with a ‘ukulele learned to play the guitar, the bass, and every instrument in between. As a youth, his father taught him how to make music in any genre and appreciate them all.
As they boarded their flight, the two talked story a bit more. Ronnie found his row, put his stuff in the overhead compartment, and took his seat, still holding his guitar. The guy with a ‘ukulele took his own seat, directly across the aisle from Ronnie.
“I’m heading back to Maui to play a gig. That’s where I’m from,”
he explained, telling Ronnie about how he had been spending time on Hawai’i Island with some friends. As Ronnie listened, he couldn’t help but admire his fellow musician, traveling with nothing but a ‘ukulele and the shirt on his back.
“I’m headed to Maui for some meetings,” Ronnie shared as the plane took off. The two musicians talked a while longer until the guy with a ‘ukulele suddenly began jamming!
“Full-on singing and playing. On the plane!” says Ronnie with a chuckle. “I was stoked. So was everyone. He was GOOD!” And Ron- nie’s new friend was just getting started. Before he even finished playing that first tune, he nodded toward Ronnie’s classical guitar.
“Pick it up,” he suggested. Noting that the flight attendants were more than approving of the spontaneous jam session, Ronnie did. The guitar player followed the ‘ukulele player’s lead, quietly yet happily. One tune rolled into the next, and in between, the passengers and crew clapped and shouted “Chee Hoo!” so loudly that it could be heard from the shores of Maui, if you listened hard enough.
For an entire flight, a full 28 minutes in the clouds, the musicians played. Upon landing, the guy with a ‘ukulele patted Ronnie on the back, expressing that he hoped the two could jam together again some- day. Ronnie thanked the musician for “the best flight I ever had” and went on his way.
Later that evening, Ronnie checked into his hotel room and headed down to the ballroom to listen to that night’s keynote speaker while eating dinner with more than 500 other conference attendees. Being less than captivated by the speaker, Ronnie ducked out of the ballroom’s back entrance to have a smoke before the entertainment began.
“And who did I find right outside the back door? The guy with a ‘ukulele!” Ronnie’s new friend from the mid-air jam session was none other than the Hawaiian musical phenomenon William “Willie K.” Kahaiali’i and he was about to head on stage.
“Hey man! Whatcha doin’ here?!” asked Ronnie.
“I’m playing!” Willie K. exclaimed, and the two shared a laugh, causing Willie to miss his grand entrance. This didn’t concern him in the least. Willie K. was too caught up in enjoying the moment.
“We both were. We finished and we walked into the backstage entrance together,” Ronnie recounts. He watched Willie K. jump up on stage - just a guy with a ‘ukulele, donning the same cut-off, sleeveless t-shirt he had sported on the plane and jammin’ his heart out.
A winner of several prestigious Nā Hōkū Hanohano awards and a Grammy nominee, Willie once said of himself “When you come to the Willie K. experience you leave knowing who Willie K. really is.”
Brother Willie K. didn’t need a band or drums. Hold the bells and whistles please! His music and his Aloha spirit were enough to easily rouse the crowd out of their chairs and onto their feet. Willie jammed and they danced, proving that music truly is a life force.
“It was a beautiful thing,” Ronnie reminisces. “Brother Willie and I never got the chance to jam again, but we ran into each other over the years. And every time we did, we talked about that day.”
A day that Ronnie would never forget, jammin’ in the clouds with a legendary musician who did life his own way, living it authentically and entirely in the moment.
I’ll miss you, friend. But I’m glad I got to know you,” says Ronnie, his words echoing the sentiment resounding in all of our hearts. Perhaps if we stand on the shores of Maui, listening hard enough, we may hear the strum of Willie K.’s ‘ukulele as he plays in the clouds once more, jammin’ mid-air.
Rest in Paradise Brother Willie
October 17, 1960 - May 18, 2020
Sara Stover is a freelance writer living on Hawai’i island. You can find her at SaraStover.com.
