By: Rick Landers
Dave “Kawika” Fiely
Dave “Kawika” Fiely, discovered slack key guitar when he lived in Hawai’i, while in the U.S. Army. Diving into the music and the culture of the Hawaiian Islands became a mission of sorts, as Dave was driven to hone his craft, while honoring the culture and traditions of the island’s indigenous people.
While many guitar players linger in the Pentatonic scale, others broaden their music with various tunings and more often than not find their way to open tunings, adding more complexity to their studied understanding of their favored instrument.
While stationed in Washington, D.C., he and his wife, Tammy, discovered a robust Hawaiian music culture in the Nation’s capital, and both immersed themselves in their passions, Dave’s guitar playing and songwriting, and Tammy’s focus on the nuanced complexities and rhythms of of hula dancing.
In 2020, Fiely was honored when two of his songs were recognized by the Songwriters’ Association of Washington (SAW) with two songwriting awards, a Finalist (“Kaweloaloha”) and an honorable mention (“No Greater Love”). Quite a feat, given there were over one-thousand entries into SAW’s annual songwriting competition.
Fast forward a year, and Dave is working with multi-award winning producer, Marco Delmar of Recording Arts studio in Arlington, Virginia, on his first album of songs that reflect the spirit and beauty of the Hawaiian islands.
Like many new artists, he’s learning about studio magic, multi-tracking, working with fellow musicians, collaborating with Marco, a 13-time Washington Area Music Association award winner (Producer of the Year) whilst working out the details and the polishing of the final tracks. And Dave’s been learning to navigate the paths of BMI registration, embed codes, albums cover art, download platforms and marketing his music.
Fiely’s dug into music theory, recording, songwriting and more in the classroom, as well as on the street. Like many, he’s moved from playing open mics, restaurants and coffee shops, and is building his own strategic path to larger venues, where he can plant the seeds for others to appreciate the traditions of Hawaiian music, the beauty of slack key guitar and the captivating style of his own music to a larger audience.
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Rick Landers: You seem to have a talent for writing sparkling melodies coupled with romantic lyrics, many played in a guitar genre or in the style of slack key guitar. Was there a particular moment when you decided to hone in on Hawaiian music?
Dave Fiely: Mahalo lua noa, Thanks so much), Rick, for asking me to do this interview and your kind comments. I remember exactly the moment I fell hard for Hawaiian music.
It was at a dedication ceremony for a reconstructed Hawaiian altar (heiau) near where I lived on the Leeward coast of Oʻahu in 1986. The “Makaha Sons of Niʻihau” — a group that included the famous ʻBraddah Izʻ Kamakawiwoʻole) provided music entertainment, and I was hooked. Donʻt get me wrong, I love all kinds of music, but it was then and there that I started listening to, playing in standard tuning, and singing Hawaiian music.
It wasnʻt until 2007 when I seriously started studying Hawaiian slack key guitar (kīhōʻalu). I met the famous slack key artist, Ozzie Kotani, a year later, and he started mentoring me. I didnʻt really start getting comfortable until a few years ago, when I decided to start composing my own pieces.
Rick: How about a little background on slack key, how it got started and how we might be able to differentiate it from other open tuning guitar music?
Dave Fiely: The story goes that in the 1800s the King of Hawaiʻi brought in Mexican cowboys to teach the Hawaiians how to raise cattle. They, of course, brought their guitars with them and after they left a few years later, they left their guitars behind.
The Hawaiians grew frustrated with the standard tunings, and started to use dozens, if not hundreds, of open tunings to simulate the rhythms and melodies familiar to them. Many other genres like the blues or bluegrass use open tunings, but the alternating bass, mid-range rhythms, melody lines, riffs and other tricks are uniquely Hawaiian. I guess youʻd say that when you hear it — you know itʻs slack key. [Laughs]
Dave Fiely: Perhaps a bit more nuanced than suddenly embarking on a music career after 41 years of Army and DoD duty. Though retirement certainly allowed me much more time to focus on becoming a professional musician, my path up to this point certainly wasnʻt a straight line.
I started classical piano when I was four, and continued playing classical, including competitions until I was 16. Quit that and turned to playing keyboards for a rock and a stage big band. Better dating opportunities, I figured.
Went to West Point, and decided playing a guitar was a lot easier than a piano, so started fiddling with folk and acoustic rock, like Neil Young. My military career eventually landed me in Hawaiʻi for a seven years, and as I mentioned before, I fell in love with the music. It wasnʻt until much later, around 2010, that I got the idea that I might actually be good enough to perform paid gigs, and did play a bit at a couple local venues until my work got in the way.
In 2018, I started to write my own songs and dove hard into refining my slack key guitar skills. Retired in January 2019, then immediately enrolled in the local community collegeʻs Associate Degree music program, and started to figure out how to go pro, as a singer-songwriter and slack key guitar artist. I started recording my first album just a few months ago. What a ride!
Rick: Tell us how a couple of your new songs evolved and if you have a standard songwriting process or are things more happenstance, maybe magical?
Dave Fiely: Like many other newbie songwriters, I had a thousand ideas, I started writing songs that channeled experiences or events or people that profoundly impacted me. Unfortunately, I had difficulty focusing on topics suitable for a three or four minute song, so I started by focusing on the music itself. In other words, find a chord progression or slack key lick that seems to convey the feelings that inspired the song.
I discovered that once I had that, itʻs a matter of choosing the words and phrasing that fits without overly crowding the songʻs focus. For me, thatʻs the hardest part, cause I love to talk!
The process is obviously much easier with a slack key piece. For example, my instrumental “Nanakuli Sunset” leveraged emotions I felt watching the sunset on a day that marked the end of a 14 year marriage. I chose open D tuning to allow for a richer, more soulful sound.
At other times amazing Hawaiians who dedicated and gave their lives to help others like Rell Sunn and Eddie Aikau inspired me to write tributes to their memories. Yeah, Iʻd call the experience of hearing your feelings poured into music is magical.
Rick: Out of the box, it seems you won some local Washington, D.C., songwriting awards. I’d guess that might give you some positive validation of feeling that you’re on the right track. How do you build on that to either keep your focus on a particular style, or do you experiment with other kinds of styles?
Dave Fiely: I entered my first song contest in the fall of 2019 with an instrumental dedicated to Rell Sun called “Kapoliokaehukai,” her middle name that means, Heart of the Sea. It didnʻt win, but I learned a lot about what would make an instrumental better to listeners, by bringing out the melody more.
The next year I entered a dedication to my wife, “Kaweloaloha,” and Eddie Aikau, “No Greater Love,” and to my surprise, both pieces were recognized as Finalist and Honorable Mention in their respective categories, instrumental and Americana.
I honestly didnʻt expect judges to recognize them. In part, because theyʻre relatively simple pieces, but more so due to them being really part of an obscure genre of Hawaiian music. Yeah, the fact judges heard what I hear when listening to contemporary Hawaiian music was a morale booster, and I set out this past year writing more songs.
I suppose Iʻll always try to stay true to the core tenets and topical area of Hawaiian island life, but I already have incorporated a significant amount of other guitar styling in open tuning still, that I grew up with. For example, “Paradise” starts out with a traditional slack key riff, but then moves directly into a 12-string strum reminiscent of acoustic folk tunes I listened to in the ’70s. It keeps the music evolving and interesting for me, and hopefully captures a wider range of listeners, outside Hawaiʻi.
Rick: As a “Haole” or White guy, have you been sensitive to the perspectives of cultural appropriation versus cultural pollination, and how you develop, as well as respect your listeners with songs that “arrive” on your creative doorstep?
Dave Fiely: Well, living in Hawaiʻi teaches caucasians very quickly what itʻs like to be a minority. White people (haoles) are only approximately 20% of the population, and many of those are military. Though the vast majority of Hawaiians and local people welcome all, there is definitely an underlying feeling of distrust and even anger due to the wrongs created by white businessmen in the late 1800s when they overthrew the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi, as well as the paternalism of the U.S. military and civilian populations during the ’30s and ’40s.
I offer that background not to teach, but to let folks know that I take all that in mind when I write and perform Hawai’ian music; especially when I sing or speak in the Hawaiian language.
Dave “Kawika” Fiely and Ozzie Kotani
As a non-native, but deeply connected Hawaiian spirit, I take great care in ensuring that I always approach and try to ensure my music is presented in a respectful and loving manner. Mālama pono (take great care) and aloha (love) are my cornerstones.
My wife Tammy (“Kawaloaloha”) takes the same approach in dancing hula given that sheʻs Vietnamese, but a Hawaiian at heart like me. So far, that approach has served us well, as we have received love and support from the Hawa’ian community, both on island as well as here in the D.C. area.
Rick: Let’s talk guitars. What have you owned over the years and what’s in your toolbox at the moment?
Dave Fiely: Was wondering when youʻd finally ask! I got my first guitar when I was 16. It was an old classical that I learned to play basic chords. A couple years later, I got a beautiful maple Epiphone, and learned some basic finger picking.
Eight years later, I lived on Oʻahu and bought a 12-string Yamaha to replace the Epiphone. Glad I did because it help me develop finger and wrist strength for playing longer periods of time. While assigned to Korea in the mid and late ’90s I cycled through a few knock off Ovations, and even had a coffee shop owner build and gift me a classical guitar. Still have that one though itʻs pretty beat up, because itʻs the best sounding classical I ever played.
It wasnʻt until I started getting serious about slack key guitar did I finally start to upgrade my fleet. Started with a custom two-holed, all flamed koa guitar built by Eric DeVine out of Maui. It didnʻt quite have the sound I wanted, so I replaced it with another two-holer or double puka, Redwood top, Brazilian rosewood back and sides, but still didnʻt quite do it for sound.
Like a lot of musicians, I have many tools in the shed that include, a beautiful 2018 Devine jumbo, a stunning Taylor KE65 12-string with flamed Koa, a Tele guitarlele that’s also Koa, a Lanika tenor use and an ’85 Kamaka soprano all Koa ukulele, among others. Those are my players, and I have a few wall hangers that I bought a while ago that include an ’85 Yamaha FC-460-12-string, a “Tae” EAN40C and a 1995 Bara classical that was handmade and sports a resonant cedar top, back and sides.
Rick: Your wife, Tammy, oftentimes accompanies you as a hula dancer, adroitly translating the feelings of the lyrics or South Pacific breezes that your music elicits. How do you two work out the music and the storytelling of her rhythms and gestures or is that her own artistic expression to create?
Dave Fiely: I honestly feel Iʻm the luckiest Hawaiian music singer-songwriter in the world given that I found a partner in a beautiful woman, that performs beautiful hula. To be clear though, hula is something that is extraordinarily difficult to learn and perform, as intended.
It takes years to learn to make it appear effortless and smooth. As such, any serious student of hula, like my wife, learns through a hula school (halau). Fortunately, due to the popularity of Hawai’ian music and hula, these schools are located all over the world, especially Japan, and including the Washington D.C. area.
Tammy “Kaweloaloha” and Dave “Kawika” Fiely
As for the choreography, itʻs normally developed by someone thatʻs been doing and instructing hula for many years and typically lead their own halau students. They are called “kumu” and each develops their own style. Students are strongly discouraged from winging it. As such, Tammy uses choreography thatʻs already developed by famous kumu for popular songs that I cover. However, one day we hope to have a kumu develop a choreography for a Hawai’ian language song I wrote last year. Got the language tweeked by a kumu already, so Iʻm halfway there.
Rick: Lately, you’ve been very busy with life changes, not just disruptive, but exciting I’d say. Are you able to compartmentalize the music when you need to decompress and make some music or get into the studio and perform at your best?
Dave Fiely: Wow. Great question. Been finishing up my degree program, we’re moving to a new home here in Virginia, got a Shiba Inu puppy named, Biscuit, thatʻs my wifeʻs new love, and finally got the encouragement to get in the studio to record my very first album! Yeah, pretty busy. [Laughs]
I guess my military training sort of kicks in when I get into a situation where Iʻm juggling a bunch of glass balls. I tend to focus hard on the task at hand to ensure Iʻm doing it right vice multi-task and donʻt do anything particularly well. Put another way, once I decided to go into the studio to record, I became laser-focused on working and grinding on the songs I was going to record.
I hit pause on writing new music, though I did write and record a new slack key piece for my tenth song on the album, and I didnʻt perform any gigs for the four months I was recording. Hard to do, but it seems to have paid off. As for decompressing, I always find joy noodling on ʻKaleonaniʻ and listening to my favorite tunes.
Dave Fiely: Good lord, thereʻs a lot to learn when you finally decide to turn pro in music and record a CD. So much goes into both and nothing seems to be intuitive. Iʻve now got massive respect for the folks that I now know put the work into becoming successful. It can be overwhelming at times, but like the old elephant adage goes, “Itʻs best done one small bite at a time.”
Of course, Iʻve used YouTube and on-line articles extensively, but itʻs the help Iʻve received from other artists, thatʻs been the best help. On line articles and videos are great, but they never seem to have the details you need to not screw it up, like how to successfully release a song.
People like Jim “Kimo” West, a Grammy award winning slack key artist, has been invaluable in providing me frank and timely advice for playing, recording and establishing a business. Bottom line, Iʻm getting there, but still have a few months more before I can relax.
Dave Fiely: Aside from moving into final mixing and mastering my CD, One Day, Iʻm not really working on anything musically at the moment. Buying and selling homes and moving pretty much have taken the wind out of my performing sails.
Heck, I even took a semester off from school after I completed a music degree, and will started classes for recording technology studies. That said, ten years ago I could have only dreamed to be where I am at the moment; however, I can say that the road I chose to study Hawaiian language, to work hard on slack key guitar, to take classes to reengage my brain in music theory, to get vocal coaching, and even learning classical music on the guitar all set me up for where I am now. Hopefully that approach will help me in the next ten years.
Rick: I know you are very sincere in trying to promote Hawaiian music, and maybe slack key, specifically. What are your thoughts on how to do that in a way to do it properly?
Dave Fiely: It all starts with a sincere desire to share what you know and do it in a respectful manner. My hope is to introduce a wide audience to what I have grown to love so much, since that day in 1986 when I listened Braddah Iz sing. I can credit Hawaiian music for making me a better man than I would have been without it.
To that end, I also hope to teach youngsters here or around the globe via video links, how to play slack key guitar. Thatʻs how I expect to keep it alive, and pay back all those that gave me the opportunities I have loved so much. Aloha, Rick, and mahalo again for letting me talk to you.
