A warm welcome to new Sweet Adeline, Rose, who was confirmed by the chorus as a new Na Leo Lani member this week. Rose brings her melodious voice, warm smile, and previous choral experience to our tenor section. We are thrilled to have her and look forward to many happy musical moments together!
Making it official with our director, Chris, and president, Deb.
It’s almost that time of year again when the malls are decked out in poinsettias and we find ourselves crooning along with Bing Crosby, Mariah Carey (and Wham!?!) about Christmas days of old. If you love putting the “Mele” in “Mele Kalikimaka” (you know you do!), then Na Leo Lani’s “Sing with Us for the Holidays” (“SWUFTH”!) is for you!
Returning this year for another memorable season of song, SWUFTH 2023 is a ten-week program for women and women-identifying singers, age 14 and up, of all vocal talents and ranges.
WHEN? Wednesdays, 6:00 – 7:30 pm, October 11 – December 20 (December rehearsals may extend a bit longer)
WHERE? Mo’ili’ili Hongwanji, 902 University Avenue, Honolulu. Click HERE for map and parking details.
WHAT & HOW MUCH? $30.00 (Includes sheet music and learning tracks for three songs and two singalongs, plus weekly rehearsals & participation in our holiday performances in December.)
FOR MORE INFORMATION: Email naleolanichorus@gmail.com or simply come to one of our weekly rehearsals.
For general info about Na Leo Lani chorus, see our Join Us and Who We Are webpages.
Whether you are an old hand at choral music or have only ever sung in the shower, we invite you to embrace the spirit of the season and experience the delights of four-part a cappella barbershop harmony for the holidays.
“SWUFTH” 2023 starts October 11. Come join the fun!
With our “theme” rehearsals each week, you’ll never know what incarnation of your chorus mates will appear. This past week we had Captain Hook and a merry crew of shipmates “aaarrrrr”-ing enthusiastically.
Weekly themes are an activity our Music Team started during the pandemic to keep chorus members engaged and eager to see each other every week during the long, long months (nearly two years!) that we were rehearsing solely on Zoom. The themes proved so popular, we’ve kept up the practice ever since!
Although it’s definitely not necessary to come dressed up in the color or concept of the week, about a third of us usually do so, and some of our members really get into it (you know who you are, Yvonne and Rosie!), with humorous costumes and festive style.
Regardless of whether you’re adorned in pirate gear or just channeling your inner Jack Sparrow with a wink and a smile, the themes are a fun way to give shape to the evening’s activities, from our physical and vocal warmups to our customary photo op at the end of the night.
Enjoy the latest pic below, plus a video clip of four of our longtime members and former quartet-ers assembled for a pop-up quartet — “Sugarcane”!
Na Leo Lani recently had the opportunity to celebrate the musical talents of our brother chorus on O’ahu, Sounds of Aloha, at a Friends and Family performance. The men were putting the final touches on preparations for the 2023 Pan-Pacific International Convention in Auckland, New Zealand.
To make sure they kept their strength up on their journey and to infuse their singing with local flavor, we presented them a basket of local kine goodies — iso peanuts, arare, and more. 🙂 See photos below.
Since then, we heard back from the men that they had a wonderful time onstage and off. In addition to SOA’s performance, four Hawai’i quartets took part, and one of them, H4, was awarded the silver medal for Pan Pacific senior quartets!
In honor of Labor Day, the ladies of Na Leo Lani channeled the spirit of Rosie the Riveter at our September 6 rehearsal. No heavy lifting for us, though — when singing barbershop, we strive to keep it light. 🙂 Enjoy the pics below of our enthusiastic Rosies. Three cheers for woman power!
We had a special treat at this week’s rehearsal — a coaching session with Region 12 visual coach Pamela Johnson! In addition to waving colorful ribbons in time with the beat for warmups, we sported paréos and inflatables in rainbow colors in keeping with this week’s “beaches” theme.
Thank you for the fun and inspiring session, Pamela!
A fun night was had by all who attended our 48th anniversary party on August 26. We made mounds of salad and chowed down on soup and bread, reminisced about when we each became members (Wow! What stories!), and of course sang a few tunes to cap off the evening.
Thanks again to Deb for hosting the party at her condo, and to the rest of our board members for setting up and decorating.
We were thrilled to formally welcome new member, Summer, to the chorus at our August 16 rehearsal. Summer comes to us from Velvet Hills Chorus of Colorado Springs, where she was a lead. She has now ventured into the wild roller coaster of baritone — bravo, Summer, and a warm E komo mai to you from Na Leo Lani!
. . . for National Coloring Book Day!
Returning to rehearsal this week after a two-week break, we marked this week’s theme, “National Coloring Book Day,” with our favorite colors and children’s books. After fun warmups by the Wee women, we launched into repertoire review, including sectional duets of our Summer Program song, “Count on Me” — a tune that is rapidly becoming one of our favorites.
Coming through town or interested in joining a chorus? Come check us out — Wednesdays at 6 p.m. at the Mo’ili’ili Hongwanji! See our join us page for more info.
What a blast we had on July 8 performing the two songs we learned for our summer program, as well as many other favorites from the Na Leo Lani repertoire. Making it even more special was a supportive turnout from sister choruses Honolulu Blend Show Chorus, Mission Valley Chorus (California), and Velvet Hills Chorus (Colorado).
After our performance, members of the audience and Na Leo Lani singers came up to participate in our first ever open mic event. It was a great afternoon of singing all around.
Many thanks to our summer program participants Summer, Marlene, Carolyn, and Donna — we hope you will continue singing with us! — and of course to all our chorus members and their families who made the event possible. Thanks most of all to Chris, our Director, for introducing these challenging but fun new songs. As she noted, they are still very much works in progress (hence our holding our sheet music in the video clip), but we covered a lot of ground in just six weeks and look forward to perfecting them further.
Enjoy the pics and video clips from the performance and open mic event below.
Na Leo Lani Chorus 