{"id":193111,"date":"2024-03-05T16:05:36","date_gmt":"2024-03-06T02:05:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/?p=193111"},"modified":"2024-03-05T16:05:36","modified_gmt":"2024-03-06T02:05:36","slug":"uh-maui-college-kawaa-on-the-voice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2024\/03\/05\/uh-maui-college-kawaa-on-the-voice\/","title":{"rendered":"<abbr>UH<\/abbr> Maui College grad gets two-chair turn on The Voice"},"content":{"rendered":"<span class=\"span-reading-time rt-reading-time\" style=\"display: block;\"><span class=\"rt-label rt-prefix\">Reading time: <\/span> <span class=\"rt-time\"> &lt; 1<\/span> <span class=\"rt-label rt-postfix\">minute<\/span><\/span><div class=\"responsive-video-wrap-post\"><figure class=\"wp-block-embed wp-block-embed-youtube is-type-video is-provider-youtube epyt-figure\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\"><div class=\"epyt-video-wrapper\"><iframe  id=\"_ytid_44213\"  width=\"620\" height=\"349\"  data-origwidth=\"620\" data-origheight=\"349\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/rsRD1G__5ps?enablejsapi=1&origin=https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu&rel=0&autoplay=0&cc_load_policy=0&cc_lang_pref=&iv_load_policy=1&loop=0&fs=1&playsinline=0&autohide=2&theme=dark&color=red&controls=1&disablekb=0&\" class=\"__youtube_prefs__  no-lazyload\" title=\"YouTube player\"  allow=\"fullscreen; accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen data-no-lazy=\"1\" data-skipgform_ajax_framebjll=\"\"><\/iframe><\/div><\/div><\/figure><\/div>\n<p>Maui\u2019s Kamalei <span aria-label=\"Kawaa\">Kawa&#699;a<\/span> got judges Reba McIntyre and Chance the Rapper to turn their chairs during the blind auditions on season 25 of the hit singing competition <em>The Voice<\/em> on <abbr>NBC<\/abbr>.<\/p>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.maui.hawaii.edu\/\">University of <span aria-label=\"Hawaii\">Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> Maui College<\/a> graduate\u2019s rendition of &ldquo;Redemption Song&rdquo; by Bob Marley and the Wailers moved Chance, whose team <span aria-label=\"Kawaa\">Kawa&#699;a<\/span> ultimately elected to join.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_193156\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-193156\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/maui-kawaa-the-voice-and-maui-kawaa-the-voice-300x169.jpg\" alt=\"person speaking into microphone and holding a guitar\" width=\"300\" height=\"169\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-193156\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/maui-kawaa-the-voice-and-maui-kawaa-the-voice-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/maui-kawaa-the-voice-and-maui-kawaa-the-voice-130x73.jpg 130w, https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/maui-kawaa-the-voice-and-maui-kawaa-the-voice.jpg 676w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-193156\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Kamalei <span aria-label=\"Kawaa\">Kawa&#699;a<\/span> appears on <em>The Voice<\/em>. (Photo credit: Casey Durkin\/<abbr>NBC<\/abbr>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>&ldquo;Doing &lsquo;Redemption Song&rsquo; in front of millions of people, it brought something out of me,&rdquo; Chance said. &ldquo;It&#8217;s a very radical song and it means a lot to all oppressed peoples around the world, and I think having you on here and representing Pacific Islanders, Indigenous People, Hawaiians, people around the world. I think it&#8217;s really important for the show to have.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p><span aria-label=\"Kawaa\">Kawa&#699;a<\/span> is also a member of the quartet N&#257; Wai <span aria-label=\"Eha\">&#699;Eh&#257;<\/span>, which was nominated for a Grammy in 2021. He honed his craft at <abbr title=\"University of Hawaii\">UH<\/abbr> Maui College, taking voice and piano lessons, as he worked on his associate in arts degree in Hawaiian studies.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"blocklink\">Related story: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2021\/03\/09\/na-wa-eha-uh-maui-college\/\">Grammy-nominated artists honed craft at <abbr>UH<\/abbr> Maui College<\/a>, March 2021<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;I hope [<em>The Voice<\/em>] coaches will be able to feel the words that I sing. There\u2019s a cultural connection there, my people have been through a lot of the same struggles and the lyrics of the song remind us to set yourself free,&rdquo; <span aria-label=\"Kawaa\">Kawa&#699;a<\/span> said. &ldquo;It\u2019s my hope that through what I\u2019m going to do on the stage, the rest of the world can see how beautiful our people can be.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p><em>The Voice<\/em> airs on <abbr>NBC<\/abbr> on Mondays and Tuesdays and streams the next day on Peacock.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p><abbr>UH<\/abbr> Maui College graduate Kamalei <span aria-label=\"Kawaa\">Kawa&#699;a<\/span> sings &ldquo;Redemption Song&rdquo; on <em>The Voice<\/em>. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[90,679,1500,60],"class_list":["post-193111","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-people","tag-alumni","tag-alumni-recognition","tag-hawaiian-studies","tag-maui-college","entry","has-media"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193111","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=193111"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193111\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":193168,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193111\/revisions\/193168"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=193111"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=193111"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=193111"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}