Larrua's magic show at LAX
OOPs, no UPS! Promoter Tom Moffatt found himself in something of a shipping dilemma the other day, and wasn't sure where to turn. Then he remembered former isle publicist Tracy Larrua with whom he'd worked here. She's now living in Los Angeles, where Moffatt had 350 pounds of Shriners Hospital benefit posters sitting in a print shop and no way to get them here outside of bankruptcy. So he got on the horn to Larrua whose motto, as she puts it, is, "Once you work for Uncle Tom, you always work with Uncle Tom." So she heard his plea for help, drove over 100 miles to the print shop, loaded down her little Honda Civic with the boxes and hauled them to the Continental cargo office at LAX. The shipping people there, doubtless charmed by Larrua and the opportunity to help out the Shriners, loaded the boxes at no charge to show their support for the event. Oh yes, it's the Franz Harary "Magic Spectacular" at the Arena Aug. 22-24. The posters should be up by now.
HER nickname is "The Tiger," but pianist Virginia Lum is a lion at heart. This Tuesday Lum again appears at UH Orvis Auditorium, in a concert sponsored by the Honolulu Chinatown Lions Club and the Ernest Chang Piano Studio. It was Chang who sponsored Lum's late dad, Hoppy, into the Chinatown Lions and he's now being replaced by her mom, Muriel Pang. Lum, who made her debut with the Honolulu Symphony at age 8, has a blockbuster program on tap Tuesday: Bach's Toccata in D Major, Moussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition, Debussy's l'Isle Joyeuse and Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue. Part of the proceeds provide a year's scholarship to a piano major in the UH music department ...
IT took me time to get to it, but the Time magazine cover story on Sharks (Aug. 11) is datelined Honolulu and much of it is written about experiences with sharks off Waikiki and Coconut Island. The UH shark research program is featured in the article along with UH'ers Carl Meyer, Chris Lowe and Kim Holland. It also sets the record straight about shark misinformation perpetuated by Steven Spielberg and "Jaws." ... Sharks, underwater variety
SHOULD be a colorful sight tomorrow night as hundreds of tiny lights float down the Ala Wai Canal as part of the 11th annual Honolulu Toro Nagashi, or Floating Lantern Ceremony. The small beacons are lit candles housed in Japanese paper lanterns placed on wooden rafts and towed by canoes. Each represents the memory of a deceased loved one. The ceremony traditionally is held during the Japanese o-bon season, when ancestral spirits are welcomed with prayer and offerings.
POSTCARDING from London were localites Bill & Connie Burlingame, who with about 2,000 other founding members of the American Air Museum were guests at Duxford when the Queen held dedication ceremonies. "The lunch was cold," Burlingame wrote, "but the rain was warm." I followed his instructions to say hi to son Burl Burlingame, a Star-Bulletin staffer, and was greeted with, "He didn't send me a postcard." ...
THE tradition of prank-playing on outgoing members of the Legends in Concert show continued, when the youngest member of the cast, 17-year-old Ahnya Chang did her final "Blue Hawaii" solo for "Elvis" before leaving for college. As she sang, in strolled "Roy Orbison" in a makeshift bra and pareau to do a hula. A shocked "Elvis" said, "That's gross. It's 'Beauty and the Beast.' " But the crowd loved it ... Only the lonely
Contact Dave by e-mail: donnelly@kestrok.com.