COURTESY OF LAURELLE FAVREAU
Keith Underwood, John Marshall and Benjamin Verdery (clockwise from top left) are ready to weave their special music.
Ufonia plays tonight
Listening to Benjamin Verdery's enthusiasm in describing his music, you would expect the sounds of Ufonia to be filled with energy and verve.
Well, it does sometime. But the group's varied rhythms and diverse mix of classical, jazz and world music shows a much more disciplined yet sensitive approach -- even though they're known to play a bit of "classic rock" in the form of Cream's "I Feel Free" as an encore to their well-received concerts.
Verdery, along with compatriots Keith Underwood on flutes and John Marshall on percussion, will present their Ufonian sound tonight at the Honolulu Academy of Arts. This will mark the first time that Verdery, the group's musical director, will be performing in Honolulu with Ufonia, although he's no stranger to the islands: He has lead an annual guitar master class in Kihei, Maui, every summer for the past six years.
Pleasing mix
Ufonia with Benjamin Verdery
Where: The Doris Duke Theatre at the Academy, Honolulu Academy of Arts
When: 7:30 p.m. today
Tickets: $18 general, $15 Academy members
Call: 532-8701
Also: 7:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Makawao Union Church on Maui. Call 808-579-9261 for more information.
On the group's debut, self-titled CD, they were joined by occasional member and oboist Vicki Bodner, creating music much in the same light as New Age jazz legends Oregon.
"Vicki, however won't be in concert here with us," Verdery said. "We've been mostly been playing as a trio since last year. Sanae Nakayama, a flutist from Maui, will be joining us as a guest."
Local guitarist Jeff Peterson (who recently dueted with Riley Lee both on CD and in concert two months ago, and is an occasional student of Verdery) will also guest during Verdery's solo set that will lead off the second half of Ufonia's concert. They'll perform a new Verdery piece titled "Mahalo."
There is also a Hawaii-inspired composition on the Ufonia CD, "Ua Apuakea," a solo piece performed on a double-neck baritone-tenor ukulele.
"It was made by Leland Onekea," Verdery said, "and I was staying at his split-level home in St. Louis Heights, and it was just by chance that he heard me playing and he mentioned that he makes ukuleles. This one in particular that he showed me, I just went nuts over. I started composing 'Ua Apuakea' and later recorded it one night with Pierre Grill. That ukulele was unlike anything I heard before."
WHILE UFONIA, as a working collective, didn't form until 1990, Verdery has known Underwood and Marshall for a long time.
"I've known John since I was 12, and Keith for the past 25 years. They're real close buddies of mine and about the greatest musicians I've ever met. It's an honor to play with them."
Verdery, however, says he does a fair amount of international touring as a soloist. And when he's not on the road, he also teaches graduates as chairman of the guitar department at the Yale University School of Music.
Of the pieces Ufonia will perform tonight, Verdery said that four in particular that always get a good audience response are "Seattle," the one piece that inspired the grouping of Ufonia, "Groundhog Day (For All Groundhogs and Their Friends)," inspired by both the silly movie and the day, "In the Garden: The Girl and the Butterfly (for Mitsuko)," "which started off as a tribute to Villa-Lobos, and has Keith doing a ton of bird sounds on" and "Ellis Island."
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