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On the Scene John Berger |
Turning 93 still means
a lot of fun for DennyAge is nothing but a number, according to Art Todd, who "made the big nine-oh" last month but says he "feels like five-oh" and still enjoys a good round of golf. Todd was the life of the party Saturday when Martin Denny celebrated his 93rd birthday with a small group of friends in Hawaii Kai. Among those joining Denny and his daughter, Christina Denny, were Kit Ebersbach, Lloyd Kandell, Rodney and Pat Cazimero, Tito Berenobis and Christie Adams. Todd presided as musical conductor and provided accompaniment on ukulele throughout the afternoon. Shirley Recca added a beautiful hula to Todd's rendition of "Hanalei Moon" ...
HITTING THE ROAD: The Iona Contemporary Dance Theatre is taking "Destiny" to Wisconsin. A troupe of 14 dancers departs HNL on Saturday ... Vernon Sakata visits the neighbor islands this month touring with "that guy on the MCI TV commercials" -- Michael McDonald. Sakata is also one of the local rockers who'll sit in with the Honolulu Symphony for the "Rock Legends" shows at the Blaisdell Concert Hall next weekend. Count yourself a night-life veteran if you remember Sakata from Shnazz, circa 1980 ...
El Rey meets El Kutmaster: Rolando Sanchez, rightly known as "El Rey (The King) de la Salsa en Hawaii," rarely misses an opportunity to promote contemporary Latin music outside the largely self-contained local Hispanic music scene. He guests with Kutmaster Spaz on OC16's "Dis-N-Dat" show next week. (The show repeats 18 times after the first broadcast at 6 p.m. Monday.) ...
Happy birthday to: Justice Moon, who'll be celebrating tomorrow ... also to Dick Jensen (April 19) and record producer Laiku Soares (April 20) ...
LOOKING BACK: Tom Moffatt made local music history by presenting Cecilio & Kapono in a sold-out reunion concert at the Waikiki Shell on April 17, 1982. C&K officially broke up after releasing their fourth album, "Life's Different Now," on StarBolt Records in 1978, and Kapono released a successful self-titled debut album in 1981, but "Uncle Tom" made the reunion happen. Moffatt also recorded the concert and released a two-record "live" album of the event, "Cecilio & Kapono: Together" (Bluewater BW-830), which included solo minisets by Cee and Henry and the duo's first recording of "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes," a favorite back in their early days at the Rainbow Villa (the original two-record vinyl album contains material omitted from the CD re-release). It was the first of many successful "reunion" events for C&K, whose current album, "30 Years of Friends -- Lifetime Party," commemorates 30 years of good times together ...
See the Columnists section for some past articles.
John Berger has covered the local
entertainment scene since 1972. Contact
him at jberger@starbulletin.com.