[ MARTHA POEPOE HOHU / 1907-2004 ]
Hoku winner led
Kaumakapili choir
When Kaumakapili Church on North King Street went through a $2.5 million restoration project last year, donors paid special tribute to the woman who directed the church's choir for more than 67 years and whose presence in the congregation spanned more than nine decades.
As early as 1930, Martha Poepoe Hohu was leading a group in song during Kaumakapili's Sunday services. Today her name is emblazoned in a stained-glass window above the church's choir loft.
"We decided to honor her," said longtime friend and church member Henry Maunakea. "What she was gifted with was her ability to compose Hawaiian hymns and to compose a range of Hawaiian hymns."
Hohu, a conductor, composer, arranger, singer and organist who spearheaded the compilation of three Hawaiian hymnals and won numerous awards for her music, died Saturday at Kuakini Health System's Hale Pulama Mau. She was 97.
Hohu's father, the Rev. Henry K. Poepoe, served as Kaumakapili's pastor from 1903 to 1950. When the current Kaumakapili Church in Kalihi was dedicated in 1911, Hohu was 4.
"Mama grew up in the church," said Hohu's daughter, Leila Kiaha. "She was a true Christian, a true teacher, a musician. ... She lived a full life."
Hohu, also known as "Auntie Martha," received a Na Hoku Hanohano Lifetime Achievement Award in 1993. Earlier, she was named a Kamehameha Schools Outstanding Alumna and was given a Hawaii Aloha Award from the Hawaiian Music Foundation.
Hohu attended Kamehameha School for Girls, where she learned to play the organ. In 1932 she got her bachelor's degree in music from the University of Hawaii.
By the time she was a teenager, Hohu was Kaumakapili's organist. At 23 she became the church's choir director.
During her lifetime, Hohu served as a music teacher for Kamehameha Schools, a guide at the Bishop Museum and a docent at Washington Place.
In 1967 she started directing the Hawaiian Electric Co. Employees Glee Club and also conducted the Honolulu Police Department's choral group.
She was also a Hawaiian history, ukulele and Hawaiian language instructor.
In 1969, when residents of Hana wanted to start a choir, Hohu became their music director. Twice monthly for 25 years, she flew to the island to bring them musical arrangements and lead them in song.
And every week for years, Hohu would spend the day in Kalaupapa teaching songs to Hansen's disease sufferers, her daughter said.
"As a result they were able to give concerts for their families," Kiaha said. "Mama would teach and then she would come home."
Kahaunani Schoenstein, choir director at Kaumakapili Church, said her predecessor "set a lot of examples."
"I could never fill her shoes," Schoenstein said. "It's just a matter of trying to continue what it is that she wanted to do as far as the church is concerned. ... One of her favorite hymns was 'I Am Happy in the Service of the King,' and she was truly that. She was truly a servant, a servant of God."
Hohu is survived by her daughter. Services are pending.