‘Strumming My Ukulele’
Troy Fernandez
(Neos Productions)
Troy Fernandez holds an important place in contemporary local music for his work as a member of the Ka‘au Crater Boys with Ernie Cruz Jr. in the ’90s. The duo won the Hoku Award for contemporary album of the year two years in a row, and Fernandez’s crowd-pleasing showmanship on ukulele was a major part of their winning sound.
Fernandez debuted as a solo artist in 2000 and then recorded as the leader of the Kaiser Surf Crew in 2002. In recent years, he’s found a home with Bob St. John’s Neos Productions label.
Fernandez’s new project for Neos reminds Hawaii that he is a competent singer as well as a superb musician.
The straight-from-life title song is one of three Fernandez originals, and it deserves local radio play. The lyrics are straightforward but sung with hints of kaona (hidden meaning), while his strumming is crisp and catchy.
Another original, "Local Girl of Mine," puts forth his take on the ever-popular topic of island women, and the ode is a worthy addition to the canon.
Fernandez does a good job with several Hawaiian and hapa-haole classics — "Koke‘e," "Pua Hone" and "Ku‘u Home ‘o Kahalu‘u," to name a few — playing guitar on some rather than ukulele.
A medley of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" and "What a Wonderful World" is nicely done, but didn’t another artist already do that medley? Yet Fernandez’s remake of Israel Kamakawiwo‘ole’s musical signature is a memorable demonstration of his ukulele technique.
On the other hand, a silly rendition of Jim Stafford’s 1974 hit, "Spiders and Snakes," should have been left in Neos’ vaults. With no annotation provided to explain Fernandez’s selection of the song, it simply seems like a bad idea that St. John should have talked him out of executing.
www.neosproductions.com
"Strumming My Ukulele"
