Tavana McMoore — known professionally as Tavana — was 12 when he met the guitarist who changed his life. Tavana asked the man so many questions about what he did and how he did it that the guitarist showed him how to play a simple melody and he learned it on the spot. Tavana’s mother noticed his interest and gave him a guitar for his 13th birthday; the instrument became such an important part of his life that he even took it with him to school.
The release of Eric Clapton’s “Unplugged” album in 1992 introduced Tavana to the blues and led him to the music of B.B. King, Jimi Hendrix and Stevie Ray Vaughan. He was the only kid at Kaiser High School who was listening to them, but he knew what he liked.
Tavana’s interest in music took him to Los Angeles to study guitar and recording/engineering at the Musicians Institute in Hollywood. His big break came back in Hawaii when Chili’s Bar & Grill opened in Kahala. Tavana was hired as a waiter, but the manager heard him sing at an employee party and offered him the Friday night entertainer gig.
Tavana knew five songs. He’d learned 25 more by opening night. It was the start of his career as a full-time professional entertainer.
Twenty years later, Tavana, 41, is celebrating the release of “Sway,” his fifth full-length album.
Traditional hard-copy albums let an artist present a collection of songs in a specific order that tells a specific story or creates a unique experience for the listener. What story are you telling, or what experience are you creating, with “Sway?”
“Sway” is a collection of songs that I wrote during a very hard time in my life, and I certainly stacked the songs on the album in the way where they tell the story of that experience. It’s about the new path that I’ve decided to be on because of the hardships that I’m leaving behind.
I have known you as a contemporary blues artist, so the songs that aren’t what I consider blues caught my attention. “Universe” would be a great theme for a romantic Valentine’s Day. The ukulele work on “Shine” is beautiful too. How broad are your musical horizons and where do those interests come from?
I wanted to try a few different things, and working with Ian Sheridan, who produced the album, I was really able to capture, I feel, accurately some of these other styles in a great way. I’m definitely leaving them open for me.
Have any of our ocean conservation groups contacted you about using “Plastic Island” as the theme of a “don’t litter, recycle” campaign?
We’re about to put out a music video for “Plastic Island” in November and Surfrider Foundation is going to release it with us. When that all gets released my hope is that the song really does what it is intended to do, which is get as far as it can to bring awareness to (the problem).
When and why did you decide to radically change your look from long-hair-with-goatee to bald-with-a-beard? It’s quite distinctive.
I had this image going. Everybody knew me as the guy with long hair who wore the hat and played the music. Having this transition (in my life), and this shift that was happening whether I liked it or not, I had realized that I was holding on to a lot of tension in terms of what I was identifying as me. I was getting worried about this idea of getting older and I realized that it wasn’t doing me any good at all and I needed to let it go. Me shaving my head was me shedding the old me and letting it go and embracing that change that life’s putting me through. I couldn’t be happier with it.
What is something that might surprise people who see you on stage?
I didn’t start singing until I went to college. My brother and my sister and my mother are all really good singers. And when I was a kid they would tell me not to sing, because even as a kid I had a low “froggy” voice. In college there was a vocal program and I started sneaking in the workshops, and I would sign in as a guitarist and also as a vocalist. That’s when I started singing.
Where would you like to be — professionally, personally or both — in 2030?
I want to be doing sort of what I’m doing now. I don’t mean that I don’t want to grow at all, what I mean is basically what I’ve discovered in my life is it doesn’t do me much good to say to myself: “I need to get to this place.” The way I try to live now is that I wake up every day, and I try to write some good music. And I try to think about how I can improve my set and how I can grow as an artist. I think that as long as I’m doing that in 10 years still, like I’m doing it today, than I’ll be happy.
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“Sway”
Tavana
no label
Tavana has a well-deserved reputation as a multifaceted entertainer with a compelling affinity for traditional American blues and for the steel guitar (aka lap steel). Tavana’s recently released fifth album comes out of that solid foundation. Several songs build on it, other reveal his broader horizons as a vocalist, musician and songwriter. All 12 songs are originals. The lyrics become more vivid with repeat listening.
Two are worthy contributions to the continuing growth of contemporary hapa-haole music. A third, “Plastic Island,” is Tavana’s response to the problem of plastic pollution in the ocean. It’s an inspiring call for action that should be heeded. Starting today!
The most distinctive is “Universe,” a love song for all seasons, and a complete change of pace from the blues and other darker topics that prevail elsewhere on the album. As a love song written by a Hawaii-resident artist, “Universe” is one of the year’s best.
Ron Artis II, Danny Carvalho, Paul Izak, Caleb Keolanui and Mike Love join Tavana on individual tracks. Buyers of the hard-copy CD will find all the song lyrics as a bonus in the liner notes.
Visit tavana808.com.
