Pomaikaʻi Keiki Choir - Singers of Aloha, Music as Community Service

SINGERS OF ALOHA, Pomaikaʻi Performance Choir
Our Pomaikaʻi Performance Choir was created to support the need for healing, optimism, and resilience in our community after the tragedy of the Maui fires August 8, 2023. The fires which took 100+ lives and destroyed over 2,000 homes and businesses have had a deeply traumatic effect on our Maui Island people, many of which are still struggling to recover physically, mentally and emotionally. When We Shine Foundation wanted to find a way serve our community, to help lift and inspire our island families. So, on January 11, 2024, When We Shine Foundation set a small amount of funding aside to start a new Choir at Pomaikaʻi Elementary School with Melinda Caroll as Choir Director. Thirty students were chosen from 3rd, 4th and 5th Grades, to begin singing together lifting their voices in song. They promptly named themselves, Singers of Aloha.

 Singers of Aloha Choir meets 2 times a week after school, Tuesdays & Thursdays from 2 to 3:30 pm at Pomaikaʻ It takes lots of practice, focus, memorization and listening skills to sound good. Each of these exercises & rehearsals overlap into all academic fields and body-mind development, plus brings the added social, emotional learning benefits of each song they sing together. With practice and persistence, each student is building musicality, confidence & physical strength.

Our goal is to provide a safe, creative learning space for building personal skills and for singing together, vocal and music arts development & the ability to move out into our community, bringing songs and healing music to our local community and beyond. The students move at their own level and are encouraged to challenge themselves to sing lead vocals and to learn harmony. As singers and performers, they are learning to be the initiators, and creators of good will, giving back, not just taking from their environment.

When We Shine (Shine Media) released a new album, Nā Leo O Ka Honua, Voices of the Earth, in August of 2023, and itʻs currently up for a Hoku Award in Best Island Music category. Each of the songs, co-written and recorded by students of Pomaikaʻi School are stories about the endangered species of Hawaiʻi. Singers of Aloha Choir performs a number of the songs from this album!

Our Choir honors Hawaiian culture and values both through our music & songs and outreach. Each song sung by the Choir has been co-written by other students, their peers, with the focus on Aloha ʻĀina, a love for all life in our beautiful islands and for our Island Community. Our songs tell stories about the land, like the song Na Maka O Ka ʻĀina, The Earth Has Eyes, which they sing with artist Mentor, John Cruz. They sing about endangered species,  Aloha e Koholā, and Iʻiwi, Hawaiian Songbird, with Raiatea Helm, Artist Mentor. They sing about the people and the values we hold dear in our Island living in the songs like Heart of Aloha and Ohana.

Our first performance took place Thursday, February 15, 2024 in partnership with Maui Whale Trust at the Ritz-Carlton Kapalua to perform for 140 Lahaina 4th Grade students, along with their teachers, parents and all their volunteers, featuring our song from our newest album Aloha E Koholā, Hawaiian Humpback Whale! 

March 13, 2024, Singerʻs of Aloha 5th Grade Choir members recorded back-up vocals on a new song featuring John Cruz, called Lahaina Town, a song composed by local Luthier, Singer-Songwriter, Steve Grimes, featuring, Lucas Nelson, Pat Simmons of the Doobie Brothers and many other well-known local performers. This music community effort on behalf of Lahaina, which will be released in the Summer of 2024, all proceeds going back to Lahaina.

On April 12, 2024 at Pomaikaʻi school campus on The Artist in Me night, our Singers of Aloha Choir got to sing live with John Cruz and Steve Grimes, a gift to remember.

Now that we are “seasoned performers”, our choir is back in rehearsals learning and arranging new songs, looking forward to new community performance opportunities.

Listen to the artists, VOICES OF THE EARTH on your favorite streaming channel here: