Passing the Tiki Torch
Local collective Don Tiki bows to big kahuna Martin Denny
    
Lesa Griffith
    
October 1, 2003

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I go back to the music of Martin Denny and Les Baxter because they’re so inspiring with their great compositions and arrangements,” says Kit Ebersbach, Don Tiki keyboardist and owner of Pacific Music Productions. “I can spin off ideas from what they’ve done.”
     Forty-four years since Martin Denny hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart for 13 weeks (he remains the only Hawai‘i-based musician to climb that high) with the iconic album Quiet Village, he’s still influencing people. The degrees of separation are few. The late Arthur Lyman, that other earl of exotica, got his start in Denny’s band. Now a Lyman protégé, Randy Wong, is the cofounder and bassist of Waitiki, a band spreading the tenets of tiki in Boston where Wong is getting his master’s in arts education at Harvard. His bandmate is wunderkind drummer Abe Lagrimas, a Waipahu boy who performed with Don Tiki before moving to Boston to attend the Berklee College of Music.
     “There are different subsets of musicians — entertainers, theatrical types — but a core of personalities made up of people who were all in high school bands are the real musicians. Despite rubbing elbows with celebrities in Beverly Hills, Denny is a funky old musician guy. “There’s no pretense with him,” explains Ebersbach, who, along with Don Tiki impresario Lloyd Kandell, has become friends with Denny.
     This Saturday, Don Tiki takes the Hawai‘i Theatre stage with a “Tribute to the Sounds of Martin Denny,” and 92-year-old Denny will make a rare stage appearance when he mans the keyboards for part of the show.
     Don Tiki usually performs their biannual cabaret of tiki-lounge culture at the more intimate Hawaiian Hut on Atkinson Drive. “This is a big step up for us,” says Kandell. “The Hawai‘i Theatre holds 1,400 people — more than double the Hawaiian Hut.” The neotiki troupe has adapted its extravaganza to the theatrical venue, enlisting John Parkinson, who does set design, directing and lights for Hawai‘i Opera Theatre. Handling choreography and costumes is multitalented Tunui Tully, director of John Hirokawa’s Magic of Polynesia spectacle. The nephew of showman Tavana, Tully not only designed the burlesque-hula outfits of Don Tiki’s five alluring dancers (one of whom is Dick Jensen’s daughter Summer), but he’s been known to join the lineup too.
     The change in venue is the result of kismet. In May, Martin Denny played solo for a one-night event at La Mariana on Sand Island. To the promoter’s surprise, the place was mobbed — Kandell, who was in the audience, had to help a rather frail Denny get through the crowd to the piano. The godfather of bachelor-pad music loved it. After the show, Denny said to Kandell, “You know, I always wanted to play Carnegie Hall. Do you think you could set that up?”
     Well, no, Kandell couldn’t, but he had an idea: “How about if you play our own version of Carnegie Hall — the Hawai‘i Theatre?” Denny thought that sounded good.
    
Everlasting Exotica
     Born in 1911, three years before World War I broke out, Denny was a classical piano prodigy. But he chose to apply his keyboard skills to the big band scene — he toured South America for four years with the Don Dean Orchestra in the late 1930s, and, following three and a half years in the Air Force, Denny made his way to Los Angeles in 1945. Hawai‘i beckoned in 1954, when Don Beach hired him for a six-week solo engagement at his Don the Beachcomber restaurant. The gig led to his hopscotching the Pacific for a stint at the Royal Hawaiian, a return to Don the Beachcomber’s, and the formation of a trio with Arthur Lyman on vibes and John Kramer, an accountant for the then territory, on bass. When he was offered a job to play at Henry J. Kaiser’s new Hawaiian Village resort, Denny recruited percussionist Augie Colón. “He added the exotic sounds,” says Denny, referring to Colón’s off-the-wall bird calls.
     “We traveled a lot on the Mainland, but we came back every 12 weeks because the guys had their families here,” says Denny. And soon he did too. In 1955, the musician met his future wife, June, and married her the following year. His daughter, Christina, who recently returned to the islands from Oregon to care for her father, arrived a few years later. “I loved the lifestyle and my career was built here,” says Denny. His 1990 Hökü Lifetime Achievement Award speaks of his place in Hawai‘i’s music pantheon.
     Being at the crossroads of the Pacific influenced Denny, who started adding South Pacific and Asian instruments to his distinctive arrangements. His tropical bachelor-pad soundtrack emerged fully formed in his 1957 record “Exotica,” for Liberty Records, along with the wanton red-lipped, curvaceous covergirl identity. Villagers never looked so good. The groovy percussion-and-vibe compositions brought Martin Denny his chart-topping three months and an appearance on American Bandstand.
     Thirty-five years later, the craze for retro velvet-lounge sounds — from Esquivel to Dean Martin — saw Martin Denny elevated to demigod status as king of the tiki beat. From Boston to Seattle, alternakids hearing “Quiet Village” for the first time and fortysomethings having a nostalgic flashback to their parents’ cocktail parties sipped drinks in bars decorated with old couches and lava lamps. And the fad has become a staple — in the past two years bars like Waikiki Wally’s in Manhattan and Luau in Seattle have opened to mai tai-swilling crowds.
     Honolulu, the birthplace of exotica, hasn’t remained immune — Ala Moana’s Mai Tai Bar and Tiki’s Grill & Bar in the Aston Waikiki Beach Hotel aren’t exactly the Tahitian Lanai, but they do angle for a revival of nightlife past, even if they’re J. Crew-ized versions. (For the real thing, check out Del Courtney’s Tea Dance at the Elks Club the first Sunday of each month. Jimmy Borges, Shari Lynn and Gabe Baltazar join the big-band leader; and Denny even shows up from time to time.) A slew of Web sites, such as the Book of Tiki and Tiki Room, are electronic gathering places for tiki freaks from Germany to Japan, who chat about things like the new book Tiki Quest: Collecting the Exotic Past (Pegboard Press).
     Even J. Lo has jumped on the Denny bandwagon — in 2001 she recorded Denny’s song “Firecrackers” as “I’m Real.” “It’s her interpretation,” Denny says diplomatically.
     In 1998, Denny and Colón played a Beverly Hills benefit. They opened for big guns like Whitney Houston and the Doobie Brothers, but it was the old-school duo who brought down the house, instigating a standing ovation.
     “I am amazed that I’m at the center of the resurgence these past several years of my style of music,” says Denny from his Hawai‘i Kai home.
    
The Birth of Don Tiki
     A decade ago, Kandell, who runs Kandell Advertising as his day job, attended a recital organized by his client, the Ellen Masaki School of Music. Denny was also at the recital, and Masaki introduced the two. Longtime music maven Kandell (he got his advertising start back in the 1970s when, as a DJ at the Wave, he made radio promos on the side) was mesmerized. “Marty’s become my spiritual mentor,” he says. He learned that Denny didn’t have his “Quiet Village” hit until he was 48 years old. Kandell, 42 at the time, was inspired. “It’s not too late for us!” he told his old friend Kit Ebersbach, a longtime musician-composer-producer of Hawai‘i’s music scene. Discussions and seeing a performance of the Iona Pear Dance Theatre with loungecore band Combustible Edison clinched the deal. They rounded up talented friends, and Don Tiki was born, putting out their first CD of original material (penned by Ebersbach) in 1997. In the process, the band widened its tiki circle.
     “The most creative people always have their antennas out and find each other,” says Ebersbach. “We intended Don Tiki to be a studio project, but at the same time I also did the soundtrack for Magic of Polynesia. One night the show’s choreographer, Tunui Tully, said he wished he could do a show using Don Tiki’s music and did I know how to contact them?” All of a sudden Don Tiki was three-dimensional. Tully’s Polynesia-on-acid creations for the band’s spectacles differ from the Waikïkï whirl with their ironic over-the-topness. “He’s been set free,” says Kandell.
     And what does the maestro think?
     “They’ve imitated my sound to some degree,” says Denny. “I think they’ve done a marvelous job of restoring the music of that period.”
     The Don Tiki team has orchestrated a whole new show for this Saturday, Oct. 4. Part I unveils the familiar jungle-drums razzmatazz of 10 musicians (including appearances by Teresa Bright and Ho‘okena) and five sultry dancers playing and dancing to Ebersbach tunes such as “Barbi in Bali” and “The Natives Are Restless.” One thing that’s gone is the giant faux-wood headdress — every dancer that wore it became pregnant.
     Part II is all Denny, with special guest stars Augie Colón; his son Lopaka (he’s genetically coded to continue the bird call tradition and percussion); and Buddy Fo, the legendary conga player who was influential in the 1960s as one of the Invitations, performing songs from Denny’s canon.
     Although Denny suffers from heart trouble, and his doctor has warned him against rehearsing and performing, he has every intention of joining in. “I’ll play several selections,” he says. And it will be rousing. Said Ebersbach: “He still plays with vigor and passion.”
     The audience will witness a family reunion of sorts. “Dad and Augie’s eyes light up when they’re together,” says Denny’s daughter, Christina. “Augie’s family calls him Uncle Marty.”
     The music — Don Tiki’s funky homage to exotica, and Denny’s groundbreaking original sound — is a groovy cross-generational unifier. “Everyone is drawn to it — blue-haired women who approach Marty like teenage groupies and say, ‘I used to watch you at Duke’s,’ people like me who want something out of the mainstream but not too loud, and kids obsessed with everything retro,” says Kandell.
     This is one tiki torch that seems to burn eternal.

Essential Denny
Martin Denny made 38 records — originals with the breast-baring covers are probably moldering in your parents’ old stereo cabinet. Here’s the best of what has been re-released on CD.
The Exciting Sounds of Martin Denny: Exotica/Exotica, Vol. 2 (Scamp, 1996)
The trademark 1959 hit “Quiet Village” will make you think birds of paradise are flying through your living room.
Hypnotique/Exotica III (Scamp, 1997)
This two-in-one CD features the mesmerizing title track “Hypnotique,” which was recently heard on the soundtrack of the film Confessions of a Dangerous Mind.
Quiet Village/Enchanted Sea (Scamp, 1997)
Besides the title track, this 1959 lounge gem includes May Day favorites “Little Grass Shack” and “Hawaiian War Chant,” done in Denny’s vibed-out style.
Forbidden Island/Primitiva (Scamp, 1996)
Denny invented the concept of Pacific Rim: These combined albums cover tunes from “Akaka Falls” to “Burma Train” to “March of the Siamese Children” (!).
Afro-Desia (Scamp, 1995)
The quasi-sounds of Africa put through the Denny filter. That means bongos, congas and, of course, vibes, along with a tsetse fly’s buzz and the Randy Van Horne Singers (that’s them singing the theme song to The Flintstones and The Jetsons). Heart of campiness!

Delve Into Don Tiki
Set the tone for your own
lomilomi time at home.
The Forbidden Sounds of Don Tiki (Taboo, 1997)
Martin Denny actually makes a guest appearance on this debut album, as does Lopaka Colón. The album keeps the tiki torch burning.
Skinny Dip with Don Tiki (Taboo, 2002)
Mixed in with original songs are some Denny covers, such as “Primitiva.”
Don Tiki Adulterated: The Remix Project (unreleased)
In the works, this is a compilation of Don Tiki songs remixed by star DJs such as Frank Orrall, Ursula 1000 and Br. Cleve (formerly of Combustible Edison). It puts the funk in tiki, taking it beyond retro homage.