"I guess this is gonna sound kind of weird, but I'm not scared for myself for dying. "I was scared when I lost my mother, my father, my brother, my sister," Israel told de Mello. "There was such great content in what this beautiful Hawaiian man was talking about - the trials and tribulations of his own life and his family's life." "And every session, I would keep him for an hour afterwards." Just tell me stories, he told Israel. So he instructed his engineers to keep the tape rolling for all the rehearsals, all the jokes. To de Mello, everything Israel sang and said became precious. He knew he was destined for a brief life. His brother Skippy died from complications of obesity, as had almost all of Israel's immediate family. Israel weighed close to 700 pounds when he came to de Mello to start a solo career in 1993. If you sat there with a book and a score card, you could count the mistakes or you could listen to the song and smile."
"He gets the lyrics wrong, he changes the melody. "There's been a bunch of articles written about 'Over the Rainbow,' " says Bertosa.
"He had a grand heart attack in 1989, so this was right before his heart attack." De Mello put "Over the Rainbow" (actually a medley, with "What a Wonderful World") on Facing Future, which is still the best-selling Hawaiian album of all time, thanks to one song. "Israel was really sparkly, really alive," recalls de Mello after hearing the recording. He turned to producer Jon de Mello and said, "This is great, but there's more." Bertosa fished out "Over the Rainbow" and played it for de Mello. As Bertosa listened during the final days of recording, he had an epiphany. In 1993, Milan Bertosa wound up working as an engineer for Mountain Apple Company in Honolulu, a long-established recording house, where Israel was making a solo album. "Whatever was going on that night, he was inspired. But he was so taken with it, that over the next few years, he played it occasionally for family and friends. The next day, Bertosa made a copy for Israel and filed the original recording away. "Then I put up some microphones, do a quick sound check, roll tape, and the first thing he does is 'Somewhere Over the Rainbow.' He played and sang, one take, and it was over." And the first thing at hand is to find something for him to sit on." The building security found Israel a big steel chair. "And in walks the largest human being I had seen in my life. 'Please, can I come in? I have an idea,' " Bertosa remembers Israel saying.īertosa relented and gave Israel 15 minutes to get there. "And he's this really sweet man, well-mannered, kind. But the client insisted on putting Israel on the phone. Bertosa said he was shutting down, call tomorrow. The client rattled off Israel's unpronounceable name and said he wanted to come in and record a demo. It was a client of mine," Bertosa remembers. Milan Bertosa was at the end of a long day in his Honolulu recording studio. The 1988 Recording Session That Made Him A Legend Israel was over 6 feet tall with flowing black hair. Both he and Skippy weighed hundreds of pounds - the girth of sumo wrestlers. Israel was the group's standout - for his voice and also his size. In music, that meant getting away from kitschy hula tunes for tourists, like "My Little Grass Shack." Israel's group was among those who embraced traditional melodies. In the 1970s, young Hawaiians were rediscovering their language and culture. They called themselves the Makaha Sons of Ni'ihau. Israel was still a teenager when he and his brother formed a band with three other local guys. And that thing just cut right through the air, stopped everybody in their tracks." Every great singer has something special. What happened was, as soon as Israel Kamakawiwo'ole opened his mouth and sang, that whole place went quiet. In fact, one of the ukuleles was held together with bubble gum. "They set up with instruments that were kind of beat up. They were teenagers and Israel showed up with his older brother Skippy at a graduation party. But it's that that makes him special, because his mana always came out."īeazley remembers the first time he heard Israel sing. And when we open our mouth to speak, to sing or to play, that's what we let out. We believe we get ours from the elements first, the Earth, your sky, your ocean, your God, and all that is inside of us. "In Hawaii, we talk about this thing we call mana," says musician Del Beazley, who grew up with Israel and wrote two of his songs. That's quite remarkable for a rendition with one voice, accompanied only by ukulele. It's become so popular, it is now the most requested version of the song by far, according to music publishing house EMI.
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His version of "Over the Rainbow" has the poignancy of Judy Garland's and the shimmering vulnerability, but these days it's heard so often on TV and in the movies, a younger generation may only know Israel's version.