It has been a busy couple of months for Kumu Hula Mark Kealiʻi Hoʻomalu. His hālau, the Oakland-based Academy of Hawaiian Arts, competed in Merrie Monarch, which ran from April 20 through 26. This week, when Disney’s live action version of “Lilo & Stitch” debuts in theaters on Friday, May 23, his voice will be part of the soundtrack.
Other featured talent include Iam Tongi, the Kamehameha Schools Children’s Chorus, and the North Shore-based brothers Nyjah Music & Zyah Rhythm. Of that group, only Hoʻomalu and the director of the Kamehameha Schools Children’s Chorus, Lynell Bright, can say they were part of creating the soundtrack for the original movie.
Hoʻomalu did the singing and some of the composing for the 2002 movie’s “He Mele No Lilo” and “Hawaiian Roller Coaster Ride,” performed with the Kamehameha Schools Children’s Chorus.
This year, at Merrie Monarch, the wahine in his hālau’s performed “Kuʻe Hao O Ka Lanakila,” a mele about a railway line that stretched from Moanalua to Waiʻanae. The oli that started the performance included parts of ʻKa Wohi Ku Ka Moku,’ which was also featured in “He Mele No Lilo” in the original “Lilo & Stitch” movie.
“On the Merrie Monarch this year, the girls kahiko, we started off with the oli. We did get recognized: ʻOh, that's the oli that he did for ʻLilo & Stitch,” the original, which is called ʻKa Wohi Ku Ka Moku,’ ” he told Aloha State Daily. “It was really nice because everybody in the audience was singing. … What a beautiful gesture to the queen.”
Going into Merrie Monarch, the practice schedule for the kumu hula included hula classes every day, with kāne on one night and wahine the next, Hoʻomalu told ASD.
“I’m different because I don't see hula and the sound of hula as the same thing,” he said. “The sound is a whole other element that’s for the hoʻopaʻa, that’s for the chanters. … Hula is for the eyes and the leo — the sound — is for your ear. It's not the same thing, but they should both make your brain dance.”
The annual competition brings Hoʻomalu back to the Hawaiian Islands. After the competition on Hawaiʻi Island, he spent time with family on Oʻahu, he said.
“It allows me to come home and to bring hula home that Hawaiʻi is not doing,” he said. “Being away from Hawaiʻi allows me to not get caught up in what everybody else is doing. … By osmosis you become like everybody else. It was like that 50 years ago, and I don't want to be like that.”
The kāne kahiko performance of “Holo Mai Pele,” was a mele that dates back to at least 1860 and tells the story of the migration of Tūtū Pele to Hawaiʻi, he said.
“Everyone in Hawaiʻi who has done it has done it the way that the Kanakaʻole family has done it,” he said. “That's where they learned it from, and they present it that way.”
But Hoʻomalu choose to share the story as a migration from the ocean, he said. In fact, his dancers brought outrigger canoe paddles to the stage.
“He's talking about a migration, sailing from Tahiti and I am bringing it from the ocean — not land locked, but from the ocean — and presenting a new rendition of an old mele,” he said.
Watch video of other 2025 Merrie Monarch performances. Get tickets to “Lilo & Stitch."
Katie Helland can be reached at katie@alohastatedaily.com.
