Facts About Israel Kamakawiwoole Hawaiian Music: Over the Rainbow

"Israel Kamakawiwo’ole" was Born in Honolulu Hawaii in 1959 and spent the first five years of his life with his Grandfather, ( "Tutu Kane" in Hawaiian ) on the Hawaiian island of Niihau. In 1964 he returned to the island of Oahu to live with his immediate family and learned the importance of his Hawaiian language and heritage. IZ was a native Hawaiian, who upon his death in 1997, at the age of 38, was only the second citizen to receive the honor of having his body lay in state at the capitol building in Honolulu Hawaii. Israel IZ Kamakawiwoole is remembered fondly in Hawaii and throughout his worldwide fan base as much more than just a Hawaiian singer, song writer and composer. IZ sings original Contemporary Hawaiian Music in the native Hawaiian tongue and performs his beautiful ukulele songs using his solo tenor ukulele to accompany the gentle purity of his golden smooth and passionate voice which covers an extraordinary range of vocal octaves.

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Béla Bartók: A Great Hungarian Composer

(March 25, 1881 – September 26, 1945)
Béla Bartók was an outstanding composer of the modern age who wrote works for string quartets, large orchestras, and series of compositions for use of young musicians and students of music. At the age of six, he began to study music in his native Hungary. He was already composing short piano pieces at the age of nine. He further continued his music studies at the Royal Academy in Budapest, and returned in 1907 as one of its youngest professors in piano.
Upon visiting a friend living in a far off village, Bartók heard a kind of Hungarian music which eventually influenced his musical compositional style for the rest of his musical career. His fellow composer, Zoltan Kodaly, also admired this type of music. They both realized that what they were actually hearing as Hungarian music in the city was actually gypsy music, a different dimension of Hungarian, or Magyar, folk music, which they can use and derive inspiration from.

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Bela Bartok: An Analysis of His Music
The Music of Bela Bartok: A Study of Tonality and Progression in Twentieth-Century Music
Béla Bartók - Mikrokosmos Volume 1 (Blue) Songbook