Don Ho

1930年8月13日，Don Ho出生于夏威夷的檀香山，是夏威夷人、中國人、葡萄牙人、荷蘭人和德國人的混血種人，原名Donald Tai Loy Ho，在以前還是農村的卡內奧赫長大。父親是一家酒巴的老板，他本人于上世紀60年代初闖入懷基基海灘一帶的娛樂圈，此后幾乎再也沒有離開過這個小圈子。象他這樣一生幾乎不曾離開同一演唱地的藝人，世上鮮有。
Don Ho曾于2004年這樣對美聯(lián)社記者說：“夏威夷是我的伙伴！”
中學時候，Don Ho曾是學校里明星級的足球運動員，當學生期間在一家菠蘿罐頭廠里工作過一段時間。1949年中學畢業(yè)后，憑運動獎學金進入馬薩諸塞州的斯普林菲爾德學院深造，后因思鄉(xiāng)心切，返回夏威夷群島，最終于1953年大夏威夷大學完成學業(yè)，獲得社會學學位。
受二戰(zhàn)期間美軍飛機進出夏威夷的影響，Don Ho曾經(jīng)參加美國空軍。朝鮮戰(zhàn)爭結束后，他先后多次駕駛軍用運輸機，往返于檀香山的希開姆空軍基地和東京之間。解甲回鄉(xiāng)后，他從父親手中接過經(jīng)營多年的酒巴Honey's，并組建了一個樂隊，并應父親的請求開始登臺表演。
Don Ho曾吐露心跡說：“我原來根本無意成為一名藝人，我只是唱了幾首從收音機里聽來的自己喜歡的歌曲，但過了不久，那里就人滿為患了。每到周末，等著聽我演唱的人總會把長隊排到大街上。”
后來，Honey's酒巴成了瓦胡島上一個不容游客錯過的好去處，夏威夷其他地方的音樂人，也經(jīng)常駐足這里，即興舉辦一些搖滾爵士樂演奏會。他開始到夏威夷的各種地方演唱，并于1966年獲得突破性成就，在好萊塢參加椰子林演唱會，并推出首張唱片《Tiny Bubbles》，獲得極大成功。
此后，他又到賭城拉斯韋加斯的火烈鳥酒店，開拓自己的演藝事業(yè)舞臺。露西·寶爾、弗蘭克·辛那特拉等著名明星，都曾是他的忠實觀眾。1976-1977年，他還在ABC主持過電視節(jié)目“The Don Ho Show”，Don Ho最難以忘記的電視表演，是他于1972年在電視劇《The Brady Bunch》的一段表演。“這些年來我得到過太多的歡樂，但確實為那一次感到遺憾。”他在2004年接受采訪時這樣說。
在對Don Ho進行評價時，美國夏威夷現(xiàn)任州長琳達·林格說，Don Ho為夏威夷州創(chuàng)造了一份遺產(chǎn)，他將激勵未來一代又一代的夏威夷本土音樂人努力前進。她說：“夏威夷失去了一份真正的財富，他奠定了夏威夷音樂界目前享有的國際聲譽的基礎。”
除《Tiny Bubbles》外，Don Ho演唱的其他著名歌曲還包括：《我會記著你》(I'll Remember You)、《給你我所有的愛》(With All My Love)和《夏威夷婚禮曲》(Hawaiian Wedding Song)等。
by William Ruhlmann
Don Ho employed his talents as a middle-of-the-road pop singer and musical ambassador for Hawaii to launch a mainland career that included half a dozen chart albums, numerous television appearances, and engagements at top venues starting in the mid-60s. He was born in Kakaako, a small neighborhood in Honolulu on the island of Oahu in Hawaii and grew up in the city of Kaneohe, also on Oahu. After a stint in the Air Force, he took over a cocktail lounge in Kaneohe named Honeys, after his mother. There, he started a band, eventually called the Aliis, with himself as singer and organist. In 1962, he moved to the Oahu resort district of Waikiki, where he played in a nightclub called Dukes. There he began to come to the attention of the mainland entertainment business. He was signed to Reprise Records, which released his debut album, Don Ho Show, in 1965. In 1966, he made his debut at the Coconut Grove in Los Angeles, an engagement followed by others at such high-profile locations as the Sands in Las Vegas, Harrahs at Lake Tahoe, the Palmer House in Chicago, and the Americana Hotels Royal Box in New York. He also began turning up as a guest on network TV talk shows. Meanwhile, his records began to sell. His second album, a live collection called Don Ho — Again!, reached the charts in March 1966, but it was the release of Tiny Bubbles that fall which really broke him in record stores. The single placed in the pop and the easy listening charts, stimulating sales of a Tiny Bubbles LP that made the Top 20 and stayed in the charts nearly a year.
Ho continued to cultivate television, appearing as himself on such sitcoms as Batman and I Dream of Jeannie. His next album, another live collection, East Coast/West Coast, reached the charts but was only a modest seller. Subsequent records didnt do as well, but another live LP, Suck em Up (the title referring to his on-stage exhortation to the audience to drink heartily), gave him his fourth chart album in the spring of 1969. That summer, he co-hosted the Kraft Music Hall TV variety series with Sandler & Young, which increased his exposure and helped put Don Ho — Greatest Hits! and The Don Ho TV Show onto the charts.
Hos record sales declined after the late 60s, but he continued to perform extensively and appeared on television, notably on episodes of The Brady Bunch, Charlies Angels, and The Fall Guy. From October 1976 to March 1977, he hosted a half-hour daytime variety series, The Don Ho Show, broadcast over ABC-TV. By the 90s, he had launched his own label, Honey Records, to release his recordings and others by island favorites. He continued to make occasional TV appearances, and in 1996 had a small part in the film Joes Apartment. He performed regularly at his own club in Hawaii. Hoku, the seventh of his ten children, launched a singing career in 2000 with her song Another Dumb Blonde, which was used in the movie Snow Day and became a Top 40 hit, followed by the release of her debut album, Hoku.