Lukela Keala

A young, inspiring singer/songwriter began with the strum of a ukulele. Lukela Keala, an amazing vocalist and guitarist began his professional musical career at the age of 18 when he released his first duo album as VALLEY BOYS. Being that Lukela and his band mate, Ata Damasco was from the island of Maui, which is  nicknamed the “VALLEY ISLE”, it was only fitting that they were called Valley Boys. His talent as a singer is amazing, but what took everyone by surprise was his writing skills. At the age of 18, no one would think a young man would be such a lyrical genius. Lukela is also known for his style of guitar playing. He plays the guitar in the Hawaiian art form called slack key, or also know as open G tuning. It is very rare to find anyone that plays only in slack key and writes all his original songs in this tuning. Moving forward from the group Valley boys, Lukela and his friends started a new band called Ekolu, which means 3 in Hawaiian. Ekolu is an Island Reggae band and has been performing in Hawaii, in the Mainland and also internationally for over 20 years. Lukela is a 6x Na Hoku Hanohano award winner. The Na Hoku Hanohano awards is considered to be Hawaii’s prestiges  award comparable to the Grammys. Ekolu has recently released their 10th full-length album titled “EKOLU MUSIC 3: FOR HAWAI’I”. Lukela has been recognized by his peers as one of Hawaii’s greatest vocalist.