World-class oboe made from Kauaʻi kauila wood returns home for free concert

A world-class oboe made from kauila wood from a tree on Kauaʻi is coming home for a special event at the beginning of November that will share orchestra music with the community and also raise awareness about the uniqueness and beauty of the environment from which the instrument was born.

Former Hawaiʻi Symphony Orchestra principal oboist J. Scott Janusch and musicians from Chamber Music Hawaiʻi will present composer Jon Magnussen’s Suite from “Nā Kau ʻElua | The Two Seasons” in a free concert at 6:30 p.m. Nov. 4 at the Kauaʻi Community College Performing Arts Center in Līhuʻe.

Janusch and event organizers in a post-concert talk story will share the tale of how the wood for the oboe came from a kauila tree in Kōkeʻe that was damaged by Hurricane Iniki in the 1980s and reclaimed by the late Ed Kaʻiwi of Anahola.

The wood eventually made its way to world-renowned oboe maker Howarth of London.

“Kauila is an ancient resource that was very important to Hawaiian culture,” he said. “This wood was a very important resource in the ancient Hawaiian culture and the few remaining trees still standing today in the old growth forests need to be protected; they stand as a majestic part of Hawaiʻi’s history.”

The concert is presented by Kauaʻi Community College in collaboration with Live Music Awareness, the University of Hawaiʻi-West Oʻahu Music Fund, Chamber Music Hawaiʻi and the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa Music Department instrument collection.

Magnussen, a professor at the University of Hawaiʻi at West Oʻahu, said the oboe concerto was inspired by the many ways the people of old Hawaiʻi made use of the once common, but now rare and precious kauila wood.

He is grateful for the partnership between the University of Hawaiʻi campuses.

“We are all connected in our university system, and we are most powerful when our knowledge and experiences are shared generously across our system,” said Magnussen.