Driving Fast with Brittni Paiva: A Young ‘Ukulele Virtuoso Speeding Toward Stardom
By Shirley Stoffer
The music world keeps opening new doors for Brittni Paiva, the 23-year-old ‘ukulele star from Hilo. She has been making music since the age of four, when she started playing piano. At age 11, her uncle gave her an ‘ukulele and there has been no looking back since! Brittni produced her first three CDs herself—the first at age 15—and has received many awards. She was honored with the prestigious Nā Hōkū Hanohano Award for “Most Promising Artist of the Year” in 2005 and the 2007 Hawai‘i Music Awards’ “‘Ukulele Album of the Year” for her third album. Her fourth CD, “The Fire Within,” was co-produced by Charles Brotman, winner of the first Grammy award for Hawaiian music.
Brittni’s first trip to the mainland was at the age of 17, when she performed at the Cerritos ‘Ukulele Festival in Southern California. “It was a huge culture shock,” she says. “I went online to try to see what it would be like, but there was no way to prepare for it!” Now her music is taking her all over the world, and she has exciting recording projects and collaborations on the horizon. She has just released a DVD, “Brittni Paiva; Living Ukulele”, which includes, among other things, a segment on her recent trip to Australia and another on her jazz collaboration with saxophonist Tom Scott.
When you meet a young artist like Brittni Paiva, you can only imagine the tremendous amount of dedication and motivation they must have possessed early in life to enable them to achieve so much so soon. Her family was very supportive of her choice to become a performer at age 13, and Brittni also gives a lot of credit to homeschooling for providing her the freedom to create and ample time to learn her craft from a young age. “I have to laugh when I hear people say that homeschooling is anti-social or lonely,” she says. “For one thing, there are homeschooling organizations that support you when you’re doing it. I played soccer too, where I met a lot of friends. I could interact when I wanted to or get away from the distraction of my peers when I wanted to. It was perfect for me.”
Brittni’s faith is very important to her, and she makes reference to it in some way on all her CDs. She is Jewish by faith, not by race. “I can’t imagine going through this career stuff without my faith supporting me. I think I’ve had a lot of grace in my life. A lot of things having to do with being in the right place at the right time, and lucky breaks that couldn’t just be coincidences, are because of it, I think. I haven’t had any bad experiences with the music industry, which is known for being ruthless. I feel protected. Also, I believe that I am supposed to share what I have been given.”
She married her husband, Brandon, four years ago at age 19. When asked if marriage has affected her choices regarding touring, gigs, etc., she says no, not really. “It was a big adjustment, with more responsibilities—running a household and my music career, too—but it’s nothing I can’t handle.”
She did have writer’s block for a couple of years at the beginning of her marriage, she says, before she realized she needed a special place in her home for creating music. “Environment is so important for creativity.” Brittni likes to pamper her husband by cooking his favorite dishes, and says, “I like taking care of people; I try to be a ‘traditional wife’ when I can.”
Brandon introduced Brittni to the fun and excitement of racing cars—customizing them and competing in drag racing. It’s now become her hobby as well as his. She is very enthused about her “new baby” – a 2005 Mazda 3 Hatchback Limited Edition that she acquired in October, 2011. “I really wanted one. They only made 3,500 of them, total,” she tells me, “and this is #400. It’s in great shape and it has a Bose sound system!”
Computers arrived on the scene when Brittni was around nine years old. Since then, she has become very tech-savvy, like most of her generation, and often uses technology in her performances—sometimes to the chagrin of “’ukulele purists”, she says. She has become extremely proficient at the difficult and precise art of “looping”, which sets up background tracks for the artist to play over. “It takes lots of practice,” she says. “Your timing has to be perfect.”
Though she was raised around Hawaiian music, Brittni generally does not perform it, choosing instead to push against “’ukulele music barriers” by exploring as many different genres as possible with the instrument. “I try to think ‘outside the box’,” she says. On her CDs there are a wide variety of musical treats: her originals, some jazz, some classic rock, some pop. Again taking advantage of available technology, she recorded a long-distance collaboration with Johannes Linstead, a Latin guitarist from Toronto, Canada. She is currently working on a CD with internationally-known saxophonist Tom Scott, who has won three Grammy awards for solo albums and appears on many other artists’ recordings, from Frank Sinatra and Barbra Streisand to Joni Mitchell, the Grateful Dead and George Harrison.
Brittni and Tom met at the first Lana’i Jazz Festival in June of 2011, and hit it off immediately. They recently performed together in “An Evening of Jazz” at the Ritz-Carlton on Maui and at the Mauna Kea Beach Hotel on the Kohala Coast. Their CD will feature originals by both, and there’s even one song that they are composing together for it. “There’s a song that I just couldn’t finish. I wrote the first part, but just couldn’t get the second half. I sent it to Tom, and he got really excited about finishing it. We recorded some of the album on Maui and will finish it in his recording studio in L.A.” The CD should be ready for release in the Spring of 2012.
During the week, Brittni gives private lessons through her Brittni Paiva School of Music, which she conducts out of her home in Hilo. She’s working on making Skype lessons available, as well. She is well-versed in music theory, sight-reading, and due to the Suzuki method of piano training she had at age four, playing by ear. She studied slack key guitar with Keoki Kahumoku, but she considers the guitar to be a “side instrument” for her. She teaches ‘ukulele lessons at Keoki’s annual Hawaiian Music and Lifestyle Camp each November in Pahala. Her second favorite instrument is drums, and her third is the electric guitar.
As we parted, Brittni told me how thrilled she was to be meeting her guitar idol, Orianthi, at the annual NAMM show (originally the National Association of Music Merchants) the following week in Anaheim, California, where Brittni was to be a featured artist at the L.R. Baggs booth. “I think she’s probably the best young female electric guitarist around today. She’s 24 and was picked by Michael Jackson to be on what would have been his come-back tour.”
“You know,” this young slip of a woman continued, “I was really feeling old the other day when I realized that I’ve been playing music for 20 years!”
Brittni Paiva’s career is accelerating, with no slowing down in sight. ❖
Contact writer Shirley Stoffer at shirley@konaweb.com
Brittni Paiva School of Music: info@brittnipaiva.com
DVD available at your favorite music supplier or from Brittni’s website: www.brittnipaiva.com
