University of Hawaiʻi at Hilo alumnus Keliʻi Kalaukoa Masao Grothmann has created a unique career that bridges his Native Hawaiian and Japanese heritage, merging the two cultures through dance and language. Now a kumu hula based in Japan, Grothmann, who earned a degree in Hawaiian studies, not only teaches hula but also emphasizes the importance of ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi (Hawaiian language), ensuring that his Japanese students understand the meaning behind the dances they perform.
Grothmann’s passion for blending cultures began during his time at UH Hilo. For his senior project in a Japanese theatre and performance class conducted by Professor Yoshiko Fukushima, he performed a fusion of hula and Noh, a classical Japanese dance theater style.
“The more I studied about it, the more I saw the connections through hula,” Grothmann said.
Hula lineage
His deep connection to the performing arts began long before his academic career. Both of his great-grandmothers were trained in sacred, kapu hula by masters who had witnessed the conquests of Kamehameha I. Grothmann also learned his family descends from the bushi, or warrior class, who were once patrons of classical Japanese arts, like Noh theater. The feudal rule of the Tokugawas was already at an end when his great-grandfather became a military officer, but his grandmother remembers her father being filled with a particular nostalgia for that bygone era.
Noh actor debut
In Japan, Grothmann has also taken up performing in Noh productions, training under master Noboru Sano. Additionally, he recently debuted a new production called Kulāiwi, Land of the Ancestors, which blends his two passions, hula and Noh.
Grothmann hopes to bring the show to “many other shores” and is already working on preparing to bring the performance back home to Hawaiʻi.
—Sophia Kim Osullivan
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