How did guitars come to Hawaii?
The popular story is that three Mexican vaqueros (cowboys) were hired on contract to come to Hawaii and teach the Hawaiians how to manage cattle. Mexican longhorn cattle had been introduced as a gift to Kamehameha I in the 1700’s. The first two Mexican cowboys arrived in 1781 in Lahaina, Maui. Around the same time, three Mexican cowboys were brought to the Big Island. These cowboys taught the Hawaiians the Hawaiians to manage cattle. When they returned to their families on the mainland, they gave their guitars to their Hawaiian friends. The Hawaiians didn’t know the chord fretting positions on the guitar neck or how to tune the strings relative to each other… so they loosened the keys (tuners) until the strings sounded nice strummed open… and then because there were only a few instruments and none to accompany, they created a technique of self accompaniment described earlier.
