becoming

Shapeshifting through art forms to advocate for disabled, queer and Indigenous dreams; KEALOHA calls for intifada, globally.

 

"The youngest of three siblings raised by our single mama; my Ohana battled the anti-Indigenous colonial family court system for over a decade to be free from domestic violence. I know what it means to bury dreams and lose family and futures to thees colonial poisons. MY BOOK OF PRAYERS is my debut album - chanelling generations of survivors silenced too long."

 

Kealoha Browne weaves pathways for individual, community, and global Re-Matriation. Witnessing global genocides while living resistance to these same systems on different stolen homelands… This fight for justice calls for all of our medicines.

Their music carries essences of their Hawaiian, Tahitian and Lheidli T'enneh Indigeneity; woven with Brown & Black artists and music lineages who have importantly mentored Kealoha’s voice. "Dynamic, multi-pronged musical paradise. Grounded, Elevated, oceanic, bars, all of it" (Music Waste Festival 2022). ​KEALOHA weaves soundscapes of Indigi-Pop wonder, beaming and shapeshifting as a vocalist, drummer, and dancer.  

 

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FROM TAP DANCE TO DRUMSET​. BEDRIDDEN TO STAGE HANDING. RHYTHM SECTION TO BANDLEADING.

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"MY young love for tap dance my Mama to surprise me with drum lessons when I was 12!!! Our Mom, ever nurturing, fiercely believing in us. At 18, we moved to xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish) and Səl̓ílwətaʔ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations, where I achieved a Bachelor of Music in Jazz Drums on full scholarship. Bussing to gigs with my drumset, stage-handing arena shows, gathering dreams; the impact of this hustle in a chronically ill Indigenous body was a slow burn to crash…"

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Bedridden for years with inflammation, chronic pain, and eczema lesions; Kealoha’s path is not pretty pop star-group selfies at afterparties-glammed up and going out. Their reality is: breathwork and bilateral stimming to make it out of the house for an hour. Biologic injections to stop their body from fighting itself on the inside. Self-advocating through anti-Indigenous and homophobic healthcare prejudices to attempt to access restorative care. Checking on little cousins struggling with the same s*lf harm and ideation survival coping that kept them alive.

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KEALOHA’s original music project was born out of necessity. “Living with chronic illness is like being a bird asked to learn a life on the ground.” My second single, was nominated to CBC Searchlight Top 100 in 2021. Their third single - Mahina - reached #13 in the Indigenous Music Countdown. ​The spring of 2021 to 2022 saw KeAloha across stages and circles in Turtle Island, including Banff Centre for the Arts, Oahu Indigenous Youth Workers gathering, Indigenous Day Live presented by APTN, Music Waste, Vines Festival, and Shipyards Festival.

 

Through creation and advocacy, KEALOHA opens portals that traverse hope & lament, heartbreak & remedy. A Two-Spirit and Mahu person, a chronically ill time-bender and shapeshifter, music is part of Kealoha’s commitment to collective liberation. 

 

lineage

I am a Great-Great-Grandchild of Granny Seymour, “Matriarch of the North” of Lheidli T’enneh Nation; medicine woman, trapper, crafter, and knowledge keeper. I am a Great Grandchild of Captain Owen Browne, and Grandchild of Earl Browne, who passed the traditions of Hawaiian and Tahitian dances down to my Mama, Nani Browne, who in turn taught my siblings and I. Our Mom's Mom was Lorraine Grove, descended from Irish-English farmer-settlers. I am paternally descended from Chinese immigrants.

 

I belong to Lheidli T’enneh Dakelh Nation; I am committed to these homelands and waters - I grew up there.

I am devoted to xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations - these homelands have nurtured me 18-29.

I am Kanaka Mamao - Native Hawaiian diaspora; I wonder what it was like for my ancestors to navigate by stars from the South Pacific to Salish coastlines. I pray for more time with my ohana doing 'aina work.

I am Tahitian - in this I feel the interconnectedness of Mahu travellers, original community bridges

I am Chinese - despite the one who would try to steal my life

I am Irish and English - I think of holding sweet, strong Gramma Grove as she made her journey to spirit world.

 

I am not percentages of these ancestries.

I am a whole being . I am all of these, all at once.

I am KEALOHA

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Through music, dance, and storytelling; I amplify the wisdom of disabled, queer, Indigenous, Two-Spirit, and Mahu identities.

 

lands

I grew up in the urban centre of so-called "Prince George, BC" in our unceded Lheidli keyoh.

When I was 18 I moved to the unsurrendered ancestral homelands of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations ("Vancouver, BC").

I have had the opportunity to return to Hawai’i once with my siblings when i was 16 years old, and again last year - to offer my music with Indigenous Youth Workers in ‘Oahu.