"Aloha Oe": The Classic Hawaiian Song

Aloha Oe
by Queen Liliuokalani, 1878

More than a century ago, “Aloha Oe” became one of the first Hawaiian songs to achieve recognition outside of the Islands. Today, it remains Hawaii’s most famous composition. Since Liliuokalani composed the song in the late 1870s, its poignant words and melody have been sung on countless occasions, from sendoffs at Honolulu Harbor to final farewells at local funerals.

Says Hawaiian historian and singer Nalani Olds, “When I was with the Royal Hawaiian Band, we took a six-week tour of Europe, and it was amazing to hear Aloha Oe’ done in so many foreign tongues. All of these people knew it, even in the remotest places.”

Although the song has become synonymous with goodbye, the queen herself reportedly insisted that it was a love song. She is said to have composed the song during a tour around Oahu, shortly after witnessing a lingering embrace between a woman in her entourage and a man at the Edwin Boyd Ranch in Maunawili.

In the opening lines, the queen describes in Hawaiian the proud rain upon the cliffs, seeking out the lehua- flower. “The rain represents semen falling from Wakea, sky father, seeking out Papahanaumoku, earth mother,” explains Dr. Kekuni Blaisdell, who helped research and publish The Queen’s Songbook, a collection of 55 of her compositions. “It’s a poem about love and passion, man and woman. It’s much, much more than just goodbye.”

The queen was the most prolific among the royal composers, which included her siblings who lived to adulthood, Kalakaua, Likelike and Leleiohoku. Collectively, they are known as Na Lani Eha, the royal four, for their accomplishments as composers, musicians and perpetuators of their culture.

While Liliuokalani was imprisoned for eight months at Iolani Palace after the overthrow of the monarchy, she described composing as a “a gift of nature [which], never having been suffered to fall into disuse, remains a source of the greatest consolation today. ... Hours ... I might have found long and lonely, passed quickly and cheerfully by, occupied and soothed by the expression of my thoughts in music.” 

Hawaiian lyrics:
Ha'aheo ka ua i na pali
Ke nihi a'ela i ka nahele
E hahai (uhai) ana paha i ka liko
Pua 'ahihi lehua o uka

Aloha 'oe, aloha 'oe
E ke onaona noho i ka lipo
One fond embrace,
A ho 'i a'e au
Until we meet again 

'O ka hali'a aloha i hiki mai
Ke hone a'e nei i
Ku'u manawa
'O 'oe no ka'u ipu aloha
A loko e hana nei

Maopopo ku'u 'ike i ka nani
Na pua rose o Maunawili
I laila hia 'ia na manu
Miki'ala i ka nani o ka lipo      

English lyrics:

Proudly swept the rain by the cliffs

As it glided through the trees

Still following ever the bud

The `ahihi lehua of the vale

Farewell to you, farewell to you

The charming one who dwells in the shaded bowers

One fond embrace,

'Ere I depart

Until we meet again

Sweet memories come back to me

Bringing fresh remembrances

Of the past

Dearest one, yes, you are mine own

From you, true love shall never depart

I have seen and watched your loveliness

The sweet rose of Maunawili

And 'tis there the birds of love dwell

And sip the honey from your lips

See also:
50 Greatest Songs of Hawaii