The Drum Remembers

Each pahu begins as a coconut palm log, shaped by hand over weeks of patient adzing into a vessel for sacred sound.

The drumhead is stretched from shark skin, lashed in star patterns with olonā cordage — the sea’s voice held in place.

Every beat accompanies the ʻōlelo — preserving genealogy and place in the pattern of sound across generations.

Sawtooth bands and concentric arches register each zone of the drum’s surface as sacred, echoing canoe-prow and shark-tooth motifs.