The hula was originally a religious dance performed to promote fertility, honor the gods, or provide praise to chiefs.

Courtesy of Sri Maiava Rusden/Big Island Visitors Bureau

Hawaii - Music and Performing Arts

By Smithsonian.com
Smithsonian.com, November 06, 2007

Hawaii is indelibly associated with hula, the story-telling dance style invented on the island of Molokai. Every spring, the Big Island city of Hilo celebrates hula at the Merrie Monarch Festival. The week-long event includes art exhibitions, craft fairs, hula lessons and performances, a parade and a three-day international hula competition.

The Annual Ukulele Festival, every summer in Waikiki, showcases Hawaiian music’s signature instrument, invented there in the 1880s. The festival includes free concerts by world-class ukulele players and an all-ukulele orchestra.