Tucson crooner Ernie Menehune performed his Hawaiian-flavored songs all across the Old Pueblo for decades, and even made a splash in Las Vegas.
Now, more than ten years after his death, his former sound engineer and good friend Frank Luna is helping keep Menehune's memory alive through his music.
"Oh, my gosh, what a voice," Luna said of his buddy.
Like many in Tucson, Luna first heard Menehune sing at the storied Spanish Trail Supper Club off of I-10.
Ernie regularly performed there in the 1960s and '70s.
Frank said Ernie was so beloved in Tucson because he was the city's answer to Don Ho.
"When he made his first recording, "Back to Aloha Land" in 1964, it sold like hotcakes, especially here in Tucson," Luna said. "That pretty much started the ball rolling on him being so popular. He made Tucson his home."
Born in 1923 in Waimea, Hawaii, Ernie Menehune moved to Tucson permanently in 1974.
By the time he arrived here, he had already become a well-known figure, performing in supper clubs in Arizona, California and Las Vegas.
"Frank Sinatra would come into his shows and listen to him," Frank said. "When he told me, 'Oh yeah, Ol' Blue Eyes, after he did his shows, then I would start my shows.' For all of these celebrities to hear Ernie, that's how his popularity exploded."
Vegas is also where Ernie earned his best-known nickname.
Of Hawaiian and Irish descent, a newspaper reporter once dubbed Menehune "Hawaii's sun-tanned Irishman."
That would become the name of his second album.
Ernie always came back to Tucson, often performing at places like the Kon Tiki on East Broadway, selling vinyl records as a source of income.
Frank Luna became his sound engineer in 2010 and convinced Ernie to release his albums on CD.
"I made a promise to him that his music, his recordings, would see the light of digital going into the 21st century," Luna said.
Menehune insisted that the CDs had the same sound of the original recordings, which they do.
Sadly, Ernie passed away in March of 2015 at the age of 92.
In honor of his friend, Frank has now helped create a commemorative tiki mug with a unique bamboo flash drive filled with all of Ernie's music.
"Although he's been gone for more than 10 years, his music still lives on," Frank said. "I made him that promise that (his) music will never, ever go away, no matter what."
