My wife and I had been married for about a year. We were both in college, and she was now seven and half months pregnant. We were excited to be having our first child. We new that it was a boy and we had his name ready. His name would be Napela. Unfortunately there were complications with the pregnancy and we lost him. This was extremely hard for both of us, and she really wanted to go home to Tahiti. She wanted to be with her family and to have her father take care of her using Tahitian herbal medicines. So we decided that she would drop out of school and that I would stay and finish the semester. She went and I stayed. To say that it was easy would be a lie. The lost of my first son and having to be in school was not easy. Add that fact that my wife not here with me was really rough. What helped me, was I began to write. By the way the shower worked a lot. Something about a hot shower and that tile sound just made every note and word sound like a million bucks. Can't say anything about the looks but never mind. I began to sing this melody line over and over again. Then I started to write what was going on in my head. Slowly but surely moment by moment began to take shape. Mind you she was gone for 3 months so I had a lot of time to craft this one. Back during those days we didn't have FB or email. There was this thing called a phone. No not a
Cell phone, but a phone attached to a line that connected to the wall. For those of you who may not have seen these type of phones. Using this type of communication was super expensive especially since it was an international call. My phone bill was nuts. One month I spoke to her so much the bill came out to $2000.00. Yup phone calls back then was not cheap. I finished the song wrote the verses and chorus had the song structure locked in. The only problem was, that the song was in my head. I didn't use my guitar to write, I just sang it. Back then I was not as proficient with guitar as I am now. So, I went to a friend who played the piano and sang the song to him. I took that recording to another friend who was a dang good guitarist and had him play to the piano. Thats how I learned to play my song. I would later use these two same friends to record the song in studio for the album, crazy yeah. I would learn over time, that it doesn't matter how you do it. Getting to the best end result however method you use is all good.
Moment by moment was now complete. I had played the song to Sylvianne and Sam and they both loved it. So now I had to figure out who would sing the song. Originally I wanted to sing this with my wife's cousin Marua. Who at the time was the top female recording artist in Tahiti. Sylvianne's family was pretty big in the music business in Tahiti. Her oldest brother was a producer and had his own recording studio. One of her brothers was one of the main recording engineers in Tahiti. And, an amazing musician as well. Any ways I pitched the idea to my brother in law and he declined. So i was like ok. So I asked Sam to sing the song with Lina. I believe my brother in law made the best decision cause Sam and Lina killed this track. I was able to fly my brother in law here and he mixed the album at MoonSurfer studios. Moment by moment was the 2nd song that made FM 100 play list.
Off of our debut album Puko'a kani aina. Moment by moment. Enjoy. P.S Families are Eternal.