Don Ho, Hawaii's famous crooner, dies at age 76

HONOLULU — Legendary Hawaii crooner Don Ho, who entertained tourists for decades wearing raspberry-tinted sunglasses and singing his signature tune "Tiny Bubbles," has died. He was 76.

He died Saturday morning of heart failure, publicist Donna Jung said. Information on where he died was not released.

Mr. Ho had suffered from heart problems for the past several years and had a pacemaker installed last fall. In 2005, he underwent an experimental stem-cell procedure on his ailing heart in Thailand.

He entertained Hollywood's biggest stars and thousands of tourists for 40 years. For many, no trip to Hawaii was complete without seeing his Waikiki show, a mix of songs, jokes, double entendres, Hawaii history and audience participation.

Shows usually started and ended with the same song, "Tiny Bubbles." Mr. Ho mostly hummed as the audience enthusiastically took over the song's swaying, silly lyrics: "Tiny bubbles / in the wine / make me happy / make me feel fine."

"I hate that song," he often joked to the crowd. He said he sang it twice because "people my age can't remember if we did it or not."

The son of bar owners, Mr. Ho broke into the Waikiki entertainment scene in the early 1960s and, except for short periods, never left. Few artists are more associated with one place.

"Hawaii is my partner," he said in 2004.

The "undisputed king of Waikiki entertainers," as The Honolulu Advertiser has called him, continued to tour when he wasn't performing at his longtime home base, the showroom of the Waikiki Beachcomber Hotel. His final performance was Thursday, Jung said.

"Singing is what keeps me young," Mr. Ho, then 70, said in 2001, not long after the trendy men's magazine Maxim recognized him as one of the "50 Coolest Guys Ever."

Donald Tai Loy Ho was one of nine children with a mixed ethnic heritage that included Hawaiian, Chinese, Portuguese, Dutch and German. He was born Aug. 13, 1930, in Honolulu and grew up in the countryside of Kaneohe on the island of Oahu.

In high school, he was a star football player and worked for a brief time in a pineapple cannery. After graduating in 1949, he attended Springfield College in Massachusetts on an athletic scholarship. He grew homesick, returned to the islands and graduated from the University of Hawaii in 1953 with a degree in sociology.

Inspired by the U.S. military planes flying in and out of Hawaii during World War II, Mr. Ho joined the Air Force. As the Korean War wound down, he piloted transport planes between Hickam Air Force Base in Honolulu and Tokyo.

When he returned home and took over his parents' struggling neighborhood bar, Honey's, he put together a band and started performing at his father's request.

"I had no intention of being an entertainer," Mr. Ho said. "I just played songs I liked from the radio, and pretty soon that place was jammed. Every weekend there would be lines down the street."

Honey's became a happening place on Oahu, with other Hawaiian musicians stopping in for jam sessions. Mr. Ho began to play at various spots in Hawaii, and, soon, he was packing places such as the Coconut Grove in Hollywood and the Flamingo Hotel in Las Vegas.

Stars such as Lucille Ball, Sammy Davis Jr. and Frank Sinatra were known to be in the audience for his shows.

Mr. Ho also became a television star and hosted "The Don Ho Show" on ABC in 1976-77. One of his most memorable TV appearances was a 1972 cameo on an episode of "The Brady Bunch."

"I've had too much fun all these years," he said in a 2004 interview. "I feel real guilty about it."

Besides "Tiny Bubbles," his other well-known songs include "I'll Remember You," "With All My Love" and "Hawaiian Wedding Song."

Mr. Ho long ago had given up smoking and drinking.

He also made another concession in recent years: No more kissing "grandmas," dozens of whom would often line up for a kiss.

"I stopped kissing them when one grandma died in my arms, right then and there," he told The Honolulu Advertiser in 2000. "It was frightening."

Mr. Ho is survived by his wife, Haumea, and numerous family members.

Material from the Los Angeles Times is included in this report.