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Kī Wahine · her signature tuning
Tune your guitar the way she did.
From the 6th string (lowest) to the 1st string (highest), drop into her signature tuning:
D – G – D – F♯ – B – D
Also called Auntie Alice Nāmakelua’s G Tuning, Double Slack, or F♯ Tuning.
No ke aha · why this tuning
This is a double-slack variant of G major: the 6th, 5th, and 4th strings are dropped to D, G, D — and the 3rd is slackened to F♯ — so that strumming all six strings open sounds a full G chord. Aunty Alice played in it for most of her recorded catalog.
Slack key families each carry their own signature tuning, passed within ʻohana. This one is now shared canon. Every serious kī hōʻalu player knows it — many learned it from her directly, or from a haumāna who did.