Pōpoloheno is a song-creation project which will celebrate the untold stories and contributions of people of African descent who arrived in Hawaiʻi soon after the time of the first Western contact and who shaped Hawaiʻiʻs early history. Supported by a grant from the Gerbode Foundation, Pōpoloheno will also explore the process of song composition in the style unique to Hawaiian tradition: the gathering of composers to haku (weave) mele (songs).