Hawai'i loses revered public radio host

The late Alan Bunin, right, is shown here at Chef Mavro restaurant, where he programmed music to a meal for a Hawai‘i Public Radio benefit last year. With him are Hawai‘i Public Radio’s Maggie Ryan, center, and volunteer Bonnie Pestana. Judith R. Neale/Hawai‘i Public Radio

Alan Bunin (1951-2001) Title: Music director of Hawai‘i Public Radio Born and raised: Sept. 28, 1951; Great Neck, N.Y. Died: Feb. 17, 2001; Tucson, Ariz. Instruments: Viola, accordion and kazoo Family: Wife Helen Takeushi; daughter Natasha Bunin, 10 Quote: "All too often we forget the medium of radio, what it has been used for historically. Now it’s just background. But radio is so much more than sonic wallpaper."

In the film "It’s A Wonderful Life," George Bailey, played by Jimmy Stewart, was surprised to learn of the impact his life had made on the lives of others. Hawai‘i Public Radio "Morning Concert" host Alan Bunin, 49, who died of a heart attack Saturday while attending a music director’s conference in Tucson, Ariz., might have been surprised, too.

Yesterday his stunned friends, colleagues and listeners couldn’t say enough about his skill and his character.

"I felt like I had been hit with a baseball bat," said Mark Wagner, HPR director of operations, of his reaction to the news, which began to trickle back to the Islands on Saturday morning.

Beth Ann Kozlovich, host of HPR’s "Morning Edition" and "Town Square," said she couldn’t take it in when Bunin’s wife, Helen, called her Saturday morning: "It just wouldn’t register. He was like an older brother to me."

Samuel Wong, music director of the Honolulu Symphony, said from his New York home, "I cannot imagine life in Hawai‘i without Alan. Just his voice on the radio every morning has always been a source of comfort for me."

Valerie Yee, HPR director of marketing and development, said the station had heard from dozens of supporters. "Alan’s listeners were very attached to him," she said. "He had an enormous number of fans. He was so brilliant, and he could make you laugh."

While most who remembered him mentioned Bunin’s intelligence and encyclopedic knowledge of the classical compositions he presented on "Morning Concert," another common thread was his odd slant on humor. Bunin was variously described as the "class clown of the studio" and the guy most likely to deliver the David Letterman-style comment.

Mort Brown, who heads the annual HPR Almost-New Record Sale, said Bunin, a trained violist, had the world’s finest and most complete collection of viola jokes (although no one recalled Bunin playing his own viola on the air).

"Alan and I had sort of a morning ritual," said Kozlovich. "When he came in, he would always make faces at me through the glass. He was trying to make me crack up as I was signing off the air. He never succeeded, and I always think he felt badly about that."

"If he had been of age in the 1950s, he could have sat down beside Mel Brooks and Woody Allen and written jokes for Sid Caesar," said Wagner.

Judith R. Neale, HPR director of public relations, recalled an incident last week when Bunin tossed off a "walking pun." Honolulu Magazine editor John Heckathorn had been in the studio making some promotional clips for an upcoming fund-raiser, recording a segment about matching duck with pinot noir. Later he groused a bit about his own performance, to which Bunin responded, "Ah ha! Hoist on your own canard!"

That sort of humor sailed right past some, said Wagner. But Bunin’s delivery was so engaging that listeners stayed with him.

HPR president and general manager Michael Titterton, back in the Islands yesterday after accompanying Bunin’s wife and daughter to Tucson, said Bunin didn’t seem to care if anyone got his personally skewed jokes. "He was just having so much fun in his own cerebral sandbox," said Titterton.

A trademark of Bunin’s was a selection he picked as the opener for his morning show, a piano composition by Checkfield and Craig Palmer called "The Good Brown Earth," complete with chirping birds. For many daily listeners, the birdsong was as distinctive a mark in the day as the morning alarm, or the start of the evening news. As Titterton said, "You knew you should have your socks on by then."

The show also was marked by Bunin’s singular, deep, calming though somewhat raspy voice.

"He didn’t have the classic FM voice," said Wagner. "Alan had a natural, relaxed style of talking to you on the radio. He brought a lot of people into music and, without talking down to people, would speak to them as if he was talking to a friend or someone he would meet on the street."

Kozlovich may have summed up Bunin best when she said, "He had an incredibly fine brain. He knew much about classical music. He knew much about life in general. He could turn a phrase. ... And he could make you laugh."

Bunin is survived by his wife, Helen Takeushi, and his daughter, Natasha, of Honolulu; his mother, Elisa Bunin, and a sister, Karen Hess, both of New York state. A memorial service is planned for 2 p.m. Sunday at Temple Emanu-El, 2550 Pali Highway. The family requests aloha attire and no flowers.

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