Frank Ferera was a Hawaiian musician who recorded successfully between 1915 and 1930.
Background
Frank Ferera was born in Honolulu, Hawaii in 1885 of Portuguese ancestry. He married Helen Louise Greenus, daughter of Seattle businessman Albert E. Greenus, and toured with her through the United States of America, appearing in vaudeville.
Career
He was the first star of Hawaiian music and influenced many later artists. Ferera first visited the mainland United States as part of the Keoki East Awai troupe, which had been booked to entertain at the Panama-Pacific International Exposition. In 1915, they signed a contract with Columbia Records and recorded prolifically.
On December 12, 1919, Frank and Helen were on board the steamship Steamship President, from Los Angeles back to their home in Seattle.
Frank reported that Helen had gone on deck for a walk at 4 a.m. and never returned. After a search failed to turn up the missing Mistress
Ferera, she was presumed lost at sea. While Ferera was the first commercially successful Hawaiian recording artist in the teens, by the late 1920s, a new wave of steel guitarists, including Sol Hoopii, were upstaging him.
Ferera married three times.
He died on June 26, 1951, due to complications following a stroke.