THE ISLAND OF Hawaii is one of the few places in the Western world where human beings have not yet managed – and don't care – to hide from the creative and destructive powers of nature. A mere 800,000 years old, Hawaii, also known as the Big Island, is one of the last actively forming land masses on Earth, and its 120,000 inhabitants are reminded daily of its growing pains and joys. In the shadows of Mt. Kilauea, the most active volcano in the world, life adapts to a constant lava flow that changes land patterns from one day to the next. Ninety-three miles long, 76 miles wide, and biologically and geologically diverse, the Big Island ranges from desert to semiarid to temperate to tropical zones, meaning you could be caught in monsoon-like downpours while your neighbor is taking a swim on a sunny beach five miles down the road. There are plants, birds, and insects that are found nowhere else – although more than 300 of them (and counting) are on the endangered species list.

On Hawaii, as elsewhere, modern civilization has taken a heavy toll. Ever since Captain Cook set foot on the Hawaiian Islands in 1778, a native lifestyle based on respect for the sea, the heavens, and the earth has little by little been replaced by annexation treaties and high-rise hotels. Yet the spirit of hospitality and love for the land has been handed down to many inhabitants, both native and nonnative. I experienced that legacy firsthand during a week spent among some musically inclined residents of the remote community of Pahoa, in the southeast part of the island.

Music in Pahoa is all around you. From marimba ensembles to Buddhist chanters to the dreadlocked, didgeridoo-blowing Austrian expatriate and the local kids playing grunge metal with an island twist, it's happening all the time, in the usual places and sometimes where you'd least expect it. Iopa K. Maunakea, a big man with a big heart, an even bigger smile, and a ukulele strapped around his neck that seems to have found a permanent home there, is a case in point. On my first night in Pahoa I heard his band Bruddah Kuz perform at Punatix Bar, but I was happily surprised to bump into him at the Sunday farmers market on Old Pahoa Road, where he played surrounded by orchids, pineapples, and a motley crowd of earthy-looking types.

He summed up the Big Island in his song "Nei Keia La": "I can't dwell on yesterday, or my life will go astray / If I live right now, today, then I know I'll be OK / Life is life from day to day – you're living in Hawaii – nei Keia la."

Later in the week, on a rainy Saturday afternoon, I was invited to jam with a local folk band called Into Wishin', whose rehearsal space was located in the middle of the jungle. Turning off a washed-out dirt road at telephone pole no. 75, guiding my spinning wheels through a tiny opening in the dense, lush rainforest vegetation, I found myself sliding into a secret gardenlike cove and almost slamming through the mosquito nets separating the musicians from the jungle.

The next thing I knew, I was equipped with an acoustic-electric Ovation guitar, plugged into a state-of-the-art soundboard, and encouraged to let my hair down (it actually stood up, owing to the humidity). Taking part in a solar-powered stew of mellow island folk injected with an urban-industrial acoustic restlessness, I wondered what our transmissions sounded like to the animals dwelling beneath, around, and inside the dripping green curtain of vegetation. I was a long way from my Oakland rehearsal space.

In a place where few homes have running water and the goddess Pele decides who stays and who must move (fiery lava buried the town of Kalapana, just a few miles south of Pahoa, from 1986 to 1990), looking out for one another is essential. And while issues of colonialism and globalization, and their effects on ecology and native populations, manifest themselves in Hawaii's growing sovereignty movement, the feeling I got from the locals is that we're all in this together. In fact, it seems that love for the land and respect for one another are their ultimate defenses.

If you go

You can fly any major airline to Honolulu Airport. From Honolulu there are several daily flights to Hilo International Airport on Hawaiian Airlines. www.hawaiianair.com.

If you're looking to rent a vacation place, try Kapoho Tropical Vacation Rentals (800-680-6108, www.alohakapoho.com), six homes in the vicinity of Kapoho that have geothermally heated swimming ponds.