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Maui   Travel Guide

Courtesy of Mike Andrew Photography | Getty Images

Why Go To Maui

Maui is not nearly as large as the Big Island, nor is it as small as Lanai, as bustling as Oahu or as quiet as Kauai. For many Hawaii vacationers, Maui is just right – offering a taste of just about everything the Aloha State has to offer, from impressive wildlife to intriguing history and culture. While on a visit here, you can shimmy alongside professional hula dancers, golf along coastal fairways, sail down a zip line , snorkel  alongside five different types of sea turtles or simply lounge along some of Hawaii's most notable beaches.

One of the archipelago's most popular tourism spots, Maui can be found sandwiched between the Big Island and the much tinier Molokai (which you can explore by signing up for one of the best Maui tours ). Maui is divided into five distinct regions: Many travelers base themselves along the coasts of South Maui (home to the famous Wailea Beach ) or West Maui, where the sands of Kaanapali Beach  and the music from the Old Lahaina Luau are located. But the rest of the island should not be missed. Travel along the Road to Hana to experience East Maui's scenic coastline, explore Haleakala  – the world's largest dormant volcano – in the Upcountry and discover the former tribal battlegrounds of Central Maui's Iao Valley State Park . And for a bird's-eye view of it all, reserve a spot on one of Maui's best helicopter tours .

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• # 1 in Which Hawaiian Island is the Best to Visit? Our 2024 Ranking
• # 1 in Best Honeymoon Destinations in the USA
• # 2 in Best Places to Visit in the USA for 2023

See All 12 Rankings

Best of Maui

Best hotels in maui.

• # 1 in Four Seasons Resort Maui at Wailea
• # 2 in Montage Kapalua Bay
• # 3 in Hotel Wailea

Best Things to Do in Maui

• # 1 in Haleakala National Park
• # 2 in Road to Hana
• # 3 in Ka'anapali Beach

Popular Tours

Maui Nui Luau at the Sheraton Maui Resort & Spa

(946 reviews)

from $ 198.00

Molokini and Turtle Town Snorkeling Adventure Aboard the Malolo

(1687 reviews)

from $ 159.95

Molokini Snorkeling Adventure Aboard Calypso From Ma'alaea Harbor

(1293 reviews)

from $ 179.95

Maui Travel Tips

Best months to visit.

The best times to visit Maui are April through May and September through November. The spring and fall shoulder seasons provide the pleasant weather Hawaii vacationers seek without the high rates and heavy crowds that accompany the summer and winter. However, if you're into surfing, you'll want to travel in the winter for the best conditions – just book as early as possible to get a discounted rate. Meanwhile, if you're traveling with kids, you may want to splurge for a summer trip as that's when the waters are calmest. If you plan to set out on one of Maui's adrenanline rush-inducing tours and adventures, consider a travel insurance policy with medical coverage just in case.

Weather in Maui

Data sourced from the National Climatic Data Center

What You Need to Know

Nothing is free Resorts may advertise free internet and gym access, but you pay for those with the resort fee. Unfortunately, the fees are not negotiable, but at least you now know to expect them.

Pick your hotel wisely Maui is full of things to do , but the island itself is fairly large. Make sure you choose a hotel that puts you close to your must-sees.

Mind the time Maui doesn't participate in daylight saving time. When the rest of the U.S. moves their clocks back or forward, Maui's time stays the same.

Sign up for a tour Hoping to snorkel the waters surrounding Molokai, spot whales in the ocean  or see Haleakala National Park at sunrise? The best Maui tours  take the hassle out of planning these unforgettable experiences.

How to Save Money in Maui

Consider the bus Driving is by far the easiest way to get around Maui, but if you plan on spending most of your time in one single area, you may be able to save on rental fees by relying on the bus. However, if you do decide to rent a car...

Know your insurance policy Some car rental agencies will try to convince you that you'll need collision insurance. (This is a no-fault state where you'll have to pay any damages before leaving.) But your personal insurance or your credit card might already cover this.

Forgo the ocean view It's nice to look out at the water, but if you can wait to do so at the beach rather than from your room, you can save a considerable chunk of change of your nightly hotel rate.

Culture & Customs

Maui is a great place to go if you're looking to learn more about Hawaii history and culture. In fact, legend has it that it was the demigod, Maui, who pulled the islands from the sea and lassoed the sun from the top of Haleakala . Travelers who are interested in learning more about island lore will have plenty of opportunities to do so: A visit to the scenic Iao Valley will offer a glimpse into the tumultuous era of tribal warfare, while a stroll through the small town of Lahaina will yield a better understanding of Hawaii's whaling, plantation and trade history.

Today, Maui is one of America's most popular vacation destinations – probably because it's so drastically different from any place on the mainland. Vacationers will find all the makings of contemporary luxury at the island's resorts , but outside the hotel areas, the relaxed "Aloha spirit" permeates. If you're looking to blend in with the locals, you simply need to loosen up: Pack T-shirts, shorts and flip-flops (as well as some light layers) for everyday wear, and tone down the road rage (no honking here).

Other cultural traditions continue to influence everyday life in Maui, one of the most noticeable being language. Unlike many other states, Hawaii has two official languages: English and Hawaiian, which is a member of the Polynesian language family. Though you won't have any trouble finding English-speakers, you'll benefit from learning a few basic Hawaiian phrases; "aloha" means both "hello" and "goodbye," and "mahalo" means "thank you."

The arts are a mainstay on the island, with numerous festivals – like the one held twice a month in Lahaina's Banyan Tree Park – showcasing works by regional craftspeople. And throughout the year, Maui honors its vibrant culture through events like the Maui Steel Guitar Festival and the East Maui Taro Festival. 

If you're more interested in discovering Maui's natural wonders than its heritage, you'll find plenty of places to do so – from flower-filled jungles to underwater reefs teeming with aquatic life. However, it's important that you leave the island as you found it. Resist the urge to collect living souvenirs or to have a one-on-one encounter with local wildlife, as these could result in hefty fines. 

What to Eat

This is the kind of destination where you really should soak up as much of the local cuisine as possible, regardless if other options are available. Like the rest of America, Maui is on board with the local food movement – here, you'll find plates piled high with freshly caught fish and regional produce. To find these ingredients prepared the island way, you'll want to stray from resort-heavy areas and head to towns like Lahaina, Kihei and Paia, which are home to popular restaurants like Paia Fish Market ,  Mama's Fish House ,  Merriman's , Star Noodle , Lahaina Grill  and Nalu's . The farther you get from Maui's resorts, the more local mom and pop joints you'll find. These local outposts serve such specialties as pork roasted in banana leaves, poi (ground taro root) and haupia , a creamy coconut custard. If you're not quite sure where to start your culinary tour, ask some local residents for recommendations or sign up for one of the best Maui tours .

One very popular – and economical – way to get your fill of Hawaiian cuisine is to eat big around noon. Many local eateries served what's called a "plate lunch," which comes piled high with some sort of protein (usually beef, pork or fish), rice and macaroni salad. This tradition formed on the fruit and sugar plantations, where workers would gather for lunch with with bento-like boxes piled with rice and leftover meat from the previous night's dinner. Today, it's common to see residents and visitors alike chowing down on the mountainous servings dished out by plate lunch restaurants and stands.

If you are staying in accommodations with a kitchen, make sure to schedule a trip to a farmer's market. In addition to the freshest produce, you'll also find fresh fish and some readymade items, such as banana bread and passion fruit butter. Go Hawaii offers a guide to all of Maui's farmers markets on its website . Fruit stands selling smoothies and juices are also a common sight, especially on the Road to Hana . 

Maui is a very safe place with little crime. Your main concern should be staying safe in parks and on hiking trails and, most importantly, in the water. Never hike or swim alone, and be sure to consult weather and tide conditions before entering the water.

Getting Around Maui

The best way to get around Maui is by car, particularly if you're planning on exploring large swaths of the island. Maui features a fairly comprehensive set of roadways, so finding your way around shouldn't be too difficult. There is also a bus system and hotel shuttles depending on where you stay – but these won't always be a dependable option for wide exploration.

You can easily rent a set of wheels upon arriving at Maui's main flight terminal, Kahului Airport (OGG), located on the island's northern coast. You'll find two other airports on Maui: The Kapalua Airport (JHM) is located on the north coast of West Maui, while Hana Airport (HNM) sits in East Maui. Kahului services several major airlines, including United, Alaska and Delta, but both Kapalua and Hana are usually only used for inter-island transfers. If you aren't renting a car, know you can also get a taxi from these airports as well as a Lyft or Uber. 

Maui gets its nickname, the "Valley Isle," from the fact that the it's broken up by two islands on either side: the West Maui Islands and Haleakala to the east. 

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Things To Do

Best hotels.

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Hawaii - The Big Island

# 3 in  Which Hawaiian Island is the Best to Visit? Our 2024 Ranking

Honolulu - Oahu

# 2 in  Best Places to Visit in Winter

Kaua'i

# 1 in  Best Places to Visit in April 2024

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National Museum of Natural History Virtual Tours

Access the tours.

The Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History virtual tours allow visitors to take self-guided, room-by-room tours of select exhibits and areas within the museum from their desktop or mobile device. Visitors can also access select collections and research areas at our satellite support and research stations as well as past exhibits no longer on display.

Virtual Tour Tips

• To navigate between adjoining rooms in the tours, click on the blue arrow links on the floor or use the navigation map in the upper right of the presentation screen.
• Look for the camera icon which gives you a close-up view of a particular object or exhibit panel.
• Try zooming in as some of the images are stitched together from individual pictures in order to create very high resolution gigapixel images.

Please note: This tour and these presentations have been tested and should work on all common devices, browsers, and operating systems (using a desktop computer with Windows, Mac, Linux or a mobile device such as an iPhone, iPad, or Android). Functionality and appearance may vary as it will adjust automatically to accommodate the most visitors. While the virtual tour has no advertising, ad blocking software or browser settings that block JavaScript and/or XML may interfere with the functionality of the virtual tour. Please let us know what you think of the tour and how the experience can be improved. Send your feedback to the NMNH Web Team .

Site Credit: Imagery and coding by Loren Ybarrondo

Equipment Used: Professional Nikon digital single-lens reflex (DSLR) camera bodies and lenses. The photography is typically done using rectilinear lenses with minimized distortion and shooting equirectangular panoramas at 22K pixels on the long side.

Software Used: No authoring software is used. The tours are hand-coded in HTML5 and JavaScript using the krpano graphics library.

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How to buy Childish Gambino tickets: Dates and prices compared

When you buy through our links, Business Insider may earn an affiliate commission. Learn more

Rapper Childish Gambino is heading back on tour in 2024, and tickets are going fast to see him perform live. While the demand is high for his first tour since 2018, there are a few avenues to explore when it comes to how to buy Childish Gambino tickets for his 2024 concert series.

Donald Glover has been busy in recent years with his acting career following hits like "Mr. & Mrs Smith," the final seasons of "Atlanta," and "The Lion King" remake. As the artist returns to his musical prowess this year, Glover has confirmed that his two 2024 albums will be his final releases under the stage name Childish Gambino. Following his reissue of the "3.15.20" album from 2020, now known as "Atavista," on May 13, 2024, the rapper will drop his last Childish Gambino album, "Bando Stone & the New World," this summer.

Childish Gambino's The New World Tour kicks off shortly after his "Atavista" release and will coincide with his "Bando Stone & the New World" album drop, promising plenty of new tracks on his upcoming concerts' setlists. The concert series begins on August 11, 2024, in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, with Childish Gambino scheduled to take his final bow on February 11, 2025, in Perth, Australia, after a total of 68 concerts.

We've got you covered if you're looking for how to get tickets to Childish Gambino's 2024 tour. Here's our breakdown of the New World Tour schedule, purchasing details, and price comparisons for resale and original tickets. You can also browse ticket specifics at your leisure on Vivid Seats and StubHub .

• See also: Bad Bunny tickets | Dead & Company tickets |  Nicki Minaj tickets | Drake tickets  | Maroon 5 tickets

Childish Gambino 2024 North American tour schedule

Childish Gambino's world tour kicks off on August 11, 2024, and will end on February 11, 2025. The New World Tour consists of three legs in North America, Europe, and Australia/New Zealand, which will take Glover to 15 countries across the globe. Currently, Childish Gambino has 68 shows scheduled for his 2024 – 2025 world tour.

The chart below shows the cheapest available North American tickets on Vivid Seats and StubHub at the time of writing. All concert times are listed in local time zones.

Childish Gambino 2024-2025 international tour schedule

The chart below shows the cheapest available international tickets on StubHub at the time of writing. All concert times are listed in local time zones.

• Flights & hotel:  Booking.com  |  Expedia  
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How to buy tickets for Childish Gambino's 2024 concert tour

You can buy original tickets to see Childish Gambino's 2024 tour on Ticketmaster . However, since his New World Tour went on sale to the general public on May 17, the number of remaining original tickets is limited.

Tickets for Childish Gambino's 2024 tour can also be purchased from verified resale ticket vendors such as Vivid Seats and StubHub . You might find better luck on these resale sites when it comes to seating variety and availability.

How much are Childish Gambino tickets?

Compared to similar touring acts, prices for tickets to Childish Gambino's 2024 concerts are fairly reasonable. On Ticketmaster, the least expensive available standard original tickets start at $50 for his Columbus, OH show on August 15. Of course, ticket prices vary depending on the date, location, and demand for each show. Generally, resale tickets are comparable to or less expensive than the price of standard original tickets for Childish Gambino's upcoming tour. For the most part, Vivid Seats only sells tickets to Childish Gambino's North American tour dates, while StubHub has offerings for almost all dates, including international performances.

The cheapest tickets for Childish Gambino's New World Tour on Vivid Seats range from $56 for his Columbus, OH show on August 15 to $135 for his Los Angeles, CA performance on September 19. StubHub offers similar prices for Childish Gambino's upcoming shows, with the least expensive tickets starting from $58 to $191 for the same concert dates. However, most ticket prices on these sites begin in the $65 to $95 range. 

Childish Gambino is also offering a few VIP Packages for most shows on his 2024 tour. These packages include the Diamond [Early-Entry] Package (starting at $299) and the Emerald [Reserved Seating] Package (starting at $499). 

Who is opening for Childish Gambino's tour?

Childish Gambino has two opening acts scheduled for his 2024 New World Tour: Willow and Amaarae. Willow will open for Childish Gambino for the North American leg of the tour, spanning from August 11 until October 3. Amaarae will take over as Childish Gambino's special guest for the European (October 31 – December 5) and Oceania (January 28, 2025 – February 11, 2025) legs of the tour.

Will there be international tour dates?

There are already 27 international dates scheduled for Childish Gambino's 2024 tour. This includes four tour dates in Canada (Toronto, Edmonton, Calgary, and Vancouver), 18 shows in the UK and Europe, and five concerts in Australia and New Zealand.

Note: Certain services and regions prohibit the resale of tickets. Business Insider does not endorse or condone the illegal reselling of tickets, and entry into an event is at the venue's discretion.

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At 70, Cyndi Lauper Has Nothing Left to Prove

She’s plotting a farewell tour. She’s starring in a documentary about her life. And she could only ever be herself.

At 70, Cyndi Lauper is charging back to action with a road show and “Let the Canary Sing,” a film that tells her life story. Credit... Thea Traff for The New York Times

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By Amanda Hess

• June 4, 2024

One Friday afternoon in May, Cyndi Lauper stepped out of her Upper West Side apartment building and into the streets of New York City. She wore glitter-encrusted glasses, sneakers with rainbow soles and a stack of beaded bracelets on each arm. A rice-paper parasol swung in her hand. As she walked, she examined the crowds and remarked when glints of interest caught her eye.

“Of course, up here it’s fashion hell,” she allowed of her tony neighborhood. And yet, every few blocks she rubbernecked at another woman’s look, her famous New Yawk accent lifting and tumbling in pleasure at what she saw:

“Look at these dames, how cute are they?”

“Did you love those pants? I kind of loved those pants.”

“Look at this lady,” she said, stepping off the curb and clocking a passerby. The woman moved nimbly, tomato-red streak in her silver hair, body draped in shades of fuchsia and cherry as she pushed the gleaming metal frame of a walker. “Fabulous,” Lauper exclaimed. “Come on!”

At 70, the pop icon and social justice activist isn’t just charging back into the streets. On Monday, Lauper announced her final tour, the Girls Just Wanna Have Fun Farewell Tour, which will have her headlining arenas across North America from late October to early December. And “Let the Canary Sing,” a documentary about her life and career that premiered at the Tribeca Festival last year, is streaming on Paramount+.

Lauper has not staged a major tour — “a proper tour, that’s mine” — in over a decade. But now her window of opportunity is closing, so she’s leaping through it. “I don’t think I can perform the way I want to in a couple of years,” she said. “I want to be strong.”

And until recently, when she finally agreed to sit for the director Alison Ellwood, she could not envision committing her life story to film. “I wasn’t going to do a documentary because I’m not dead,” she said. More to the point, she did not feel particularly misunderstood. From the moment she danced across the city in the 1983 video for “Girls Just Want to Have Fun,” she felt that she had articulated precisely what she wanted to say.

“Everything I wanted them to understand was in that video,” she said of her fans. She has a lot of people who get her: The clip has been viewed on YouTube more than one billion times. Forty years later, she holds it up as a thesis, the key to decoding her artistic perspective and understanding everything that followed. After all, “You never have to wonder where a New Yorker stands,” she said. “They’ll tell you, straight up.”

CYNDI LAUPER, BORN in Brooklyn, raised in Queens, bopped around the house to the Beatles’ songs, her older sister, Elen, singing McCartney’s parts and Lauper taking Lennon’s. It was her earliest lesson in harmony and song structure. But when she left home at 17, it was with a copy of Yoko Ono’s feminist conceptual art book “Grapefruit” in her hands.

Ono taught her that “you can create art in your head, and then you can view things differently,” Lauper told me. This attitude served her well as she tried (and often failed) to work as a painter, a shoe saleswoman, a racetrack hot walker, an IHOP waitress, a gal Friday at Simon & Schuster and the singer in a cover band.

Singing other people’s music in Long Island clubs and dive bars, Lauper struggled to find her place. She tried to channel Janis Joplin, but “I was stuck inside her body, and she didn’t like it, and I didn’t like it,” she said. She tried to sound like Gene Pitney, and “it came out sounding like Ethel Merman.” After a while, “You start to feel that you’re just not good enough.”

But really, she was just no good at being anyone other than Cyndi Lauper. When she started writing and arranging songs for herself, “I told the stories that I knew about the women that I knew,” she said. “About my mom, my aunt, my grandmother.” They guided her back to the rhythms of her own life, even if, in the beginning, few were interested in listening. “My first concert was to 14 people,” she said, “and I did the encore, OK?”

The documentary’s title is a line ripped from a real-life courtroom drama: Early on, Lauper’s career got entangled in the ambitions of an ex-manager, who sued her to retain control of her music. She sank into bankruptcy trying to escape him. When the judge sided with Lauper, he banged the gavel and said: “Let the canary sing.”

Once freed, Lauper connected with Robert Hazard, who had written a track called “Girls Just Want to Have Fun.” He’d arranged it as a rock song from a man’s perspective — the girls were the ones he imagined sleeping with — and Lauper had some edits. She recast it as a gleeful public announcement, calling out a sexist double standard (“Oh mama dear, we’re not the fortunate ones”) while claiming liberation from the workplace, the home and the patriarchy. And she rearranged the notes, pitching her voice so high that it could not be ignored. “I sang that high because I was trumpeting an idea,” she said.

And then there was the video. “That video was what you call ‘inclusive’ nowadays, and that was the most important thing,” Lauper said. In addition to the Italian American pro wrestler Lou Albano, Lauper featured her mother, her lawyer, her manager, a crop of record-company secretaries, and a racially diverse group of singers and dancers. “I was sick of the segregation” of the music industry, she said. “It’s people together that create a style.”

MTV was still in its infancy in 1983, and it was fortuitous that Lauper’s debut album, “She’s So Unusual,” came out just as the network was ascending. She saw her public image as a visual art form. Her makeup artist was a painter, and her stylist was a vintage buyer.

“People sometimes get the wrong idea that it was very thrown together,” Laura Wills, the founder of the vintage shop Screaming Mimi’s, said of the singer’s style. “People just didn’t look like that.” In the early ’80s, Lauper worked for Wills, often bartering her labor for clothes. When her career took off, Wills started styling her, and the pair often constructed Lauper’s outfits as if sliding chips across a poker table, as in, “I’ll see your polka-dot socks and striped capris, and I’ll raise you a plaid top,” Wills said. “I’ll see your polka-dot socks, striped capris and plaid top, and I’ll raise you a paisley hat.”

Lauper seemed to shoot to fame as a fully formed feminist icon. She refused to tell interviewers her age (“I’m not a car,” she said), and she insisted that they recognize the politics behind her aesthetic choices. “I wore the corset to undo the power of the binding of women,” she told the press. She graced the cover of Ms. Magazine and recorded the 1986 song “True Colors,” which resonated with her in the wake of a friend’s death from AIDS.

“I know that I probably lost business because I talked about AIDS a lot,” she said, but figured “I ought to stand up like any good Italian and stick up for my family, you know?” In 2008, she founded True Colors United to help combat homelessness among L.G.B.T.Q. youth. And in 2022, she created the Girls Just Want to Have Fundamental Rights fund to support abortion access and other reproductive justice movements.

In 1985, Lauper won the best new artist Grammy after the release of “She’s So Unusual.” The album — and songs like “Time After Time” and “All Through the Night” — broke records. But something odd was happening. She looked around and saw versions of herself everywhere. “When I first became famous, I felt like the whole world just kind of went” — here Lauper made a sharp slurping noise — “and sucked everything up. The jewelry, the color, the corsets on the outside, the whole thing. And then used it. Spit it out. Next!”

Lauper was accused of being a manufactured package. “No, it was me. That’s how I dressed. That’s how I looked. That was my community,” she said. “I have a brain.”

When Lauper got a call that a movie studio was adapting her big hit into a movie, she balked at its fluffy premise. “I guess it was about a couple of girls … trying to have fun,” she said. (Sarah Jessica Parker and Helen Hunt starred.) Lauper refused permission to use her song, so it featured Hazard’s version with other vocalists instead. “For me, it sucked,” she said. “You took my style. And it had nothing to do with me at all.”

In the ’80s, Lauper was compared so closely to other female musicians that it was implied there was not space for all of them. She was pitted against other women — mainly Madonna, who released her debut album the same year. On chat shows and in schoolyards (and even on the charity single “We Are the World” ), celebrities and fans were asked to choose one. “It was like apples and oranges,” Lauper told me. Or as she put it in Newsweek in 1985: “She’s just doing her thing. My thing happens to be different.” It was a shame, Lauper said: “I would have liked to have a friend.”

Though she fought her battles mainly alone, Lauper has inspired generations of women. Among her acolytes are Nicki Minaj, who in April brought her onstage in Brooklyn to duet on the song that samples her, “Pink Friday Girls.” When an interviewer asked the 26-year-old singer-songwriter Chappell Roan, “How does it feel to be called the Gen-Z Cyndi Lauper?” she replied, “I think Cyndi Lauper is the Gen-Z Cyndi Lauper.”

Lauper made 11 more albums after her debut — among them a blues record, a country record and a dance record. In the early 2000s, she walked over to Broadway, starring in “The Threepenny Opera” and writing the music and lyrics to the musical “Kinky Boots” after Harvey Fierstein, who wrote the book, tapped her for the gig. “There’s a small group of people I consider my children; she’s one of my daughters,” the actor and writer, who turns 72 this week, said. Fierstein told me that he had suspected Lauper’s talents were underused in rock, and he wanted to see what it was like for her to write a song that she would never sing herself.

“My favorite was a recording she made on her phone, in the beauty parlor, with her head in the dryer,” he said. (Lauper was often multitasking.) Her autoharp competed with the salon noise. “It’s really hard to sell a $10 million production on a recording of an autoharp song with a dryer background,” he said. “But that’s what we did.” Lauper won the Tony for best score, the first woman to win alone.

In an industry that requires the rapacious pursuit of the new and the cynical extraction of identity, Lauper was never willing to abandon herself. She had forged the revolutionary style, sang the totemic song. She inspired millions, billions, of fans to be themselves. Why should she have to change who she was?

AS LAUPER AND I traversed the Upper West Side, we ducked into an exhibition about the abstract artist Sonia Delaunay, passed the original Screaming Mimi’s location (now a dry cleaners), and wound back to her apartment, where she invited me up.

Past the doorman, past a cheetah-print doormat and a cheetah-print curtain, two little pugs named Lulu and Ping awaited Lauper’s return. She disappeared to arrange a plate of ginger cookies, the same kind Jackson Browne always sent her on Christmas, while her husband, the actor David Thornton, told me about their meet-cute on the set of the 1991 film “Off and Running.” She played a fake mermaid, he played a murderer. Off the set, he was struck instantly by her winning sense of humor.

“She’s the Rodney Dangerfield of rock ’n’ roll,” he said. As in, she is so funny that she does not always receive the respect she deserves. “I don’t think anybody has any idea how hard she works,” he said.

To prepare for the tour, she blasts the stereo in her apartment and dances and sings, vexing the pugs. She works with a vocal coach four days a week. And she trains like it’s a sport. Her weekly exercise routine includes physical therapy, weights, stretching, physical therapy, weights, yoga, more weights, yoga, aerobics, physical therapy, weights again. She’s been chomping on enormous salads that make her feel like a horse.

“But when you’re a singer, you have to be an athlete,” she said. “You can’t [expletive] around. When you’re 20, yeah. But when you get older? No.”

As the tour approaches, she’s been daydreaming about “all the crazy stuff I tried that didn’t work” in the long arc of her career. The butterfly-winged black dress that she was meant to reveal as she stepped out of a cocoon. The bit where she was supposed to change behind a backlit screen like an old cartoon character. A kind of mechanical skirt that resembled a globe, slowly spinning her around as she sang.

She’s not exactly sure what she’ll pull off this time. Whatever changes, one thing remains the same: “Who the hell I am is who the hell I am.”

Amanda Hess is a critic at large for the Culture section of The Times, covering the intersection of internet and pop culture. More about Amanda Hess

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