Well it must be summer...

Only 3 of us on a gorgeous morning, I'm guessing a lot of people were out enjoying the weather. And I don't blame you!

We had fun going through some cowboy songs, some jazz, the TUSC 60's book, Jake's version of Yesterday, and more. I've got a few extra copies of some of the songs that I can hand out next time, first come first served.

Both libraries are booked pretty solid for weekends in May and I've only got 1 weekend where I'm free. I'm ususally free on Wednesday evenings however and was thinking of trying something different.

Would anyone be interested in meeting down at the Como Park Pavilion down by the lake for a couple hours some evening? There is a little food joint down there and paddle boat rental etc and if there isn't an event going on (I'll have to check) then we should be able to sit out of the weather and do some playing. It's a nice public place with restrooms etc. I'm open to other locations if you have ideas.

Any interest in something like this? What time works best?

Keep StrumMn everyone!

A couple new links...

I put a couple new links off to the right over here ------>
One is for the Ukulele Cosmos. This newer forum seems to have a lot of traffic these days. Check it out if you have time.
The other site is from the TUSC uke club. Specifically I recommend checking out and printing their 4 song books, there is a lot of good music here that we could try out at our meetings. I'm not familiar with a lot of it but I'm willing to learn if others know and can lead us in them. Maybe we can just start with their 60's book, I know almost all of those songs.
Keep StrumMn,
Brian

Next meeting is Saturday 4/28, 10am-1pm

I reserved the NorthTown library meeting room for Saturday morning 4/28 from 10-1 and I hope a few of you can make it. The month of May is going to be tough, the library is currently available on Saturday the 12th but won't let me have 2 dates on the schedule at once so it could be gone by the 28th. If someone can find another location for a May meeting I'm open to suggestions. If nothing else comes up then I'll start looking for early June locations, maybe meet at a park or something.

Music-wise we're wide open for the 28th and can always repeat some of what we've done lately. I've tabbed out the version of Yesterday from the Jake "Play Loud Ukulele" dvd and I'm working on it. It's not real complicated but is still very challenging for me to play. I only have it on paper right now so I'll try to get it on the blog or at least bring paper copies on the 28th if anyone is interested in trying it. Anyone else have something they want to share that we can post ahead of time?

Hope to see you on the 28th!
Brian

Recap and uke news

We had a good turnout on Apr 1st and I hope everyone had fun! We ran through some blues lessons and played a bunch of songs.

Here's those I remember: Between The Devil and the Deep Blue Sea, April Showers, Aloha Oe, Take Me Out To The Ball Game, When Irish Eyes Are Smiling, My Wild Irish Rose, Sloop John B, Somebody Stole My Gal, All Of Me. I think that's all that we passed out, there were others where we just gathered around a coule copies to play.

Last night I saw a new Coke commercial on TV and they where playing/singing What'll I Do, this is an Irving Berlin tune that I passed out in the February meeting I think. It's available in the Irving Berlin uke book available for $6.95 at UkuleleWorld.com. It's a good book and costs the same as one set of good strings.

Speaking of strings. A common question is which are good. Common internet concensus is that Worth and Aquila are the top brands and I agree from personal use. I haven't found either brand available in the Twin Cities but ukuleleworld.com handles both and are great to work with. Keep asking for these locally, maybe some music store will get a clue and start stocking them!

Pick a couple songs for next meeting (date TBD) and email me a link, I'll collect them and publish a list here so we can all print copies and practice ahead of time.
We also want to generate a list of songs we can practice for a nursing home gig in the future, pick a couple favorites and let me know!

Keep StrumMn!
Brian