StrumMn, Minnesota Ukulele players

some new wood on the way...

2011-03-25T18:53:00.003-05:00

I'm picking up this piece of myrtle that has both curl and birdseye. It's 5/16" thick so I MAY try to resaw it and get 2 ukes out of it. It's enough for soprano back/sides/headstock, I'll need to pick some other wood for the top. Right now I'm thinking Western Red Cedar or Spruce, depends on what I can find that excites me.
No idea what to use as binding... what do you think would look nice?

Researching something new.

2010-10-16T18:54:00.002-05:00

I've been asked by a friend about building a resonator ukulele for him and have starting researching what goes into building one.

In a resonator you don't want the "box" adding to the sound so it's "over-built" compared to a standard instrument. In this way the cone gets to generate all the sound.

I've found multiple sources for cones and coverplates, from National, Republic, Delta and others.
At this point I'm leaning towards either National or Delta, I figure if I'm putting the effort into doing this right then I don't want to go too cheap. Also, these two are interchangeable (if I specify the size correctly) so it's easy to swap between them later if desired.

The other piece I want up front is the sound well that the cone sits on. There are several ways to go on this but I'm looking at tubular plywood, like a drum shell or tambourine ring, to support the cone. I've seen this done for guitars and it will really support the cone while also locking the top/back together to stop any unwanted vibration.

Once I get these I can work on the rest of the design to get body size and neck angle correct. I'm thinking about sizing this to fit a specific case and hoping to make it a soprano but will bump it up to concert if necessary.

After pricing a few components my thought is that I might do 3 of these simultaneously, keeping the bodies identical but using different cones so I can compare them. If I go this route then my friend will get his pick, I'll keep one, and one may be up for grabs, we'll see. I don't expect to get much done until next spring at this point, mostly design and planning.

In the mean time, lots of uke playing with StrumMn!
Check http://strummn.shutterfly.com/ for dates/times and come join us!

Logo madness?

2010-08-15T20:57:00.003-05:00

Got a custom branding iron and burned the logo onto a piece of leather.
Then did a little braiding to make something to hang it with.

Now I've got it attached to my latest uke.

next meeting, MONDAY Aug 2, 7-9pm

2010-07-31T14:21:00.002-05:00

Java J's on Monday Aug 2, 7-9pm.
I'm hearing that others are having problems with Shutterfly. I sent them a msg and we'll see what kind of response we get. We might be looking for another home again... I'm about ready to just buy a URL and pay for hosting so we don't keep going through this.

accessories!

2010-07-30T20:53:00.003-05:00

My daughter embroidered my new logo on a hand towel! I think I'll keep it in my case to wipe down my ukes. Pretty nice!

Logo for my ukes?

2010-07-18T13:02:00.003-05:00

I've been playing with the idea of a logo for my ukes.
Here is a pic of what I came up with.

It a stylized version of my initials. I took the K that I used for my tenor headstock, then I freehand digitally traced the outline of a uke picture for the backwards B. It was then resized/stretched to fit with the K and the soundhole/bridge added for the loops of the B. I added the 4 extended uprights and then cut/paste the peghead right from the old StrumMn logo and tweaked it to match.

It may be similar to other logos out there but nothing is copied from them.

I'm not putting it on the front of my headstocks but it may go on the back of the headstock or inside the uke.

I found a place that will do it as a 2cm x 2cm "branding iron" that clips right onto a Bic lighter so it can be burned in, I like the idea.

DONE!

2010-06-26T18:56:00.010-05:00

Ok, the finish has sat for a week so now it's time to scrape it back and glue on the bridge.

Bridge glued, now tape it off for a quick coat of Teak Oil on the redwood bits.

Oil wet but tape removed so it won't wick underneath.

Trying to get a shot of the reflections... it's shiny!

Strung up and looking good, just needs the strings trimmed.

Lovin' the tail graft.

A minor issue here but I'm the only one who knows...

More Sheoak in the rosette turned out nice.

The zipper and skunk stripe line up perfect!

Grover friction tuners seem to work really well!

Time to play! The fretboard feels so much wider and the frets so far apart, this will take some gettin' used to, but it turned out nice and sounds good so far!

sanding and polishing!

2010-06-22T21:57:00.002-05:00

Tonight I wet sanded with 600, 1000, 1500, and 2000 grit. I would have gone to 4000 if the store had it.
Then I hit it with Maguire's rubbing compound. Still need to use their Scratch-X but boy, does it shine!
So, tomorrow night I "scratch" it, then attach the neck. Then I measure for bridge placement and remove the finish so I can glue on the bridge. After that it's pretty much just setup; filing nut slots, fitting tuners, etc.
I'm shooting to bring it this weekend to the Lil Rev workshop even if the strings are still stretching!

It's been a "long and winding road" on this uke but if it plays half as good as it looks I'll be thrilled, and with the tap tone and lightness I'm expecting it to be a great player anyway.

Letting finish rest before polishing

2010-06-05T20:46:00.003-05:00

Have to wait a week before sanding with 600-2000 grit and polishing.
You can see a bit of reflection on the lower left. It really shines but isn't smoooooth yet.
It won't be quite like the mile thick commercial finishes but I think I'll be happy as long as I don't sand through!

Spraying finish

2010-05-30T15:50:00.002-05:00

Well I started spraying KTM-9 finish today, finally. I was a little paranoid and was putting it off until I had plenty of time to work through issues without rushing.

The first coat went well, I've got a run on the second that will need sanding. The 1st coat also really raised the grain and left it feeling rough so a little sanding after the 2nd coat dries will help anyway.

I've got pictures but it's tough to see anything, I'll review after I upload to my laptop and post any good ones. It's nice to get started on the finish after so long, I really want this complete early in June so I can have it strung up before the June 27 Lil Rev workshop.

I also shaped my rosewood bridge yesterday! I still need to drill holes (string through style) but it should work great! Pictures to come...

Brian

Fretting about things... :-)

2010-04-24T13:32:00.009-05:00

Fret slots cut. Using my new setup is really slick.

Frets installed but not yet trimmed. I had to use super glue as the slots are just a hair wider than previously. Also the fret wire came curved and my fretboard is flat so the wire wanted to pop up in the middle.

All trimmed up. I clip, file, and then sand to get the fret ends smooth and soft to the touch.

A new trick I learned if you look close. I put a couple staples in the neck and then clipped them off very short. The sharp nubs hold the fretboard in place while gluing so it doesn't squirm all over when clamping up.

Here you can see the corresponding holes in the bottom of the fretboard. I just located the fretboard and pressed it into place (ok, I had to use a clamp to drive the nubs in, that rosewood is HARD).

All clamped up and it didn't move a bit, this is slick! Thanks to Kathy Matsushita's blog for this trick.

Lookin' good! The glue cleanup was easier with this method too. Time for some final sanding and I'll be ready to spray a finish.

1 step forward!

2010-04-11T20:41:00.002-05:00

I'm finally back into the garage today and after some cleanup I was able to build a jig for fret slotting. Then I was able to slot a fretboard in just a couple minutes and it's perfect.
Building patterns for different scale lengths should also only take 5-10 minutes.
This is amazing. Next step will be to taper the fretboard and then put in the frets.
Before you know it I'll get this tenor finished up, it's been a long haul.

1 step forwards, 2 steps back

2010-02-16T17:46:00.003-06:00

Well, I took an extra vacation day this past weekend with the hope of getting a few things accomplished. One of those was getting my fretboard slotted, frets set, and fretboard glued to the neck.

I've been putting it off, it's one of those mental block things. I've done it 3 times before and they turned out great but it's picky work and this time I was working with a pre-tapered board so my jig wasn't usable as in the past.

Anyway, I finally got to it yesterday and got it slotted, then set it aside. Today I gathered up my fretwire, hammer, and special fret-setting tool to "get 'er done" but before I got started I got a big surprize! Frets are supposed to get narrower as you go up the board but ONE of my slots was off. The pattern I use had slipped, along with the jig not lining up correctly on the tapered board.

It's ruined.

At least I noticed before fretting or gluing it up!

So... recovery time, what to do, how to proceed. No more of this hand cut slot stuff for me. I'm building a new jig and ordered a fretting blade for the table saw, serious stuff ($$), and a new rosewood blank that should do 2 ukes.

I also ordered some new wood, enough to do a guitar body (I've wanted to try making one but don't worry, ukes still come first), old growth sitka spruce and goncalo alves, should be sharp!

.

Brian

GRRR!!!

2010-01-19T18:18:00.002-06:00

This site has been getting lots of spam comments lately so I've had to constantly search them out and delete them. So for a while I'm going to turn on comment moderation once again.
If you leave a comment it won't show up until after I've allowed it through which is usually once a day.

Another good reason for the StrumMn Ukulele Players to use the nexo forum instead for our communication.

Then again, it you have real comments on anything on this site I do love to hear from you, so don't hesitate to leave a note.

Brian

StrumMn meeting

2009-12-29T19:17:00.001-06:00

Sunday Jan 3rd, 2-5pm, Java J's
Hope to see you there!

Next StrumMn meeting

2009-12-14T11:47:00.001-06:00

Monday Dec 21st, 7-9pm at Java J's.
Probably heavy on the Xmas music but anything is fair game.
Hope to see you there!
Keep StrumMn!

Uke building delayed...

2009-12-05T19:51:00.005-06:00

I had another project that was a long time a'coming.

I had built several finger jointed cedar boxes several years ago. My youngest daughter got the prototype and the others were auctioned to benefit the Lupus Foundation through my oldest daughters sorority in college.

My oldest has been kiddingly asking where HER box was, and she wanted it to be octogon instead of just rectangular like the rest.

Well, I went nuts; I built a jig, bought some aromatic cedar, bought some new saw blades so I could get a deep enough dado and went to town.

I didn't get any "in progress" pics but here is the finished product with an oil finish on the outside (raw on the inside to get the full cedar effect) and some woodburning on the lid (the design is stolen from the Brighton store at the MOA, they did it in mosaic tile in the store entrance).

Back to uke finishing next.

Email from Paul in Samoa !

2009-10-31T11:36:00.001-05:00

Hi Brian,

Sorry it’s been such a long time. Life has been busy. How are you? How are things in the States?

I don’t know where to start it’s been so long and so much has happened. I’m not sure if I have told you my situation? It’s been over a year now since I left. The first three months were very intense. I could talk about the training phase forever. Some very good times and so very challenging things happened in those three months.

After graduating from training I was placed in my post. I’m on Savaii (the big island) in a district named Satupaitea on a Methodist school compound. The compound is sandwiched between the village of Vaega and Satufia if you want to look it up. The island is very beautiful and very peaceful. My position is a college (high school) teacher. The subjects are automotive mechanics, social studies, geography and English. The main reason I was brought here for was to teach automotive, but as in everything Samoa you need to be flexible that’s how I acquired the other classes.

The kids are great. Far different from the youth of America, not all the kids are great, of course there are a few bed ones here or there. The structure of the school day is much different than at home. Time isn’t valued that much here and not looked at equally. The other big difference is the priority of education. I would say it’s around forth or fifth. With that being said the education of the average Samoan student is very low. Not only is it low, but the worst part is that they don’t really have the ability to critically think.

Life moves pretty slow, not much big things happen, with the exception of the recent tsunami and earthquake activity that has been happening ever since. My internet availability is pretty poor. My island has one computer with dial up internet that does not work all the time. As of today we have a new office computer that we have been waiting computer less for 2 months now.

The travel situation is pretty rough. I have a bike that I use often, but it’s usually to hot. There are buses that run in the morning and afternoon, but they are often unreliable. Especially my bus! I have to take a boat to get to the other island. All together it takes about 5 hours to travel from my village to Apia. The good thing about it is that it keeps me in my village. Apia is nice to go to every once in a while, but I’m glad I don’t live there.

The language is great. I had a very tough time at first. Then one day it just clicked and I started understanding it. I tested at intermediate-high at the end of training and my language skills have improved a lot since then. Learning a second language is great. I took Spanish in high school but I was never at the level I’m at with Samoan. The bad part is when I go back there won’t be many opportunities to use it. That’s ok though. My language ability is one of the things that I’m proudest about in my life. The down side is that my English has suffered but I can get that back pretty quick.

In my free time, which I don’t have much of is usually spent with friends, or fishing oh and of course my guitar. I had a uke, but my students broke it. Surprisingly it is very hard to find a uke here. If you do find one it is usually ridiculously cheap, poor quality Chinese product.

I will be going back to the States in Dec./Jan. for a few weeks. If you want to schedule a StruMN get together somewhere in there I would love to go. If it doesn’t work out don’t worry about it. I’m very flexible with the dates and times if that helps. My ukulele skills have weakened but my guitar skills have increased a lot. Either way I should be able to hold my own. It would be nice to dust off that nice Ohana that I picked up at the Uke Fest last year. Tell everyone I say hi!

I better get going now. Thanks for sending me the email. I really appreciate it. Sorry it has taken me so long to get back to you. Communication should be a little easier now with the new computer in the Savaii office and you know the best email address to reach me at. Please get back to me when you get some free time.

Take care, Paul

Neck attachment time.

2009-10-18T22:49:00.004-05:00

To attach the neck I needed to drill parallel to the body, NOT perpendicular to the top surface of the neck. To do this I clamped the neck to this jig, doing t this way allowed me to line up the brad point bit right in the center of the maple strip of my neck.

The bit tracked straight! I was a bit worried about this since I was just using the spring clamps.
I also wrapped the neck with a bit of rubber carpet backing to both protect it and help keep it from shifting.

Here it is all bolted on (temporarily).

half hour cabinet scraper workout

2009-09-15T21:29:00.002-05:00

It was still warm and muggy outside but I sat in the yard and worked up a sweat tonight.
I thought the sides were looking pretty tough but a half hour with the cabinet scraper followed by a minute or two with some 100 grit and I'm a happy guy! I'll still need to work through some finer grits but this is very encouraging. I love how it looks and the tap tone is good. The top and sides are under 0.070" and I tried hard not to over brace it. I'm going for a lightweight, good sounding uke... in other words I'm trying VERY hard NOT to over build it. Just had to share!

top binding in place

2009-09-13T20:19:00.006-05:00

Here it is with the binding taped on and already glued. I tape the binding on first, using a hair dryer to heat the binding and help it bend in the tight waist and upper bout curves. After it was taped on I applied the CA super glue in the gaps, the glue wicked under the binding... and unfortunately under the tape too. But that was why I'd applied the Shellac yesterday! After applying the glue I also added additional tape and pressure using tools on hand until the glue set.

After the glue was dry I removed the tape and here you see the mess of adhesive soaked super glue. A pain in the butt to clean up, but do-able.

Almost all cleaned up and looking good! I think normal sanding will take care of it from here.

Now that both top and back binding is in place I still need to clean up the sides which is a little tougher but hopefully not too bad. There isn't as much glue or adhesive but I'll also be sanding/scraping the wide surface of the binding which may be touchy, we'll see!

StrumMn meetup at Java J's

2009-09-12T21:17:00.001-05:00

Don't forgat that we're meeting up at Java J's on Monday Sept 14th. Visit StrumMn.Nexo.com for details.

Binding

2009-09-12T20:54:00.009-05:00

I want to try my hand at putting binding on this uke. To do this I built a new jig/tool last weekend. I had to do some ugly welding (I'm out of practice) and mount this angled piece to a heavy duty drawer slide (from Axman's). The router is then kept verticle and I can keep both hands on the uke body. I tried it out last night and it worked pretty well.

Here you can see a wood guide I added to the bottom. This is necessary because of the radiused top and back, otherwise the router bit wouldn't keep the right distance from the top. You can see I added my routing directions so I would do things right.

I also decided to try my hand at inlay for the headstock. This is my first ever attempt. Here are my initials (minus the verticle on the left side), I'm leaving that off to be "artsy."

Here the binding channels are complete. I decided against purfling this time, maybe on the next one.

In this shot I've already started removing the tape. I first tried some special glue made just for plastic binding but the work time is so quick that I started to make a mess of it and had to remove it, clean up the channels and start over. I stopped to research things some more and ended up using CA glue instead (super glue). It left a real mess to clean up as it wicked under the tape and across the back.

Here is the back, all bound, and mostly cleaned up. I won't clean up the sides until I finish binding the front.

The back was such a mess that I'm afraid the CA will really wick into the Western Red Cedar top. I stopped and went to the store and bought some shellac. I'm hoping this will seal the grain a bit so the glue won't wick in but still allow it to adhere well. Then I'll sand the shellac completely off after the binding is on. This also gives a little preview of how the top will look with some finish on it... I like it!

I love the look of tortoise binding but I'm getting the idea that plastic binding in general can be a pain in the butt! With wood binding I could just use Titebond and work it like normal. We'll see if the extra effort is worth it when it's complete.

progress

2009-08-31T21:01:00.005-05:00

Well, I got the top braces glued in and carved to shape with a chisel over the weekend. I've done a bit more shaping since this and got the ends tapered right down flush with the top. A little more sanding is in order still but you can't see glue marks anymore and it looks really "nice!"

I also decided to try to put a "zipper" in the back, even after the body was mostly together. I built a jig that would flex with the curve of the back and routed a slot for the inlay. Of course it wasn't quite wide enough so I had to use scrapers and a chisel to carefully widen the channel a hair. But it's now glued in and looks good. This will also force me to try binding the body which I wanted to do anyway but again, it's once of those operations I've never done (like the zipper), which is fraught with possibilities for really messing the whole thing up. But first I need to get the top glued on... I'm getting closer.

a mock up

2009-08-26T20:42:00.003-05:00

The rosette went "ok...", they just never seem to turn out "right on" and always need some tweaking.

I still need to sand a little more as some of the super glue is visible where it soaked into the wood.

When I got done I just set the top on the body and set the neck up next to it, the neck stripe will only be visible from the back once the fingerboard and headstock veneer is in place.

rosettes!

2009-08-25T20:50:00.002-05:00

They're scary! No room for mistakes. I cut the ring to inset for my tenor tonight. I used Sheoak since I'd used it for the tail graft already and I think it'll look great against the western red cedar top.

It took 2 tries after I miscalculated on the first one... maybe I can use it for a soprano down the road.

I still need to cut the groove in the top to fit it in and the ring is also WAY too thick still. I'll have to sand it down some, maybe before gluing it to the top (I'll use double stick tape to hold it down so it doesn't move and crack).

The top is only about 0.070" so routing halfway through is "interesting". It's hot and sticky in my garage now and the mosqitos are coming out... I'm going to wait until tomorrow so I don't rush it and make a mistake. I'll also cut a groove in a test board first to make sure it's RIGHT before cutting my top.
I'll also cut the soundhole while I'm at it... I suppose I should cut the soundhole reinforcement plate while I'm at it too... so much to remember...

Build pics

2009-08-22T21:00:00.011-05:00

Ok, here are some build pics as promised. I've been working on these over the last month or so.
This first picture is the plans I made for my tenor. I used basic measurements but made the curves to my taste using visio. When printed to scale it used 4 sheets of paper.

Here is my wood for the tenor. It's curly cherry and western red cedar.

Here is the wood I picked for the soprano. It's satinwood and old growth redwood.

Here I've glued up mdf for the tenor mold and getting it cut out.

Here is the next step, building the side bending mold for the tenor using the inside bits of the mold.

Here I'm gluing in the braces. I've got it sitting in my 8ft radius dish to put a nice curve on the back.

Here is the neck glued up from spanish cedar, ready for some carving.

I also bent the sides for the soprano and scarfed/glued up a few neck blanks while I was at it. Ok, so I made a mistake on once of them and needed to do another tenor size... but the mistake can be used for another soprano or concert.

Here is the tenor back and sides all glued up, just waiting for a top and neck.

And it's tough to tell in this shot but the side of the neck closest is pretty well rough shaped here.

I just keep poking away it when I get the chance, I hope I can finish it before Milwaukee at the end of September!

Brian

Aug meeting

2009-08-09T21:02:00.002-05:00

Don't forget the meeting at Como on Monday night Aug 10th, 7-9pm.

See the nexo site for info on the pool party at Sue's on Sat Aug 15th.

Sharp tools make for easy woodworking... but can be tough on fretting fingers!
Nothing serious but took a nick out of my left index finger tonight with a sharp chisel. We'll see if it affects my playing.

And I ended up getting some spanish cedar for my uke necks... I wonder how I can tell if it's really "spanish" cedar vs some other variety? I may have to do some research on that one.

2 items

2009-07-03T21:27:00.002-05:00

1) Anyone want to meet at como monday evening the 13th?

2) I've got 2 new ukes under construction, pictures to come later.

Soprano; Satinwood back/sides, Old Growth Redwood top, undecided neck (mahogany or spanish cedar? I have mahogany on hand, but...)

Tenor; Curly Cherry body, Western Red Cedar top, same neck dilemma on this one.

Tops and backs have been bookmatched, jointed, glued, and thickness sanded. Still need to build the mold for the tenor but the pattern is ready to go and I have mdf on hand for it.

Brian

June StrumMn meeting

2009-05-17T18:32:00.001-05:00

Let's meet on Sunday June 7th, 2-5pm.

We'll meet at the Como Pavillion but we'll plan to stay outside.
Hopefully it will be nice enough to meet at a picnic table near the waterfall, otherwise we'll find space under the Pavillion roof on the lake side.

Brian

Luthierie

2009-05-17T17:59:00.007-05:00

Two projects in the works. I've got another harp frame in clamps now being glued up, the top and bottom have been jointed and thickness sanded.

Then there is this Airline ukulele. It belongs to a co-worker and needs some TLC. The top and back have some seam separation and will get reglued but it was also missing the saddle/bridge. I've built one from scratch and glued it on, here are some pictures.

First I scraped off the old glue.

Here is the new bridge.

Here it's just sitting in place.

Taped off and ready to glue.

In the clamp.

The clamp is off now and I added some Danish oil finish before removing the tape.

Now I need to glue the body separation.

You may have noticed the fretboard, we're not going to mess with it for now.

Brian

M-day project - and then back to uke stuff

2009-05-10T21:31:00.006-05:00

Pounding in the tuning pegs an then stringing it up.
Metal strings tune a lot easier than those nylon uke strings!
But 22 of them?!?!

Delivered to my mom on mothers day. It's a hit!

A close up.

Ignore the hiccups in this sound sample...

Pics of the Mothers day project

2009-05-04T20:42:00.007-05:00

Here is what I'm building. The top is mahogany, the back is some kind of ply with a cherry back. The sides are solid cherry. I've traced everything so I have patterns to build another one.
The place I bought it from is ok with this kind of thing and even sold me the second set of hardware. They sell plans for many of their instruments but this is new for them and plans aren't available yet. They sell plans/kits/complete - harps/guitars/banjos/dulcimers etc.

Here I'm gluing up the frame. It's just 4 pieces and the plans say to just tape the joints but I added the one clamp too. The joints were pretty good but I did sweeten up a couple of them.

I glued/clamped the top/back by simply placing a board on top of it and piling weight on it.
About 150 pounds to get the joints tight. I hate using a bunch of clamps, it's so much harder to keep things lined up.

Here it is with the edges trimmed. I then used a lot of elbow grease and some 40 grit to clean up the edges, followed by 100/150/220/400 grit.

Here it is hung up after the edges have been rounded over by router and sanding block. It also has a couple applications of danish oil.

It has to dry for 3 days and then I'll do 3 coats of wipe-on poly. After that I can install hardware and strings. Hopefully it will be complete by the weekend!

Woodworking season

2009-05-03T13:07:00.002-05:00

Well it's finally warm enough to work out in the garage so I'm starting to pull out my tools.
I hope to build a couple ukes this summer with the goal to be complete before the Milwaukee Uke Fest in September. Okay, it's a long way off but I've got a busy summer ahead with a graduation party to prepare for, etc.

I'm planning to build another soprano with the forms I have on hand. I also have plans drawn up for a tenor so if I can build a new side bender form then that will be in the mix too.

I bought plans for a Regal style tenor guitar last year too, so if I have time and feel real ambitious then who knows what may come out of my garage.

As a starter I'm working on something a bit different as a mothers day gift for my mom. It's called a Reverie Harp and I'm building from a kit supplied by Musicmakers Kits in Stillwater, Mn.
The kit is built and I'm working on the finish now, I'll have build pictures up soon. It only took 2 days and would be an easy one for just about anybody.

I also bought a second set of hardware and plan to built a second harp for myself completely from scratch. The mahogany has already been resawn and glued up in a bookmatch for the top/back. Need to thickness sand and built up the side pieces. More when I get going on that.

Off to a StrumMn meeting now!
Brian

March meeting update and next meeting.

2009-03-29T21:03:00.003-05:00

Nice turnout today with 13 people playing uke down at Como.

Let's plan on Sunday May 3rd for the next meeting. Como, 2-5pm.
Visit http://StrumMn.nexo.com for updates or to leave music info for everyone to try.

Brian

March StrumMn meeting

2009-03-17T19:10:00.001-05:00

Everyone has been asking, so...
Sunday 3/29/09, 2-5pm, Como Park Pavillion

See you there!

Twin Cities Ukulele Orchestra anyone?

2009-02-06T18:16:00.002-06:00

Bill, who has attended several StrumMn meetings, contacted me about this idea which he is trying to get off the ground. Here is a link to his craigslist posting if you want more info or to contact him about it.
http://minneapolis.craigslist.org/muc/1020630603.html

Feb meeting - 2/15/09

2009-01-24T13:05:00.003-06:00

The next StrumMn meeting will be February 15th, 2-5pm at the Como Pavillion.

I'll followup with music choices if I hear from anyone.

Check out the forum on http://strummn.nexo.com for any music discussion.

Check this out...

2009-01-21T22:09:00.002-06:00

Rachel has setup another tool for StrumMn to use. I've had a quick look and uploaded a few things but want all of you to check it out and let me know what you think.

It's at http://strummn.nexo.com/ and has a forum where we can all discuss anything uke or StrumMn related. It also allows anyone to upload music or pictures.

We'll "see" you all there!

P.S. This blog will not go away and I'll still send email before each meeting.
There is also a test facebook group for "StrumMn ukulele players" if anyone wants to check that out as well.

14!

2009-01-11T18:47:00.003-06:00

Great turnout today, best we've had in quite a while. The ukes were so loud we couldn't hear ourselves singing... which might be a good thing... ;-)

A February date will be announced soon, stay tuned.

1st meeting of 2009 !

2008-12-30T17:38:00.002-06:00

We had a nice turnout for our December meeting despite the weather.

We'll have our 1st meeting of the new year on Sunday Jan 11th down at the Como Park Pavillion again, 2-5pm. Add a comment or send me an email if you have songs you want to share with the group.

See you there!

Brian

We're still on for today...

2008-12-21T11:15:00.001-06:00

The weather is looking pretty good right now, if it takes a turn for the worse we can knock off early. Use your own judgement and stay safe.
Brian

song choices?

2008-12-14T20:10:00.002-06:00

Hi All,

I wanted to comment on song choices.

I threw in the song "Moonlight On The Colorado" for this month and thought some of you might be interested in how I came up with this choice.

I'd never heard of the song before Thanksgiving this year. Sometime during Thanksgiving Day I was sitting with my mom and talking about the old songs we've been playing at our uke meetings.
She started humming and then singing bits of the song "Moonlight" and asking if I remembered years ago when we had a Victrola in the basement and she played this song.

Well, I don't recall ever having a Victrola and she's been forgetting things lately so maybe it was from when SHE was young rather than when I was.

Anyway, she mentioned how she used to love the song. That was enough for me, I wanted to learn the song so I could play it for my mom.

When I got home I started searching. I didn't have too much luck at first, I found a few sound clips, just bits of the song, from websites selling CD's. I checked youtube and found one clip of a young gal singing the song but not a period clip like I was hoping for. Here it is if you want to hear it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zN_B-X6IM3Q

I finally found the sheet music for it at this website: http://sheetmusic.library.sc.edu/ and this is the version I uploaded in the blog link. I think this song would sound really cool on steel guitar... maybe I need a resonator uke to fake it.

Do any of you have stories behind song choices?

Hope to see a few of you next Sunday.
Brian

Next Meeting, DEC 21st, 2-5pm Como Pavillion

2008-12-13T12:51:00.004-06:00

Hi everyone,

Yes, we're still planning on meeting on the 21st.

I've had 4 songs submitted and I'll add a 5th; download and print them if you're coming.
If you have any more songs to share please let me know and I'll try to post them.

I don't know all of these either, come and learn them along with us.
David has supplied links to youtube for a couple of them at the top of the pages.
If it asks for a userid/password just hit cancel and they should download.
After You've Gone
Moonlight On The Colorado
Red Roses For A Blue Lady
Shine On Harvest Moon (updated version from John)
Whispering (verses included from David)
Whispering (sheet music)

The Whispering sheet music is the same as I handed out last month, grab a copy if you want as it'll help with the melody. David's version just has chord names, plus verses mine was missing.

The changes to Shine On Harvest Moon are interesting. This is the 2nd update John sent and what he's doing is converting it to a chord melody version. I play chord melody almost all the time and can show you a few more changes to take it even farther... I'd have to TAB it out to show all of it but at the meeting I can tell/show what I mean.

Last month I think we had more fun with the "oldies" than with the Xmas tunes but we'll play whatever you bring to share, as usual.

Hope to see you there.

Keep StrumMn!
Brian

Nov 23 recap

2008-11-24T18:45:00.002-06:00

Hi all,
We had 8 show up to play yesterday and had a good time. I hope 1st-timers will come back again.
John did a little rework on Shine on Harvest Moon and sent this to me, check it out. (Just hit cancel if it asks for a userid/password.)
If any of you are on FaceBook, I just signed up last Friday and created a "StrumMn ukulele players" page. I'm going to try using it as an addition to the blog here. Check it out and let me know if you think it would work better for sharing information.

Next meeting is Sunday Dec 21st. I know it may not work for everyone but I hope a few off you can come down to Como and play uke. I'll post here and send an email reminder a couple weeks before the 21st.

Until then, keep StrumMn!
Brian

A new uke cartoon!

2008-11-21T20:24:00.002-06:00

Here is the link I found it at: http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/fun/dennis.asp?date=20081119

Looking for new songs?

2008-11-19T21:22:00.001-06:00

check out this website I ran across: http://kristinhall.org/songbook/Songbook.html
They even have a parody of Ghost Riders (Ghost Chickens in the Sky)...

Songs for the next couple meetings

2008-11-14T20:56:00.003-06:00

I've had replies from 3 people and want to share this info so people can practice or review songs.

David sent me Shine on Harvest Moon, just click here. If it asks for a userid/password just hit cancel and it'll give you the doc anyway, let me know if you have problems.

Gary sent this:
Christmas songs, on Betty lou Christmas songs,
Frosty the snow man, I saw mommy kissing Santa Claus, Jingle Bells, Mele Kalikimaka, O Christmas Tree.
For the group play, how about from, www.salemukes.com, All of me, By the light of the silvery moon, five foot two eyes of blue, I can't give you anything but love, Sentimental Journey, Yes, sir, thats my Baby. These would be some good ones to start. I think we could look for some newer ones from the 50's and early 60's. I hope this gives us a start.

And Don sent a huge list of songs used at a nursing home. No music but check it out for songs we might want to learn for our own gig. The list is here.

If you have other suggestions please leave a comment or send me an email and I'll add it here.
Print a copy of the Xmas songs mentioned to play if you'll be there next meeting. The link to Betty Lou is in the links section to the right.
And Shine On Harvest Moon too!

Thanks!
Brian

Next couple meetings!

2008-11-08T14:04:00.001-06:00

Hi all, it's time to schedule a couple meetings so all of you can make plans to attend.

Sunday November 23rd, 2-5pm, Como Park Pavillion.

Sunday December 21st, 2-5pm, Como Park Pavillion.

I'd like to suggest we each try to bring a Christmas song that we can play as a group or learn for the December meeting. If you give me a link or send a copy via email I'll try to post them for everyone to download.

Also, if you have a suggestion for simple songs we can use for a nursing home or assisted living home gig please let me know or bring them along. I'd like to start putting them together into a practice book so we can give this a go in a few months.

Hope to see you in a couple weeks, and let me know your ideas.
Keep StrumMn!
Brian

A note from Paul in Samoa with the Peace Corps

2008-10-19T19:15:00.003-05:00

Malo to all,

Well I finally had a chance to sit down with my computer. The past week has been the busiest week of my life, as well as one of the best weeks. Add in the preparation to the endeavor and that makes the busiest month of my life. Thank you to all who helped me in the process and also for supporting me in my Samoan Peace Corps adventure.

PC Samoa (Group 81) consists of 13 members. Nine males and four females coming from all over the states two representing MN. Go MN! We all get along very well and have become very close in such a short time. I have two roommates. Joey from Iowa and Igor from Mass. Our group is training to become teachers. Mostly computer instructors, a few special needs teachers, construction and PC Samoa’s first automotive service instructor. There are a lot of cars here and a great need for auto service skills. People seem to be pretty excited about having an auto service instructor. Oh yeah, mechanics are called engineers here. I have already made one car repair to our medical officer (MO) ‘s Honda that wouldn’t start. So I’m feeling good about the whole auto situation here.

Most of our time has been spent in language and culture training. We also have a lot of medical and safety classes. Training is going well so far. The language is definitely the toughest part. Our safety classes have been the most fun so far. One afternoon was devoted to water safety, which included a boat ride to a far coral reef where we snorkeled for a couple hours and another afternoon was devoted to beach safety, which also included a few hours of snorkeling. Already about four hours of snorkeling, can’t complain about that. The entire island (Upolu) is surrounded by coral barrier reef. Which is beautiful. It’s amazing all the ocean life I have seen in just four hours.

The rest of the island is beautiful. Green foliage, bright colored flowers everywhere, several mountains and great views from every angle. Tons of cars, a lot of cats and dogs, glass bottled Coca-Cola, and the fish market (my favorite place to eat). We’ve been staying in the Apia (capital city) Central Hotel. Nice place, very nice employees, as well as the Samoan people in general are extremely kind and respectful. Making it much easier to warm up to life here.

The entire process of the PC training is really impressive. It makes me feel even better about my choice. So much valuable information and great instructors, I feel so fortunate to have this opportunity.

We have two current PC volunteers (PCV) helping with the training process, Dylan and Laura. They have been such a great source of information; they are also a lot of fun. They have brought us out to some of the local entertainment sites and also have introduced us to a lot of other volunteers in Samoa (40 total in Samoa). Haven’t met all of them yet though. I met Eric who I contacted before leaving to Samoa and thanked him for his advice on bringing a guitar here. I’m glad I did, otherwise I would be bumming. He was even nice enough to give me an hour long guitar lesson (very cool) It’s nice to be around so many nice and talented people who are eager to share their knowledge. I’ve already learned a lot of computer related knowledge from all the IT people here. Hopefully they will help me set up my blog. Which will most hopefully be up pretty soon, but no promises.

This Saturday group 81 heads to Fausaga, a village on the south side of the island for a week’s stay with individual host families, which should be really interesting. It’ll be fun to see how village life is for families. Our trainers have been preparing us for village life. Yesterday we had a lesson on how to take a bucket shower, due to the lack of running water in some homes.

Well that’s about it for me. I could tell you so much more, but that’s it for now. You probably won’t hear from me for at least a week. The village definitely won’t have internet access. If you have some time please drop me a line, via e-mail of course, it’s nice to hear from all of you and it’s also nice to hear about what’s going on with the presidential election. Everybody here has been pretty involved with the election so far and is always excited to hear about any news, although my short wave radio has come in pretty handy for that. Anyways thanks again and I hope to hear from you soon.

Tofa, Paulo

P.S. My Samoan name is Paulo, yeah it was a big change.

10/19 followup

2008-10-19T18:55:00.002-05:00

Hi All,

We had 7 of us show up to play today and it was gorgeous down at Como. A special welcome to the 3 first timers, Steve, Jonah, and Mercedes. I hope you come back and play uke with us again.

We're talking seriously about doing a gig at an assisted living home, the first thing is to get a short repertoire of songs together. Easy songs that we can learn and play together and that residents can sing along with would be best. Please help come up with some ideas.

I'll post a date for our next meeting soon, I'll shoot for pre-Thanksgiving which will hopefully give us a shot at another meeting before Xmas as well.

I received an email from Paul in Samoa last night, I wish I'd seen it before our meeting today so I could share it. I'll put in a separate blog entry for it.

Until next time, keep StrumMn! And come up with songs for our new "gig"!

Brian

Next meetng, Sunday 10/19!

2008-10-13T18:52:00.002-05:00

Sorry for the short notice.
Let's try for Sunday the 19th, 2-5pm, Como (Black Bear Crossing Cafe).

David sent me a couple songs and I uploaded them to my web storage, hopefully you can get to them.
http://home.comcast.net/~ukulele-melee/music/ItsBeenALongLongTime.doc
http://home.comcast.net/~ukulele-melee/music/WhiteSandyBeach.doc

If you said you wanted a StrumMn shirt, I'll have it on Sunday.

If you have more songs for us leave a comment with a link or email it to me.

If you are looking for songs to play, check this out: http://nwfolk.com/uketabs.html

Hope to see you on Sunday!
Brian

Follow-up to Sept 21 uke playing session

2008-09-26T18:56:00.002-05:00

Hi everyone,

Once again we had 6 people show up, incuding 2 more 1st timers... welcome guys!
Lots of uke talk, playing through songs and discussion with Paul about his Peace Corps assignment to Samoa. We all wish him the best!

Of course, we met on Sunday and on Monday I got a call that the new StrumMn shirts are all done and ready to be picked up. No hurry now so I don't have them yet, maybe this weekend.
If anyone is in a hurry to get theirs (assuming you asked for one) maybe we can work something out. I drive from Lino Lakes to Eden Prairie every day and there is a lot in between there where I could meet or drop one off. Otherwise I'll have them at the October get together which will be... well, sometime in October. Either the 19th or 26th... any preference? Speak up now and I'll set the date soon.

If you have links to music for us to try just leave a comment. David has been coming up with some winners lately... got any more?

Keep StrumMn!
Brian

Next StrumMn meeting - Sunday Sept 21st

2008-09-12T18:21:00.000-05:00

Hi everyone, hope you're all out there strumming your ukes.

I typed this up and then deleted it once already when my plans were up in the air, hopefully this plan will work for most of you even though it's short notice.

Big news! Paul was accepted for the Peace Corps and will be gone for 2 years... I'm hoping he can make the meeting... I'm willing to push it out one more week if it means he can be there. Paul?

I'm half way through 2 weeks of on-call work which will really stress me out so I'm planning our next meeting for after I'm done with that. I called down to Como to check evening hours and to my dismay they are only open until 7pm now. That means I'm switching us from our summer evening meetings to the Sunday afternoon winter schedule.

Sunday Sept 21st, 2-5pm, inside the Black Bear Crossing Cafe in the Pavillion at Como Park.

Now, what do you want to play? Attach a comment to this post with suggestions and links if you can.

I haven't been able to contact my t-shirt person yet, I lost my invoice and need to find contact info again, but will still try to get more info for those of you who expressed interest.

Keep on StrumMn!
Brian

Monday followup

2008-08-18T22:15:00.003-05:00

Another nice turnout on a beautiful evening. There were 6 of us out playing uke in the park tonight. We ran through an assortment of music and it was nice that everyone brought some to share.

Sara, it was nice that you could join us for the first time and I hope you come back again. By the way, that B chord on the baritone came to me on the way home. It's what the rest of us call the dreaded E chord with a 4442 shape. (I just needed to visualize my accordian buttons to come up with it.) Check out the Sheep Entertainment chord finder, the link is off to the right and here it is too. http://www.sheep-entertainment.nl/ukulele/index.html

Our next meeting will be mid September and I think we'll move inside the cafe since we ran out of light by about 8:30 tonight. Pick some music for next time and watch this space for the next date.

Oh yeah, StrumMn t-shirts should be $15, there may be a slight extra charge for larger sizes. Let me know if you want one and I'll wait a bit before placing the order and try to deliver at the next meeting if possible.

Until then, keep StrumMn!
Brian

Music for Monday 8/18

2008-08-09T20:51:00.002-05:00

We're planning to meet from 7-9 near the pavillion again. We'll be outside if it's nice and in the Black Bear Crossing Cafe if otherwise.

I picked 3 songs from DrUke (I stole one from David), download/print/practice if you want.

If you have a song you want to cover please leave a link in a comment here so others can grab a copy.

http://www.doctoruke.com/songs.html
ZipADeeDooDah
I'm Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter
Till There Was You

Hope to see you on the 18th!
Brian

Windy City Uke Fest !!!

2008-08-06T21:19:00.009-05:00

More pictures added on 8/10, take a look below... and again on 8/12! And 8/16.

I know some of you have been waiting to hear about this, the WCUF was a BLAST!

What do you want to know? Workshops daily from 9-12 and 1-4, concerts from 6-11, jamming and talking and shopping uke in between.

The lineup of performers: Kimo Hussey, Ali Lexa, Windy City Islanders, Seeso, Abe Lagrimas Jr., Gerald Ross, Tim Sweeney, Victoria Vox, Mark "Spanky" Guiterrez, Lil Rev, Barefoot Hawaiian, Jonathan Carreira, Lopaka, Keenan Kamae, Curt Sheller. Hope I didn't miss any!

If ukes can get mojo from osmosis I'm in good shape, MY uke was played by Kimo Hussey, Spanky, Gerald Ross, MGM, and others as they checked it out. It's not perfect but I think I got a few thumbs up, I even have video of Spanky playing it which I'll try to get on here somehow (I've never done that before).

Check back as I'll probably just update this blog rather than enter another one.

And remember, StrumMn will meet on Monday 8/18 down at Como.

Anyway, here's a pic of the stage at the Tiki Terrace to start things off.

And a pic of David and Paul, and Spanky playing MY uke!

And here's Mark "Spanky" Guiterrez playing MY uke... just 20 seconds worth.

I just received this next picture from Steve Matheson. He lives in Australia and attended the WCUF. Since my Sheoak wood is from Australia I thought he'd get a kick out of it, and he did!

Here Kimo Hussey teaches a class.

Part of the vendor area...

More vendor space... That's MGM (Music Guy Mike) in blue with his back to the camera and Curt Sheller walking away (his table is the one in the foreground...)

Lil' Rev performs along with Gerald Ross.

And Victoria Vox puts on a fun show.

Jamming in the hotel lobby, photo courtesy or UkuleleTonya

One more picture! I added a few t-shirts to my wardrobe. I had a couple StrumMn t-shirts embroidered for David and myself (I can get more for $15 if anyone is interested, now that the image is digitized. I'll probably change the text from "my ukulele" to "ukulele players" next time around). Then there is the official WCUF t-shirt. And David's wife surprised us by sending along the Ukulele Hero shirts for both of us; what a gal!

Can't wait until next year for the 2nd annual WCUF!

A uke is born!

2008-07-28T21:56:00.005-05:00

I strung it up tonight with Aquila strings and strummed a couple chords. The strings are still stretching so it'll be a day or two before I do much playing. At one point as I was bringing the strings up to tension I heard a good CRACK but I think it was the neck shifting slightly as I don't see any problems. I'll need to pick up a new case for it now, maybe one of those nice tweed ones that musicguymic sells. I'll try to post a sound file in a day or two if the strings have settled a bit.

Next StrumMn meeting tentatively planned for Monday 8/18 at Como, mark your calendars!

Brian

Almost there... !

2008-07-27T21:12:00.004-05:00

Another coat or 2 of Arrow Wood Finish and then tuners should get me to the point that I can string it up and test the results.

Today I bolted on the neck so I could work on the saddle placement.
Here I masked it off, placed it with double stick tape, then carefully cut around it and then scraped off the finish so the glue would have bare wood to stick to.

Gluing the saddle in place. I lucked out with a new clamp I bought a few weeks ago, it turned out to work perfect for this task! The 2 side clamps were just to make sure the "wings" made solid contact, although I was afraid to pull them up too tight as they clamped right on the body.

Here it is tonight. I put in a bone nut and saddle which may need a little tweaking, I think the action may be able to come down a little bit.

Hopefully the bolt on neck attachment will work ok, etc... this whole thing has been an interesting experience. I'm hoping I can have it completed mid week and maybe a sound sample at that time. Keep your fingers crossed!
Brian

Disaster! (and recovery?)

2008-07-26T12:54:00.005-05:00

Well I got 8 frets installed this morning and then the tail of the fretboard broke off at the 12th fret slot. :-(
I thought I'd just install the frets in the broke off piece and then glue it together with that fret glued in place but when I tried putting in fret 15 it split again. That sheoak is just too brittle when not glued to backing.
I thought about gluing it all to the body and then trying to install the frets but then I'd worry about busting up the body soooo... I took the fretboard off the neck with my table saw and I'll need to fashion a new fretboard.
I have a nice piece of ebony fretboard material I bought a couple years ago, I guess it's time to put it to use!
This may blow my timetable for having it ready for the Windy City Uke Fest. :-(
Pictures later....
Brian

Here's the start of fretting, looking good and I love that fretboard!

And here it is broken... ARGH!

I thought I'd try fretting this section and glue it on but it split again at the last fret when I tried to install it. You can click on all these pics if you want to see a larger version for details...

After much thought I decided to scrap the fretboard so I pulled the frets to re-use and here I've started nibbling the fretboard off the mahogany neck with the table saw.

Here is the piece of ebony I had on hand, I printed out a new fretboard template to glue on the fretboard blank.

First fret cut, 14 more to go...

Time to taper to match my neck and put the frets in again. I'm going to put all the frets in this time before gluing it to the neck.

And here is the new fretboard being glued to the neck. I'll need to do some glue cleanup and then, hopefully, I can install the neck on the body. Then I can do some refinishing and measure for placing the bridge and saddle. Installing that will be another hair raising adventure.

Wish me luck!

Brian

Weekend progress

2008-07-20T17:53:00.015-05:00

It's getting closer!

Here I'm gluing on the top. Most people seem to use a bunch of spool clamps. I don't have any and anytime I use a bunch of clamps then the pieces seem to creep all over. I put the back on my radius dish and applied a bunch of weight in the form of lead!

Here is how I'll attach the neck, a bolt-on into the barrel nut. Drilling the holes was tricky.

My bridge. I was going for a "canoe" shape, also looks like a smile I guess. Still needs to be a bit thinner and sanded to the curve of the top. Also needs holes for the "string-thru top" setup.

To glue on the back I sandwiched things between the 2 radius dishes, this worked really well!

Double checking my routing instructions before trimming off the excess!

After routing the excess. It left a few marks and some extra that needed trimming with a sharp chisel but all-in-all it went very well. At least no chip-out!

Here's the body after a little sanding.

I decided to just sign, date, & number it for now. There is room for a label if I come up with something...

Fitting the neck was a bear... I need jigs!!! Here it's bolted on but I'm just holding the fretboard in place.

Fretboard still just sitting in place...

The neck is removed and the fretboard is being glued under all those clamps somewhere. Still need to sand it even and install frets.

That's enough for now... it might be ready for the Windy City Uke Fest after all!

Brian

More progress

2008-07-16T21:41:00.008-05:00

Ok, a couple new pictures.
This shows the rosette inlay, it's a 1/8" ring of mahogany. Somehow the inlay ring and the soundhole cutout didn't come out quite concentric (all my practice ones did!) but I was able to sand them into allignment. I think this is the "before fixing" picture, see if you even notice the problem. Sometimes I'm a bit picky...

My "go-bar deck." I'd read you could just use a table, so I did. It took 6 fiberglass bars just fine but the 7th lifted the table! Even with extra "stuff" piled on top. Ok, guess what I'll be building soon?

The joint at the tail was not perfect (what is?) so I built a jig and inlayed a mahogany tail graft. It was easier than I thought but I need to trust my jigs. I lined up on the bad joint instead and it's a hair crooked... no one else will notice but I'll always know it's there. I could have immediately recut it but decided it was close enough and a good reminder.

Got braces and a (mahogany) soundhole patch in place, ready to carve.

I carved and did some initial sanding on the braces. I did the "tap tuning" but since it's my first and I have nothing to compare to... well I'll just have to wait and see! The tone is definitely different from the front to the back. Which is better? How should I know?! :-)

Last thing I did tonight was to glue on the internal bridge patch. I looked at pictures of others to get an idea on size/shape etc... and it looks kinda big now that it's in there... it's awful thin though and maybe I'll sand taper the edges a bit more, just because I can!

Pretty soon I'll need to button up the box. First I need to think about neck attachment, I'm planning on a bolt on neck so I need to drill a hole or two. Then some final internal sanding. Oh yeah, I suppose I should sign the inside or even make up a label... first I need a "name"... any ideas? I'll probably just go the way of C.F.Martin rather than think up something "cute."

Brian

7/14 recap and potential next meeting

2008-07-15T18:36:00.002-05:00

We ended up with 6 of us strumming up near the waterfall at Como last night. It was a gorgeous evening weatherwise, perfect for playing outdoors. We had several onlookers stop and comment which is always fun.

Everyone seemed to agree that we need advance notice of music and they agreed to submit links to stuff they're working on... infact, how about just adding your link to music for next time in a comment here. Maybe a week before we meet I can put them all in an email as a reminder.

With the Windy City Uke fest on Aug 1-3 and my work schedule I think I'm going to plan our next meeting for Monday Aug 18th. Comments?
Brian

a couple more build pics

2008-07-12T22:30:00.004-05:00

1st, Come StrumMn Monday 7/14, 7-9 @ Como.

Now, pictures!

Here I'm gluing in the "mandolin" kerfing I bought from Stew-Mac. Nothing too tough here.

I had a little glue squeeze out which I wish I'd cleaned up right away, the stuff is rock hard now so will take a little more work. At the time it was soft I didn't want to mess with it because I was worried about moving things. I guess you get a choice and deal with it either way.

Here it is after the glue is dry. It's sitting on one of my radius dishes to which I've glued down sandpaper. I'm already done sanding it to the radius at this point. I need to get my top and back ready next.

I'm a little afraid of ruining my top by doing a rosette since I've never done any inlay and it seems a little like a "black art" to me. I'd also bought a 1/8" downcut router bit from Stew-Mac to give this a try. Turns out my little router circle attachment only went down to 4" so it was back to the drawing board. I built a new base for it and put several registration holes at different diameters. I only had to re-do one of the holes. Here is my second practice attempt, a 2" hole, then 1/8" from that I have a 1/8" ring. This is all in 1/8" mahogany, nothing glued. I've got another mahogany ring ready to go when I get up the guts to route my actual top, probably tomorrow. I also have braces just about ready to go in so they'll probably get glued up tomorrow too. By Monday I should be ready to start carving the braces back.

Brian

build progress

2008-07-09T21:01:00.006-05:00

1st, don't forget to come play uke with StrumMn on Monday 7/14, see the blog below for info.

Now! I carved my uke neck tonight! I should have taken pics right after the glue up but I didn't. I had already glued the headplate on (I bookmatched scrap cut off of my sides and I'm using it for both the headplate and the fretboard.) I slotted the fretboard a couple nights ago, it went SO much smoother and faster than last time and looks good.

On my blue uke-stick I used a zero fret, this time I'm going without and will need to learn how to setup the nut. I don't know how this "Sheoak" will hold up as a fretboard but since it's my first real uke build I'm guessing it won't matter much. I may not bind this one either... we'll see. Probably no soundhole ring either, inlay still scares me and I'll need to practice a bit.

I also finished a second radius dish over the weekend. Now I have 25' and 12' complete with patterns and material to do 15' and 8' dishes when I get bored. :-)

My order from Stew-Mac came today with brace wood and kerfing so it's time to put those radius dishes to work and see about closing up the body. I wonder if I can get it done before the Windy City Uke Fest... I'm not going to rush.

Now for pictures!

Here it is, I used the exact same pattern as I used on my blue uke-stick. The center line is just pencil used for layout purposes.

The sanding isn't complete yet. I used micro-plane rasps and 100 grit sandpaper so far.

Here I just set things in place to get a sneak preview, I can't wait to finish it up!

Brian

StrumMn @ Como... Monday 7/14, 7-9pm

2008-07-06T12:41:00.002-05:00

The title says it all, we'll try to meet next on Monday 7/14 near the pavillion from 7-9pm. We'll be outside if it's nice and inside the Black Bear Crossings Cafe if the weather doesn't cooperate.
Hope to see a few of you there!
Brian

Monday night review 6/23

2008-06-23T22:07:00.002-05:00

This blog is for Gary. He likes reading about the Como happenings since he can't make it. But tonight he was there! Along with David, Tom, and myself. It was a beautiful evening to sit out there and play, at least until the mosquitos came out at about 8:45 and we cut it short.

We had some teenagers stop and listen for a few minutes and then ask us what kind of band we were. Gary told 'em the truth but should have said we were the Fab Four. :-)

We played through some good tunes that Gary had along and then David worked us through an arrangement of "You are so Beautiful" that he is putting together. I can't wait to get a copy from him, he only had his one working copy along tonight. He even taught us a new chord, I called it "David's chord" but he's going with the FSTC chord (that's F-Shaped Tone Cluster for those not there.)

We also talked a little about the Windy City Uke Fest coming up on Aug 1,2,3. David and I are going to head over there and check it out. Let us know if any other StrumMn'rs are going.
(Maybe Curt Sheller can tell us the real name of the FSTC while we're there!)

I'll get a date for our next meeting soon, most likely a Monday night in 2-3 weeks.

See ya!
Brian

1st radius dish done

2008-06-22T17:46:00.005-05:00

Radius dishes are expensive, somewhere on the order of $85 apiece. The wood is about $8.

I built a jig and patterns for 4 different radii; 8ft, 12ft, 15ft, and 25ft. I decided to do the 12ft first. This is a tedious and messy undertaking! Many passes with the router later and a little sanding with the orbital sander and it's looking good!

I think I have a good 2 hours labor in the dish though, not counting building the jig, etc. At least the jig and patterns can be re-used in the future. I'm also making my dishes 24" diameter so they're big enough to do a guitar in the future if I wish.

For those that don't know, radius dishes are used to curve the tops and backs of guitars and ukes.

They can be lined with sand paper to help shape the internal braces, and to sand the top/bottom of the side pieces to match the curve in the top and back, this gives a better glue joint.

The tops and back are also placed in the dish when the braces are glued in, this helps hold everything in place with the correct curve. The dish is placed in a "go-bar" fixture to help with this, google it if you're interested or just wait until I get to that point and I'll include pictures (I have to make it still but their are some freebie alternatives too).

Ready for some pictures?

In this first picture I'm just getting set to start routing. You can see that the router rides on the 2 radiused pattern pieces that just slide into slots at the ends of the jig. The dish turns on a peg in the middle. This is going to take a while and be very loud and messy. I held the router with one hand and the shop vac hose with the other. I also used eye protection, a dust mask, and hearing protection since this took quite a while to complete.

I'm part way done with the routing in the second picture... you can see the dishing under the jig!

In this last one, I've finished routing and sanding. I placed half of the 8ft pattern across the top so you have a straight bottom edge to help visualize the dish. The peg in the middle it to help spin the dish as it's routed. It's a piece of dowel so the router can just cut it too as it goes by. It sticks out more than 1/2" when I measured.

That's it for now.

I hope to see some of you Monday June 23 at Como for some uke playing.

Keep StrumMn this summer!

Brian

Ukin' Monday 6/23, 7-9pm

2008-06-17T21:29:00.002-05:00

Come on over to the Como Pavillion on Monday 6/23 for some informal strummn. We'll either sit inside the Black Bear Crossings Cafe (inside the Pavillion) or find somewhere to sit nearby outside.
Last time we sat in the upstairs seating so remember to check there if you don't see us elsewhere.
Hope a few of you can make it!

Recap 6/1 & Summer ukin'

2008-06-01T19:56:00.002-05:00

First off, great turnout on June 1st! Eight of us, 4 returning and 4-1st timers. Tim was a guest from the Berkley Ukulele club, in town for a conference and spent a couple hours with us. Thanks to everyone who made it!

Don brought his first homemade uke, looked and souned great, I can only hope mine turns out as well.

George brought his brand spankin' new William King custom, some of the prettiest koa I've laid eyes on... and the sustain!

David outdid himself with a huge selection of great music for us to play through. Thanks, Dave!

Hope to see Bill, Paul, and Susan back again too!

==================================

Now for the rest of the summer. What works for the rest of you? I think we'll stick to evenings, 7-9pm probably. Mondays or Fridays probably work best for me but majority will rule.

What does your schedule look like? What days could/would you show up?

Happy ukin' aand keep StrumMn everyone!
Brian

Build pics

2008-06-01T12:09:00.008-05:00

As promised, some build-in-progress pictures.

This wood is labeled "lace" but I think it was called "Sheoak" in the ebay auction. I t came from Australia and was meant to be a guitar set. The guitar side broke in shipment but I had enough for top/back/sides for a soprano uke. I have no idea if this wood will make a good uke top, we'll just wait and see I guess.

Top/back are glued up bookmatched here and one set has been sanded.

The next pictures is the two side pieces, edge to edge, ready to go into the side bender. They're wet down and the grain is really gorgeous!

My first bend ever! The thermometer never got up were I wanted and expected so I just listened for cracking and slowing brought in the waist...

Here it is cooking in the bender. There is a 500 watt halogen bulb in there, seems to be plenty hot!

I let them sit in the bender all night and put them in my mold this morning. There is some trimming to do (on purpose) but it's looking great to me so far!

I'll add more pics when I make more progress.
Brian

Last meeting before the summer? Sunday June 1

2008-05-21T13:56:00.003-05:00

The month of May has just been too busy for me but I'd like to get in one more group meeting if possible before everyone gets into summer schedules. I haven't checked with the boss here at home yet but I'm thinking Sunday June 1st down at Como again will work. If it warms up we can even meet outside if we'd like or under the pavillion roof. Heck, maybe the stage will be available and we can have some impromptu fun.

So, Sunday June 1st, 2-5pm, Como Pavillion (Black Bear Crossing Cafe) on Lexington Ave in St Paul

Anyone want to meet during the summer? At Como or some other park or cafe around town?

I'm going to start working on "summer" songs soon, maybe try Stars & Stripes or other patriotic stuff for the 4th of July. I worked on some of that stuff last year and it wasn't pretty, hopefully I've improved!

Hope to see some of you there on the 1st, if not I hope you all have a good summer of StrumMn.

Brian

Jake followup

2008-05-21T13:48:00.002-05:00

Sorry for not blogging sooner but life is busy as you all know.
Jake was a lot of fun but the concert was too short, just over an hour long.
He'll be in the Twin Cities again March 10-11, 2009 at the Ordway in St Paul.

We picked up a couple of his CD's and had them autographed. I also had him sign my Applause ukulele, I'll try to add a picture later.

Jake in MPLS on Apr 27th!

2008-04-23T21:04:00.002-05:00

I just found out tonight (thanks, George!) that Jake Shimabukuro is playing at the Dakota Jazz Club at 1010 Nicollet Mall on Sunday night, 2 shows, 7pm and 9:30pm.

This is your chance to see him locally, he's never been here before as far as I know.
It's a small venue and almost sold out already. My wife and I'll be at the 7pm show.

Web site is: http://www.dakotacooks.com/

Maybe see some of you there! Bring a uke to get autographed!

Keep StrumMn,
Brian

Back to normal on the 13th

2008-04-06T21:58:00.002-05:00

Hi all,
Thanks to those who made it to como this afternoon. Our guest from the Ukulele Club of Santa Cruz didn't make but we had a good time doing our usual thing.
There were some fun new songs we went through and we'll probably run them again on the 13th. If you're coming please consider bringing a new song to share, it's always fun to see what others are working on.
See you on the 13th! (2-5pm, Como Pavillion)
Brian

April 6th and 13th !

2008-03-15T19:36:00.002-05:00

Having only received a few replies I've made " an executive decision! "

DAMN THE TORPEDOES! FULL SPEED AHEAD!

I've told the folks from California that will be visiting Minnesota that we'll go ahead with both dates in April, 6th&13th, and hope to see them at Como.
2-5pm both dates.

I also hope to see ALL of you there; although I expect, and will have to be happy if, only a couple show up...

Playing Old Music

2008-03-07T19:12:00.002-06:00

Or maybe I could more accurately title this "Playing From Old Music".Last Sunday for those who showed up I passed out a copy of the song Dream A Little Dream Of Me. I think you've all heard this song done by the Mama's and the Papa's or other versions. The version I handed out was from a 1950 music book and included ukulele chords. I've got it saved as a pdf file if anyone wants to follow along for education purposes. Dream

To digress for a second, I like picking up old music books from used book stores or off ebay. I don't have a bunch or anything but I've bought a half dozen or so. These have many songs that I'd heard years ago and forgotten about and many that I've never heard of. I look for those with uke chords and arrangements mostly. Many of these old books list alternate tuning than the normal C tuning of GCEA, many are tuned in D (ADF#B) and some are in Bb (FBbDG) or others. The key is not to let that throw you too much and the copy of Dream that I handed out Sunday is an example of that.

My copy of Dream is written out in D tuning, ADF#B, and I got comments like " do I need to retune my uke" and "how do I play this?" When you hit these at home by yourself you've got a number of options, as you do when you play along with others.

My ukes are all tuned GCEA as are most of yours so these are the options as I see them.

1) You can retune your uke. I've never done this yet and don't see the need. In some ways it would just confuse me, in the long run maybe it would help me understand the fretboard better. I'd not be "locked in" to "5th Fret, 2nd string is A", it could open my mind to look at the tuning relationships rather than absolutes.

2) In this case I could snap a capo on the second fret and play it as written. I'd have effectively moved the nut up 2 half steps and my uke would now be tuned ADF#B. This way all the nice chord boxes are correct but the chord names don't match the shapes you're used to. I have a capo but never use it, maybe some day.

3) Forget the capo, forget retuning. If you're just by yourself you can use the D tuning chord boxes and just play the shapes as noted. The song will sound just fine but you'll be playing in a different key than the song is written. Nothing wrong with this but if you're playing with others then it might cause problems. Try this just so you know it works.

4) This is what I use and what I encouraged others to do on Sunday. Ignore the chord boxes, ignore the tuning. If it says to play a G chord, play the G chord that you know. A "G chord" is a "G chord" no matter what key the song is written in, it always has the same notes. If you play from guitar music or piano music, a G is a G is a G. Don't worry about it.If it says to play F, play F; just don't look at the chord boxes.

If you hit a strange chord in the song you'll need to look it up, right? Well, maybe. In Dream, written for D tuning, if you look at all the chord boxes and add 2 more frets to the top (where the imaginary nut was) and add dots for fretting what were any open strings, you've got the chord you need. For example, 2010 which we all know as an F chord. In Dream a 2010 is a G chord because of the tuning. Add 2 frets (add 2 to each string) to get 4232 which is a sort of second position G. You can see (or figure out) that this gives the notes B D G B and if you dropped the 4 giving 0232 you have the G chord you're used to playing with the notes G D G B. Same notes, doubled-G versus doubled-B, it doesn't make a difference. The point is that in this entire song if you move the chord box pictures up 2 frets you get the chord shapes you know and love, or you learn a second position version of those chords.

Note also that with options 1/2/4 above you're playing the exact same music, 3 people could play each using a different method and it would sound fine. With option 3 you'd be playing the song 2 half steps lower than written. You couldn't play along with others using the other methods but playing alone it will sound just fine.

Everyone thoroughly confused by now? Take a look at the song, play parts of it, ask questions. This stuff gets easier and opens up more options for playing good ol' tunes you might run across (or get tossed at you at a StrumMn meeting :-0 )

Speaking of which, see the post below for info on the next StrumMn meeting!

StrumMn together again

2008-03-02T20:10:00.003-06:00

A half dozen of us had a great time playing again down at como and we continue to get positive comments from other patrons and employees at the cafe. If you haven't been down there with us yet you should consider coming next month, it's a lot of fun! No, we're not "performing" there, we just pull a few tables together and do our thing, so come join us! We had 2 first timers today, I hope they had fun and come back again.

Next month! Based on input from those attending we're going to meet on Sunday April 13th, Black Bear Crossing Cafe at the Como Pavillion again, 2-5pm.
We're always scrounging for new play-a-long songs so bring a favorite if you can, a few copies work fine, we're ok with sharing.

Put it on your calendar now and plan on attending, I'll see you next month!

Keep StrumMn!
Brian

Next Meeting: Sunday March 2nd

2008-02-09T14:26:00.000-06:00

Hi folks,
Let's plan on meeting Sunday the 2nd at Como again, 2-5pm.
Let me know if you need directions.
Keep StrumMn!
Brian

Como on the 13th

2008-01-05T12:15:00.000-06:00

Hi folks,

Let's plan to meet at Como again on Sunday January 13th, 2-5pm as before.
Anything special you'd like to play or cover? Just leave a comment or send an email.

I'm working on a couple webpage links that I hope will allow me to add mp3's of songs from the Jumpin' Jim books and others as I've mentioned previously. Hopefully some of you can record stuff you play and add to the list once I get it set up. Come and talk about it.

Hope to see you on the 13th!

Keep StrumMn!
Brian

Dec 16th meeting

2007-12-16T18:18:00.000-06:00

Hi, I think a good time was had by all today. We went through a bunch of Christmas carols and fun seasonal tunes. I'll do some calendar checking and try to plan our next meeting for mid January. I hope you can be there with us!
Have a happy holiday season and a Merry Christmas!
Keep StrumMn!
Brian

Just for laughs...

2007-11-22T17:55:00.001-06:00

That was Fun! How about 12/16?

2007-11-18T18:01:00.000-06:00

Hi folks,

It was a lot of fun meeting down at como today! We ended up sitting downstairs and had people thanking us for playing, kinda cool! We had 2 first timers, George and John; I hope you guys had a good time and will come back again. New ideas help everyone.

Lets plan to meet down there next on Sunday 12/16 at 2pm again. Plan ahead everyone and lets play some uke. Xmas songs anyone?

Brian

Meeting Sunday 11/18?

2007-11-10T20:32:00.000-06:00

Hi Folks,

It's been almost 2 months since our last StrumMn meeting and I think it's time to get together even if it's just something informal. That said, I don't have a room reserved at the library like in the past but was hoping we could just meet down at the Black Bear Crossing Cafe at the Como Park Pavillion next Sunday afternoon and do some playing.

If someone knows of an alternative location please speak up quick and we can switch locations.
Sunday afternoons still work best for me so how about 2pm Sunday 11/18. Can anyone else make it?

I'd like to meet again before Christmas too, any dates that work best for people?

Brian

Hey folks, time for an update!

2007-10-31T18:51:00.000-05:00

First off, sorry this hasn't been very active. My new job leaves me less free time and after the Sept turnout I wasn't comfortable trying to book the big room at the library. When I tried they were booked out several months, very discouraging as it's more centrally located.

I'd like to try meeting someplace new, like the Black Bear Crossing cafe at Como Park. Or some neighborhood cafe someplace, got one near you where we could meet?

Just because I've been busy doesn't mean I haven't been playing my ukes. I've found a couple of the John Pak song sheets to be very good and should offer some good opportunities to help everyone move out of first position chords. Check out his Edelweiss (chords) and Feed The Birds (from Mary Poppins). If you can make it to the next meeting we can have fun with figuring out some better (or just different) fingering to mix it up in second position.
http://web.mac.com/johnpak/iWeb/homepage/Uke%20Song%20Sheets%20A-K.html

I've also been mulling about a project of sorts that maybe a few of you can either help with or just benefit from. I've got a bunch (almost all) of the Jumpin' Jim uke books. One of the drawbacks is the lack of a CD with most of them. Even when you know the basic song you don't always know how it should sound "as written." I'd like to record as many of the songs from his books as possible and organize them online for others to reference. And "playing as written" can still be quite individual and leave room for multiple versions. Some people just strum the chords exactly as written, some may fingerpick the melody as written, others may combine to play a chord melody (the chords as written but in different positions and/or adjusted to pick up the melody line). This could give new players guidance to what the songs sound like and give others ideas for taking them to another level. Let me know what you think, I'm also interested in easy ways to record if you've got ideas. So far I've only recorded through the pinhole mic in my mp3 player, it sounds remarkably well but I know there must be room for improvement.

Does anyone want to meet this weekend? Short notice and all but I could make it Sunday 11/4 if anyone is interested. If not then I'm looking a couple weeks out before I can try again.

Do people want to start working on Xmas songs yet? It'll come up fast! We MIGHT be able to get in 2 meetings before Xmas but that's about it. Let me know what you think about any of this, leave comments, I love comments.

If you know of someplace we can meet and play then pick the date time and let everyone know, or just me and I'll let everyone know, but lets get together and play!

Keep StrumMn,
Brian

Kick-off

2007-09-13T19:16:00.000-05:00

Howdy folks,
Well maybe it was because of the Vikings opener but the StrumMn kick-off was lightly attended.
That's ok, we got to talk and try out a few "new" ukes. The SilverTone and Howlett (Island Ukulele) both sounded and played great! The Howlett was gorgeous as well. Seems that folks are moving towards sopranos!
No date yet for the next meeting, anyone have a location they can book? If not, then I'll get to it when I can and let you all know when/where we'll meet next.
Hope to see you soon,
Brian

StrumMn September kick-off

2007-08-20T15:20:00.000-05:00

I've reserved the Roseville Public Library meeting room on Sunday September 9th from 2pm-5pm for our fall kick-off meeting. The library is at the corner of County Rd B and Hamline Avenue. Let me know if you need directions. It's a big room, come and help fill it!

There is a link on the right to a new flyer if you want to print and post one at a favorite music store or elsewhere.

Pick a song you'd like to try as a group and bring some copies along to share. Even better, get a copy to me that I can post or link to here so others can make their own copy and practice ahead of time.

Bring an extra uke or 2 along to share or to let others try out.

Bring a friend along to share the extra uke!

I'll bring my laptop so we can access songs on the internet or view DVD instructional material.

If you want to lead the group in something particular just let me know. (ie. TPA, Hawaiian, etc)

Let me know if I missed anything here and I'll update as necessary. Feel free to leave comments, I love getting feedback.

I hope to see you in September!
Keep StrumMn!
Brian

Just because I promised...

2007-08-19T16:01:00.000-05:00

Here is a pic of the drum sander. I still need to build the dust hood and true up the drum itself but it's looking good and everything seems to be lining up nice.

I priced out crank handles and they cost $25! The black knobs are $4.75 each (I used 5) at any local hardware stores. I found the knobs for $0.75 each online and ordered them up. They came only as female knobs and I had to cut threaded rod to length and epoxy it to the knobs, a little extra work but saved a bunch of $. Then I bought a stop collar and got out the welder to build a crank handle, got it done for under $4 including a new locknut.

The platten was too wide and I needed to trim it up some which I did with a belt sander. I chucked the drum in a wood lathe to do some real rough work, getting some glue off, etc. But it needs to be finished by putting sand paper on a board and running that through to sand the drum itself. Then a couple coats of finish to seal the drum at which point I can wind the drum itself with sandpaper. Almost there! Like the yellow? Maybe I'll write DeWalt on the side in Magic Marker for fun.

I'll probably finish just in time to head back to work and won't get much time to play with it. :-(

Brian

8/22 Last Wed @ Como for the summer?

2007-08-17T17:33:00.000-05:00

8/15 was another nice night at Como. The Mn State Concert Band played again, they're really good! I just did my thing up on the hill as usual.

I plan to be down there again on the 22nd but it may be my last Wednesday for the summer. On Wednesday 8/29 I'm starting a new job out near 62&494 and I have no idea if I'll be able to make it that day. I don't want to leave a uke in the car all day either. If you've been planning to drop on by then next Wednesday is the day to make it! The concert that night will be "First Light Trio" if anyone cares.

I hope to post more pictures of my drum sander this weekend too, it's getting close to being functional! Once I've got it up and running if any of you are interested in building a uke and want to run a couple plates through we can have a StrumMn meeting at my place and do a little woodworking while we're at it.

Hope you're all StrumMn the summer away, enjoy!
Brian

8/8 and 8/15 at Como

2007-08-09T15:32:00.000-05:00

Another nice night out playing the uke on 8/8. I drove down there in the miserable humidity thinking "what am I doing?" Got down there and the temp was 5 or 10 degree's cooler by the waterfall, it became overcast and the temp and humidity both dropped even more. It became the perfect evening to play outdoors! The Minnesota Concert Band did a concert on the promenade and sounded great too, but I stayed put and played uke.
Paging through my books I tried a couple songs that I'd bypassed previously as "too hard", now Moonlight Becomes You sounds like it may be do-able after all. I'd also played Build Me Up Buttercup a number of times. It always sounded great strummed but I couldn't get it to work as a chord melody arrangement. Last night I tried it for the first time in over a month and it seemed to work fine so I guess general chord melody practice is paying off. I also tried switching fingerings (again) for the alternating 2033 2433 chords in Sentimental Journey and what didn't work at all in the past seemed natural last night. The finger twisting I've been doing now makes it work for me a couple different ways depending on what chords I'm coming from or going to. Anyone interested in learning these just show up and I can at least show you what is working for me.
I don't think I've got anything going next Wednesday so I'll plan to be down there again on the 15th. I welcome any company if you care to come play some uke.
Keep StrumMn!
Brian

uke building - drum sander

2007-08-07T14:42:00.000-05:00

Well, it's taking shape! The main body is together and in primer. I won't paint it until the humidity drops a bit. The platten is just fit together, not fastened... good thing too as it's about 1/8" too wide! I'll have to narrow it slightly to fit, easy at this point thank goodness. The sandpaper for the platten belt and for the drum is on order so it won't be long now until I can do final setup and a test run. You can see another view of my sidebending form in the background of one of the shots.

Brian

8/1 at Como and next try on 8/8

2007-08-05T21:41:00.000-05:00

Well I went to Como again on 8/1. Was there about a half hour when I got a phone call from my wife telling me about the interstate 35W bridge collapse. I stayed put for another hour in case anybody else showed up to play, all the while hoping nobody decided to come THAT route. This was the first time I left early, I wanted to get the new abot what was happening. I doubt I'll ever forget where I was and what I was doing when I got the news.

Anybody up for some playing on 8/8? You can find me outside the pavillion near the waterfall from 6-8pm. I'm easy to recognize, I'll be the one playing the uke.

Keep StrumMn!
Brian

uke building

2007-07-30T18:19:00.000-05:00

Ok, I mentioned last blog that I want to build a uke. Here are some pictures of the forms, side bender jig, and drum sander I'm working on.

Looks like the blog software put 'em in reverse order and won't let me move 'em around, grrrr.

I'm using the sander plans from Shop Notes magazine. It's powered by a v-belt from the arbor of a table saw and so it doesn't require it's own motor. Maybe down the line I'll convert it, I really prefer standalone tools so I'm not changing setups all the time. I don't have a dedicated dust collector and just swapping the shopvac from tool to tool is a pain in the butt.

The drum itself is probably the toughest part of the project. Using a circle cutting jig on a bandsaw sure helped. The glue up of the disks is a pain, I'm not quite done yet. I've got most of the other pieces cut out and ready to assemble and I'm waiting for the pillow block bearings to arrive at the h/w store since they didn't keep them in stock.

The Fox style bender was fun to make and looks cool. I can't wait to try it. I still need to make the cauls to pull the wood into the form, not sure how I want to fasten them just yet. Heat will come from a halogen bulb on a dimmer from an old lamp. I've got aluminum sheet to sandwhich my wood and the whole form is lined in several layers of aluminum foil to protect it.

The uke shape is just the cutout from inside the form but gives a better idea of the shape and shows some of the layout on top. I designed the shape on my PC using Visio, print it out and use spray adhesive to attach to the form. Then just cut it out at the bandsaw and use an oscillating drum sander to bring it to the line and smooth it out. I still need to hinge the form and make cauls for holding the uke body sides tight to the form while glueing head/tail blocks and kerfing.

Como, Aug 1, 6-8pm

Brian

7/25 Como recap

2007-07-26T15:50:00.000-05:00

Another nice evening at Como. While the radio said it was 91 with a 93 heat index on the drive down there, once I got settled in the shade near the waterfall just outside the pavillion it was very comfortable for playing.
I had a couple nice conversations with people who wondered about, or just commented on, the ukulele.
Next Wednesday is August 1st and I'll probably head down there again.
Tracie had mentioned the possibility of a meeting at her place. If anyone wants to host a meeting, please, just pick a date & time and go for it! I'll help spread the word if you wish.

I hope to follow up with another post in the next day or two. In addition to playing uke I've been nurturing my bug to build one. I've almost completed a Fox style side bender using my own design for the shape (ok, not much different from any other uke... a 1/4 inch here, a 1/4 inch there, but I did do it from scratch using Visio to get curves that I liked.) I'm also part way into building a wide drum sander for thinning ukulele top/back/side plates. Pictures will be included.

Keep StrumMn everyone!
Brian

7/18 at Como

2007-07-18T22:15:00.000-05:00

I had company tonight! Ok, my wife doesn't play uke but she came down to Como and sat with me while I played.
The weather looked really ominous on the way down there but it never rained on us and the sun actually came out after a while and the humidity dropped to a comfortable level as well. There weren't as many people down there due to the weather and the evening concert sounded pretty good as we left.
I'm planning to go back again next Wednesday, 7/25, 6-8pm if anyone else wants to drop by and play.
Since Wednesday evenings don't seem to be a favorite for anyone except me I'm open to suggestions for meeting another day/time. Does anyone want to try a weekend or something? Or just wait until September when we can go back to meeting indoors at the library? I think everyone is just busy with their summer and that's ok too.

7-11 review

2007-07-12T13:22:00.000-05:00

7-11 was another gorgeous evening at Como, however by 8pm my fingers were actually getting a little too cold and stiff to play well. No other uke players but I had a couple people stop and talk to me tonight.
The first asked if I was part of the band when I was walking through to see if anyone else was there and when I said no she said, "oh, you're the one who sits out there and plays that little instrument, right?"
Yup, that'd be me.
The 2nd just asked what I was playing and when I responded ukulele his response was "just like Authur Godfrey."
Lots of little kids asking parents about "the little guitar" too.
Being a glutton for punishment I'll plan to be down there again next week, the 18th.
Brian

Wed 7/11/07 anyone?

2007-07-09T21:42:00.000-05:00

I'm going down to Como again from 6-8pm on Wed 7/11 if anyone wants to come down to play uke for a while. The Minnesota Sinfonia is playing on the promenade at the pavillion at 7pm if you have family coming along who would prefer to listen to something besides uke.
Brian

Happy 4th of July!

2007-07-03T18:57:00.001-05:00

If you're looking for some patriotic tunes to try you should check out the Ukulele Tips 'n' Tunes book from FMM. It's got You're A Grand Old Flag, America(My Country Tis of Thee), The Star Spangled Banner, Yankee Doodle, and America The Beautiful.

My favorite book at the moment is Ukulele Gems (from FMM again. No, I'm not a shill for them, they're just great books for the uke.)
I mentioned Heart and Soul before which I found in this book. I also discovered It's Been A Long, Long Time which is a great song to play on the uke. Others I'm practicing from this book are Ukulele Lady, Bye Bye Blues, Ain't She Sweet, All Of Me, and Sentimental Journey.
Sentimental Journey is a real finger twister for me but I'm starting to hear a LITTLE progress. This one will take a long time but could be worth it. I'd love to hear/see how others finger an Am7 (2433) which needs to alternate with (2033), maybe there is an easier way than what I'm using.

Have a great 4th and come out to Como on Wednesday if you can, I'll be down there 6-8pm or so.
Keep StrumMN!
Brian

Wed the 27th recap and plans for next time...

2007-06-27T21:45:00.000-05:00

A nice, cool, dry evening down at Como. Nicest I've seen down there this summer.

I had a nice little old lady shuffle up close and ask if it was ok to listen while I played. I told her fine, I don't normally play from memory but I'd try. So I played Blue Skies, got through 2 verses and most of the bridge when I heard her say to her grandson "this is my favorite part." As I transitioned to the last verse he sounded surprised when he asked "you know this song?" and she nodded and said "yes." When I finished she thanked me and said it was so wonderful that I would play the uke down there. Then she shuffled back to the rest of her family and kept listening and smiling. It was fun, I wish I played more songs from memory, but I'm working on it!

I probably won't make it down to Como next week due to the 4th (although I might be free on Friday the 6th if anyone else is interested in meeting up to play.)

Otherwise I'm going to plan for now on being down there on Wed the 11th unless something unknown comes up. Come on down and let's play uke!
Brian

Wed the 20th

2007-06-20T22:01:00.000-05:00

A gorgeous evening at Como! Rain elsewhere in the Twin Cities but not at Como. I did get a rainbow, ironically just as I was playing Somewhere Over the Rainbow.

I could hear the concert, lots of patriotic tunes, and got to playing a few myself. Almost ran out of frets trying to pick out the melody on one of them, it was right up to the 12th. (I wasn't actually playing the song, just trying to pick out the melody.)
I've been practicing You're A Grand Old Flag and the national anthem, maybe I'll try to gather a few more for next week in prep for the 4th of July. Anyone got a favorite figured out and want to share it?

If you feel like coming out on the 27th I hope to be down there again, it would be more fun with some company...

Hope you're all StrumMn through your summer...
Brian

StrumMn, Minnesota Ukulele players

some new wood on the way...

Researching something new.

Logo madness?

next meeting, MONDAY Aug 2, 7-9pm

accessories!

Logo for my ukes?

DONE!

sanding and polishing!

Letting finish rest before polishing

Spraying finish

Fretting about things... :-)

1 step forward!

1 step forwards, 2 steps back

GRRR!!!

StrumMn meeting

Next StrumMn meeting

Uke building delayed...

Email from Paul in Samoa !

Neck attachment time.

half hour cabinet scraper workout

top binding in place

StrumMn meetup at Java J's

Binding

progress

a mock up

rosettes!

Build pics

Aug meeting

2 items

June StrumMn meeting

Luthierie

M-day project - and then back to uke stuff

Pics of the Mothers day project

Woodworking season

March meeting update and next meeting.

March StrumMn meeting

Twin Cities Ukulele Orchestra anyone?

Feb meeting - 2/15/09

Check this out...

14!

1st meeting of 2009 !

We're still on for today...

song choices?

Next Meeting, DEC 21st, 2-5pm Como Pavillion

Nov 23 recap

A new uke cartoon!

Looking for new songs?

Songs for the next couple meetings

Next couple meetings!

A note from Paul in Samoa with the Peace Corps

10/19 followup

Next meetng, Sunday 10/19!

Follow-up to Sept 21 uke playing session

Next StrumMn meeting - Sunday Sept 21st

Monday followup

Music for Monday 8/18

Windy City Uke Fest !!!

A uke is born!

Almost there... !

Disaster! (and recovery?)

Weekend progress

More progress

7/14 recap and potential next meeting

a couple more build pics

build progress

StrumMn @ Como... Monday 7/14, 7-9pm

Monday night review 6/23

1st radius dish done

Ukin' Monday 6/23, 7-9pm

Recap 6/1 & Summer ukin'

Build pics

Last meeting before the summer? Sunday June 1

Jake followup

Jake in MPLS on Apr 27th!

Back to normal on the 13th

April 6th *and* 13th !

Playing Old Music

StrumMn together again

Next Meeting: Sunday March 2nd

April 6th and 13th !