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

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

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

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

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'

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

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

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

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!

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

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 !

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

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

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

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

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

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...

That was Fun! How about 12/16?

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?

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!

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