Don’t forget to get your nominations in for ukulele video of the year 2009.
Back to this year, two fantastic videos include loops, beats and electric ukes from Kilgore Trout is Dead and Little6ster (which I think is the first contender for video of the year 2010). Also this week is the swearier of Sebi’s two odes to WMG (his story has been picked up by the Swiss press), Judy Marshak and many more.
A couple more new ukes from NAMM 2010:
– Ohana resonator here’s ,resonator specialist, Bob Brozman testing it out.
– Uke-blog tributing Ukulelia ukulele.
If you can’t wait for the Ohana resonator to turn up, this nickel-plated bell brass Recording King Resonator seems like a sweet deal. But it’s still the National resonator that makes me go all gooey in the knees.
Keli’i are turning out some curly koa ukes at a reasonable price.
Picture of the week: Ukulele side-hugs.
The New York Times declares the end of the ukulele fad, “The high school girl has shelved her “uke” with her slave bracelet.” Michael has been turning up a whole load of great stuff on The Backwards Ukulele Player – well worth subscribing to.
Line-ups for the Ukulele Festival of Great Britain and Denver UkeFest 2010.
The Blockheads play ukulele for a little while at least (thanks to Mike for that).
Frank Skinner wants to write an England football song on ukulele.
Armelle finds 7 ukulele tutorials for strumming and fingerpicking.
Things to make: a ukulele from a tub of butter.
MP3s: Local Vertical has April Smith’s rather brilliant Colors, Eardrums has Oh, Harry’s He Is Not the One. Here Comes the Flood has a track from the new Julia Nunes EP, Seychelles Footwear are giving away the ukulele song from their ad.
Pictures: Norwich Ukulele Society = super cool, uker on Google Street View.
In the comments: In response to the post about Mid-East ukuleles, robgonzo mentioned this rather fantastic instrument he had made.
One event I’m very much looking forward to following this year is Bosko and Honey’s Oz Safari. Compared to New Zealand, we hear very little about the Australian uke scene. So I’m eager to learn more.
One Australian I don’t expect to be seeing on the Safari – I believe he lives in the US now – is Scott Matthew. But it’s a good enough segue for me because I’ve been meaning to post this one for an age.
Before you tackle it a couple of things you need to know:
– It’s played in D-tuning
– It’s in 3/4 time.
– For the picking use your thumb on the G-string then one finger each for the other strings.
“And IIIIII…” part is A7 then one strum each on D – D7 – D6.
Suggested by Emilie and Antwan.
Time to look back on the ukulele videos of last year. And it was a bumper crop. If you need any proof check out the list of some of the contenders below. And – to be honest – that’s the real purpose of the vote: to get people watching excellent musicians. So if there’s a video you think has been cruelly overlooked, be sure to give it a nomination because I’ll be watching anything I missed first time round.
For the first stage, everyone gets to nominate up to 5 videos – leave them in the comments. From those nominations, I’ll cobble together a list of ten (ish) to go to the big vote.
The rules remain as ramshackle as ever:
– There has to be a ukulele in there.
– Videos must have been recorded and uploaded in 2009.
– Videos must be publicly available online.
– Maximum of five nominations per person.
– Post your nominations in the comments.
– Nominations close midnight Monday 1st February (Hawaii time).
– Ten acts with the most nominations go into the final vote with their most nominated song going forward.
– No prize. Just the love and admiration of the heaving masses.
UPDATE: New rule: no sucking up by voting for me.
Don’t panic if your comments don’t show up right away. When a comment contains a few links it gets held back for spam checking.
My Nominations:
John King and James Hill – Larry O’Gaff & Swallowtail Jigs
Sophie Madeleine – Take Your Love With Me
Peggy Sue – Lover Gone
The Bobby McGee’s – Go, Tiger, Go!
tUnE YaRdS – “Hatari” Part I – Pastport Office
Others you might like to consider:
Michelle Blades – Rie Rio
U900 – Diamond Head
Miss Jess – Philadelphia
Rocky and Balls – I Heart You Online
Mr B the Gentleman Rhymer – Chap-Hop History
Arborea – Beirut
Gensblue with Bosko and Honey – Earthquake
L’Uke and GUGUG – Girl U Want
Kalei Gamiao – Mach 4
Honeycomb – Cough Syrup
Craig Robertson – Wrong’s What I Do Best
Todd Baio – No Tears in Heaven
Dent May – Meet Me in the Garden
Victoria Vox and Boulder Acoustic Society – America
Ukulolo – Ravel’s Bolero
Garfunkel and Oates – Present Face
Tiny McItchyFace – I’m Yours
Agathe and Fine – Pirate’s Gospel
Wellington International Ukulele Orchestra – Dreaming of You
Elliott Brood – Valley Town
Ukulelezo – Looking Down the Barrel of a Gun
There seems to be a natural synergy between the ukulele and knitting. Both much maligned, both newly hip and both excellent, low-key ways for people to be creative. There are certainly a lot of people who do both. And I’m very much in favour of it. Perhaps I should take up knitting. Anyone offering lessons?
Suggested Strumming
For the Em and D chords:
d – d u – u d u
– u d u – u d –
For the shorter chords after that:
d – d u – u d –
And the same patterns for the middle.
Twiddly Bits
The solo uses the same chords as the middle. It’s a tricky progression to solo over and she’s gone for the smart (and easy) way of dealing with F# chord: play notes from the chord itself.
Buy it on BandCamp and you can now get Life.Love.Ukulele. with killer artwork on vinyl (it’s a spinning disc with music on apparently – I can’t see it catching on) – Discount code “love” for 15% off.
Phredd, being a purveyor of goofy songs for kids songs and worship songs, is an act I would expect to hate. Yet he has a knack of winning over grumpy atheists like me and Craig Robertson. I think it’s because his songs sound naturally fun. It’s so easy for this sort of thing to sound forced and done by the numbers. But he always gives the impression that this is what he’d be doing anyway. You certainly don’t get an attitude of, “That’ll do, it’s only for kids,” that a lot of children’s acts come with.
Phredd has a brand new album out, Phreddtastic!, which is packed with good-timing tunes about about monkeys, pirates and monkey pirates.
Highly recommended for anyone who gets the occasional urge to dance around their bedroom like a monkey pirate (no matter how grown up and grumpy they pretend they are the rest of the time).
Essential tracks: Zoo in Space, 4 Monkey Pirates, 42 Monkeys.
You can get the CD on WJTL, pick up the MP3s on iTunes, subscribe to his YouTube and visit him on Phredd Central.
Before I start, a quick update on the Sebi situation. After having his channel suspended for covering a song owned by WMG, he’s set up a new one with two videos sharing his love for Warners.
I’ve already covered most of the best ukulele albums from 2009 (like Sophie Madeleine‘s Life. Love. Ukulele. and L’appropriation Bourgoisie de la Bobby McGee’s), but I’ve almost completely ignored BiRd-BrAiNs by tUnE-YaRdS (perhaps because it’s such a pain in the arse to write the name). A horrendous oversight since it was one of the most exciting and interesting albums of the year.
As with all things tUnE-YaRdS, her ukulele tuning is somewhat unusual. As revealed in her interview with UkeToob, she plays a tenor ukulele but tunes it baritone style dGBE (with a high-D string). That means you can play it as written on a standard ukulele but it will be five frets higher.
Part two of the UkeTube features a beautiful song from Matt Kresling, shouty Scots GUGUG, fleat-fingerwork from Martin Wheatley and Ian Emmerson and plenty more.
A two parter needed for all the videos that have cropped up during my break. The first includes Emily Ritz’s newly christened band Honeycomb, Jake Wildwood, part of the UOGB’s Proms performance and Supercute! the new band of Rachel Trachtenburg (of the Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players) covering the Mighty Zeppelin.
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