What a great night we had a the Townsend Community Church, entertaining the senior’s group called “Seasoned Souls”. Pat Wright and Pastor Ken were awesome hosts and invited us back to play the third Friday in December.
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Big kudo’s to everyone of us who turned out to represent, on a long weekend!!!
Enjoy this slide-show featuring the best photos of our latest theme song night, Tie-Dye and Flowers in Your Hair, held on May 1st at the Robot Cafe, Port Dover, Ontario.
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Powell Park Gazebo
Uke Heads are going to be busy a couple of times a month in the next 4 months. We have committed to five public appearances between now and end of August, as well as our Summer Luau in June. The set list of songs we are playing are listed on this website here Song List.
The following events list is as complete as possible at this time. More details to be added as we get them, so check back now and again to stay updated.
Townsend Community Church, Friday May 18th, 7 to 7:45 pm
We are the monthly entertainment booking for the church’s senior group, “Seasoned Souls.” Arrive 6:30 for set-up at the only church in the town of Townsend. Bring your music stand, set list of music, your uke, a kazoo or harmonica (or both), your good mood and let’s wear our yellow shirts!
Relay for Life, Friday June 1st, Holy Trinity Catholic School, 6 pm
We have been asked to help out this charitable event by playing for half an hour, 6 pm to 6:30. Peter suggests playing the following songs: Those Lazy, Hazy, Crazy Days of Summer; Glory of Love; When the Red, Red Robin; When You’re Smiling; Walkin’ My Baby Back Home.
Musical Presentation at Mount Zion in Renton, Sunday June 10th, 10 am
Jenny is setting this one up with her friend who wants us to participate in a morning of music at her church, so we would expect to play 2 or 3 gospel songs, such as I Saw the Light, Down By the Riverside and I’ll Fly Away, etc. :) Suggestions?
Summer Luau, 8 Foad Rd Port Ryerse, Saturday June 16th (June 17th rain date)
Stew and Val Smith offered to host our Summer Luau at their place in Port Ryerse, about 6 pm. Once again, George Rout has been booked to play some songs for us on his Hawaiian guitar. Back in the day, George had taken lessons under Peter’s father back in Halifax; to learn more about George Rout click here. The theme is Hawaiian music so come prepared to share something with the group, as well as Peter and Cat will have some entertaining Hawaiian songs lined up for the group to play together. Like last year, this will also be potluck, so we might have to co-ordinate on the main dishes, salads and deserts, bringing your own refreshments, of course! Don’t forget to bring camp chairs, music stands, music, and….your uke!
Port Ryerse Fish Fry, Saturday July 7th, 5 til 7 pm
This is a fundraising event for the Port Ryerse Church Bell Tower. We have been booked for an encore appearance, LOL! Peter thinks maybe we will work on a more complimentary seating plan before we get there, which means he wants to make a plan for performing our songs before-hand, drawing on what we would improve from last year’s experience. Bring the usual equipment, as listed above, but we thought wearing some Hawaiian shirts or other casual dress to fit in with the idea of the Fish Fry would be appropriate. Let’s have some fun with this!
The Annual Butterfly and Dragonfly Festival, Backus Heritage Conservation Area, Sunday July 8th, 11 to 12 am
This is the 3rd annual event. Families attend from all over the county, and many venues are available from face painting to crafts. Click here to read more about it. The co-ordinator, Deb Solymar, has asked us to play our own choice of songs in “the pavillion” from 11 am to 11:45, at which time she will announce the formation of the children’s butterfly parade. She would like us to play some children’s songs that they can march to, and Peter immediately thought of Skinnamarink. This is a great opportunity for community involvement for our group! We’ll have to bring our own chairs with music stands, and the rest of our equipment.
Summer Concert Series, Waterford Old Town Hall, Thursday August 16th, 8 pm slot!
This wonderful outdoor Summer Concert Series showcases some of the county’s finest musicians. New member Mike Hogg co-ordinates this weekly event and even builds the stage! It takes place on the front lawn so we need to bring our own camp chairs as the night’s performances start at 7 pm, and we are on for the last half hour. If anyone feels inclined to check it out beforehand, the concert series takes place on Thursday nights starting June 28th. (FYI, the event organizers are very likely to “pass the hat” in order to keep the lights on at the Hall.)
Once the hot weather comes we move outside to the gazebo in Powell Park. This is almost directly across the street from the Lighthouse Theatre. We meet out there on the same night and time, unless it is raining, lightning, hailing or otherwise storming…..!
If any of you are familiar with CBC’s Singalong Jubilee, you will know Bill Langstroth. Here he is, singing an entertaining East Coast tune written by Jim Bennett.
And he plays a ukulele in it! Alot of our members were present for that special moment.
Promoting a Blues workshop for our uke club and a Blues Concert at the Robot Cafe by Canada’s Own Ukulele Bluesman, Manitoba Hal (Hal Brolund), was nothing short of an adventure. Sure it was a lot of hard work, but with the support of the ROBOT CAFE for starters as a venue, and the Dover Uke Head members themselves, it all turned out great! We managed to scare up almost 30 patrons for the concert, which made for some crowded conditions in the Robot ~ probably a full house!
Hal is a great entertainer and an easy-going, humourous M.C. who is both knowledgable and gracious about his trade as a Canadian Bluesman.
Some of the songs he featured were from his new album, Flirting with Mermaids, as well as from previous recordings: Huckster and little Box of Sadness. What a voice!
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We look forward to hosting Hal again in future years. We hope it’s the start of a beautiful friendship!
You will have to click on the underlined song, wait for it to appear in yet another post, then click on the underlined title beneath that. (I don’t know why WordPress does that!) It’s a good idea to put these pages together in a different binder, or using rings, or in a special place in your regular binder, so they’re always ready for the next outing. Also, photocopy #13 and 14 and put those two songs with the rest, in order, so we don’t have to go back and forth between 2 books during our performance. We want things to look as smooth and organized as possible!
5. Under the Boardwalk: undertheboardwalk
6. Yellow Bird
7. Deep In the Heart of Texas, Key of F, From the Two-Chord Song Workbook
8. How Much is That Doggie/Window, Key of F, From the Two-Chord Song Workbook
9. You Are My Sunshine: You_Are_My_Sunshine
10. Five Foot Two: fivefoottwocomb
11. Audrey’s version, Six Foot Two
12. Help Me Rhonda
13. When the Red, Red, Robin….Page 264 of Daily Ukulele
14. When You’re Smiling, page 265 of Daily Ukulele
15. Tiny Bubbles by Don Ho Tiny Bubbles by Don Ho
16. I Saw the Light in C I SAW THE LIGHT
17. Down By the Riverside in C, as a medley with I Saw the Light: Down by the Riverside.
On April 2, when most of us got our first look at the April 2012 issue of SNAP Haldimand-Norfolk monthly newspaper, we were surprised to see some familiar faces on the cover! Two weeks earlier, Dan Wiest of SNAP had visited us on a Tuesday night and took umpteen photos of our group for his newspaper. Little did we know that would also include being featured on the front page! What an honour!
Although we have been in several other media publications, we have never been on the front page or cover! I posted it to Facebook right away and commented that I was both “humbled and worried”! SNAP claims they put their free publication in over 400 store locations across Haldimand and Norfolk. That’s a lot of people and the uke craze really seems to be growing in leaps and bounds! For full det’s: http://www.snaphn.com/index.php?option=com_sngevents&id[]=372863
Good news, Uke Heads!! A very finely regarded blues musician called Manitoba Hal will be performing at the Robot Cafe on Thursday April 19th. We met him in October last year when we travelled to Liverpool, Nova Scotia to the Ukulele Ceilidh where he was a ukulele workshop instructor and one of the concert performers for the weekend. Canada’s own “Ukulele Bluesman”!
Lucky for us, he will be able to instruct a Blues Workshop for ukulele for our club at 6 p.m. that day, and the concert will be at 8 p.m.
Recently Hal completed a tour from the East Coast to Western Canada, travelling by Via Rail on their Performers in Motion programme. For more info on him, visit his website at www.manitobahal.com .
Listen to some of his songs at Reverbnation: http://www.reverbnation.com/manitobahal
Roots Music interview with Video: http://www.rootsmusic.ca/2011/03/27/manitoba-hal-ukulele-venison-and-zombies/
Get ready to let your inner flower child out because Tuesday April 24th is another of our “open mic” theme performance nights. And this time our fearless leader chose “Tie-Dye and Flowers in Your Hair” for the theme. Our last performance night was great with impersonations of Liza and characters from My Fair Lady, etc. So let’s dress up again, perhaps as Bob Dylan, or Sonny and Cher….the sky’s the limit!
Here are instructions on how to tie-dye a basic white t-shirt, by Expert Village:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2PJnM6MK30U&feature=relmfu
Here is a link to a YouTube video of Going Up the Country, a Woodstock favorite, from Peter:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hf0Dm-OaTNk
And here is one of the Top 25 Songs of the 1960′s, for some inspiration (Lovin’ Spoonful, Simon & Garfunkle, The Band, Aretha Franklin, The Who – My Generation, Ike and Tina, the Mamas and the Papas, CCR, The Doors, Rolling Stones, The Beatles, Bob Dylan, Janis Joplin…..wow, just to name a FEW!!)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=opvluxWBxY4&feature=related
I hope it serves as inspiration!
HAPPY STRUMMING!
Last Tuesday night Uke Head Gord gave me his copy of The Mighty Uke and announced to the group that anyone interested can borrow it. I watched it Wednesday night and Thursday during the day. As some of you get the chance to view it, or maybe already have seen it, certain parts might have an impact on you. At the very least you will be entertained!
One part of the movie that had an impact on me was about “kanikapila” (kahnee ka-PEE-lah). I found it really interesting because recently while reading The Ukuele Entertainer Ralph Shaw talks about it, too. Basically, it means “jam session” in the Hawaiian way.
Everyone knows the Hawaiian people believe in sharing, giving and “Aloha”, love. For them, a jam session takes place at a family gathering that generally involves potluck food, visiting and activities or games, and at some point every one wants to participate in singing songs and playing music. In the movie, they talked about sitting in a circle and each person has a turn at either requesting a song or performing a song for the group. You don’t even have to play an instrument because they value singing just as much. This notion is also applied to social community gatherings as well. I’m hoping that during our Summer Luau this year we can try forming our own kanikapila, as well as playing through lots of songs in our binders and books.
More information available at the following links:
I guess they hold a big one annually at Waimanalo Park in Hawaii http://www.alohaupdate.com/2010/08/03/gabby-pahinui-waimanalo-kanikapila-at-the-waimanalo-park-pavilion/
Check out this family with all their ukes at The Pacific Music Foundation http://www.pmfhawaii.com/?p=17
The Hawaiian Cultural Centre regularly hosts Kanikapila events http://www.hawaiianculturalcenter.org/events2.html
