Tuesday, March 25, 2014

The Nicest Letter Came In Last Week!

it read kind of like this:

Dear Store Manager,

I want to thank you, the store and especially Kim Logue for the weekly Ukulele club. It provides an opportunity for ukulele enthusiasts, such as myself, to gather on Friday evenings. It has become a very important part of my week.
Kim Logue is a wonderful leader. Her love of music and particularly the ukulele has a positive effect on everyone. She has a quiet effectiveness and gives people in the club opportunities to shine both musically and organizationally. Everyone, from first time beginners to advanced players feel comfortable.

Because of the Ukulele Club I feel a loyalty to the store. I wanted to let you know that the Ukulele Club provides Long & McQuade a good opportunity to sell merchandise, both during the Friday evening break and at other times during the week. Since joining the group I have purchased a new ukulele and case, a music stand, a harmonica and have attended a harmonica workshop at Long & McQuade. I also follow Long & McQuade on facebook.

It is difficult to put into words how much this club means to me. The ukulele club has helped keep my spirits high, despite personal challenges and the difficult winter.  My ability to play the ukulele has greatly improved and I am now playing at song circles and open mikes in Guelph, something I would never have considered previously.
Thank you, Mgr, Kim and music store for your support of Guelph music.

Monday, March 24, 2014

Uke Club, Fri. Mar 21, 2014

Iko Iko
Just When You Needed Me Most
Hit The Road Jack
This Land is Your Land
I Can See Clearly Now (Steve & Cynthia)
All My Loving
Fisherman's Blues (no paperwork)
Wagon Wheel (no paper)
Crazy Little Thing Called Love
What Colour Are You
Lay Down Sally
Blowin' In The Wind

Practice Room Rental $31.80

Tuesday, March 18, 2014

Uke 101, Mar 26, 2pm


The activity manager from a retirement residence in Cambridge reached out to our store with a note, "I was on your website and read about Ukulele Club and wondered if Kim Logue would be interested in doing a feature event here.  If interested Kim could come in and talk about the instrument and then do a simple interactive session that residents can participate in."

We set the date and time, and then she borrowed 8 ukuleles, and I brought 6.

We spent a lot of time getting comfortable with tuning, and passing around different ukes to experience first hand the different sound and feel of each.

We learned the so-called z-chord, and practiced a lot of G-C-E-A open string plucking, before trying the c-chord.

Then we sang lots of songs together,
Row Row Row Your Boat
Three Blind Mice

We even tried to master the F chord and enjoyed more tunes together:
Skip To My Lou
Iko Iko

And also Mary Had A Little Lamb, which one participant had in their uke kit booklet!

"The residents are still talking about how much they enjoyed that afternoon, so you were awesome!!"

Friday, March 14, 2014

Uke Club, Fri. March 14, 2014

"Watch, it will only be the two of us..." said the first arrival this week, who had brought a music stand, as did others that did in fact join us!  I kept thinking, how like Bev, who wasn't there this week, I really like to sit back and listen sometimes.

Do we need to bring back name tags? How did we do on the mailing list updates? We did not do well with the re-filing as we went, lol.  Also, the group-uke shot was taken before everyone arrived, oops.

Also, I think during Christmas break, we should offer some special extra sessions through the lesson centre, instead of fully shutting down.  And, that maybe it could work in the store's favour that the lesson parents haunt the sales floor, while the waiting room is too uncomfortably full of uking carollers? ha.

Songlist:
Me & Julio
Pay Me My Money Down
Tennessee Waltz
Hit The Road Jack
Wagon Wheel
Hey Good Looking
The Lion Sleeps Tonite

Saturday, March 08, 2014

Uke Club, Fri. March 7, 2014

Song List:
The Lion Sleeps Tonite
Down By The Bay
What A Wonderful World
Fever
I'm Gonna Be A Country Girl
Brown Eyed Girl
Happy Birthday (to Peter)
You're Looking At Country
What Colour Are You
Yellow Bird
Carmelita (no paperwork)
Tennesee Waltz
The Lion Sleeps Tonight

We didn't have enough staff in the store that I could actually participate very much.  I rang in uke club practice room rental contributions at $17.  

For next week I propose some new steps:

[ ] back to group teaching room #7
[ ] free pass for role takers (secretary re: set list, librarian for refiling paperwork, host with a new song or 2?)
[ ] practice room contributions will be processed during intermission aka "shopping break"
[ ] MAXIMUM 3 NEW TUNES PER WEEK
[ ] MAXIMUM 5 COPIES OF EACH, no take homes
[ ] members will provide and share music stands

I also want to use some some sort of audio/photo permission sign in page.  I forgot to take the group uke photo, but I have a snap of participants in action that I don't know if I have their permission to publish or not.




Monday, March 03, 2014

Family Uke Jam, Sunday Mar 2, 2014


I am so glad I crashed the family jam hosted by Momma Uke.  I sure do want to be in her band!

It was fun to walk into the pub to be reunited with one of my ukes!  I should have handed out a biz card or two, or mentioned that I can sell them, because Cynthia gave it such an introduction, one man came up to meet it after the music.  He even took a picture of it, if you can believe it!  I thought it was a bit out of tune, and I hadn't loaned my tuner with it for the return that had just happened, so I have really GOT to learn to tune by ear.

my cfru toque made the video posted on facebook

I got there just in time for my "favourite" song, the Danny Michel one.  My kid seat neighbour didn't have the paperwork, and we couldn't see the projected song sheet  overhead screen run by the stand up bass ipad dad, ha, from where we were sitting, but I know a lot of the words and have practiced all the chords, and i love singing it!

One of our other-uke-club adult buddies was there, but she said she couldn't keep up, and admired how I snuck right in and at least tried to...  I was also there for Hey Soul Sister, Five Foot Two, Down By The Bay, one i didn't know but love, as they clearly did too, by Owl City.  It was so nice to hear all the kid voices! And to see them strumming their ukes.  Especially on the lyrics of a song called Brave, that they did by duress, yet all sang, "you can be amazing… be the outcast or backlash of somebody's lack of love...or you can start speaking up...say what you wanna say...let the words fall out... honestly, i want to see you be brave."  It was so beautiful!