Cerritos Festival

We had a great time at this year's festival. It's so cool to meet people that I've only known online like, Aldrine and Gerald Ross. I also always enjoy seeing my old friends, and in Dominic's case, I mean old )) and MGM. Mike's booth was three deep full of people waiting to try out and buy ukes!

Would love to have been there. Anyone have photo's to post?

Tim Pike said:

Would love to have been there. Anyone have photo's to post?

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Once Cali gets up out of bed, she has several pics that I'll get her to post.

Pics from So. Cal Ukulele Fest



AG and his new Kanile'a. This could be the most beautiful ukulele I have ever seen. The curl is perfectly straight across and goes from a dark brown to gold. I talked with Joe Souza after the concert and he said when AG chose the koa AG thought the koa had already been finished since it was so striking.

Joe said this was from his stash of pristine koa.







Aldrine even let me play his new stick (along with pretty much anyone else that wanted to try it out.) I played the only song I know from memory.

Mary had a Little Lamb never sounded so good!

It was nice meeting the UU gang, Aldrine, Ryan and Aaron. All three are very nice and polite and grateful to the entire UU community.

I have noticed that the entire ukulele community were very gracious. Derek Sebastian is a wonderful entertainer and he was also very gracious while I talked with him after the festival. Dominator was also helpful and willing to take the time to talk about his self-made custom ukulele. I didn't realize he had made seven of them already! He said the one he was playing at the festival took 17 weeks of part-time work.

One bad thing, UU sold out of most of their shirts so those in Napa and Baltimore might be disappointed. Luckily, I hit their booth right after they opened and was able to stock up. I haven't had a chance to watch the new DVD yet.

Thanks to Dominator, AG, Ryan and Aaron for taking the time out to chat.

I just wanted to say thank you to everyone who took the time to come down to our booth at the So Cal Uke fest. We're always so humbled by you guys in so cal. It's always so nice to see the actual faces tied to these screen names here on the forum.

I need to send out a HUGE MAHALO to Ric Douglas aka ricdoug on the boards. He brought his busking PA systems which instantly turned our booth into the most awesome (and loudest) booth in the park. It allowed us to do things like have an open mic and have a bunch of professionals perform at our booth. Ricdoug, thank you for all your help from the bottom of our hearts. Our booth would not have been the same without you.

Also, thank you to all our "interns" that helped us all afternoon selling merchandise. You guys were a huge help and also had us laughing almost the whole day.

And with that we'll be heading off to the East Coast tomorrow.

festival was a lot of fun. This year I accually took the classes and went for the luau and concert and they were great. cant wait for next year. Maybe ill memorize a song and get up for the open mic =)

It was a lot of fun (thanks Aldrine for a great seminar, and for being so sweet and friendly). I still can't believe you let me hold your new Kanile'a. It is just beautiful.

The festival was a lot of fun, some good classes, including the one taught by Joe Souza. I couldn't believe that Kristen remembered my name after I only met her once on their factory tour.

I bought some cool stuff (UU tshirt, UU DVD and Kanile'a tshirt), and enjoyed it a great deal. The luau was nice, but I'm sorry I missed the concert since I had to leave early. All in all, it was a great day!

Ronnie Aloha said:

It was nice meeting the UU gang, Aldrine, Ryan and Aaron. All three are very nice and polite and grateful to the entire UU community.

I have noticed that the entire ukulele community were very gracious. Derek Sebastian is a wonderful entertainer and he was also very gracious while I talked with him after the festival. Dominator was also helpful and willing to take the time to talk about his self-made custom ukulele. I didn't realize he had made seven of them already! He said the one he was playing at the festival took 17 weeks of part-time work.

One bad thing, UU sold out of most of their shirts so those in Napa and Baltimore might be disappointed. Luckily, I hit their booth right after they opened and was able to stock up. I haven't had a chance to watch the new DVD yet.

Thanks to Dominator, AG, Ryan and Aaron for taking the time out to chat.

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great photos! thanks for sharing. i guess we'll just have to buy the shirts off their backs when they get to Napa.

Oh man I wish we would've gone (the surf was pumping!!) ... thanks for sharing the photos!! Looks like a great time!

WOW!
i wish i was there!
beautiful

Just getting back from the fest. With the change in management many of us were not sure what to expect but Charlie and the staff did a great job. Having UU in the house made it really special. I'd also like to my hat to Ricdoug for providing his gear for the UU booth. There were huge crowds around the booth for the performances at the open mic.

I wasn't able to hangout at the UU booth near as much as I would have like as I was assisting Ali Lexa with his two Jazz & Blues Improvisation workshops. It was alot of fun and the feedback from the participants was really positive.

Thanks to those that made it a point to come up and introduce themselves. It was great to meet some new UU members and I know there were others that I didn't actually get to meet that I would have liked to.

My batteries went south on my camera but I think I have a few pics that I can post later.

Great time in Cerritos

Ukulele Underground really added to the success of this year's festival. It was so cool to meet everyone. Aldrine, you are too modest. I was not surprised that your class was the one to get into--overflowing into the street! This is why I made sure to get into Gerald Ross's class just before yours to make sure I got a seat. Gerald's class was way cool too. The classes were great, and I missed the concert once again due to parenting obligations, but having live music in the UU booth is what makes the day for me. The highlight of my first SoCal fest was listening to Dominator jam in Bruddah Mark's booth, but this year this was taken to crazy new heights because I got to jam with Dominator, Aldrine, and many others in the UU booth. Thanks for having the open mic. Once I found the key I was trying to sing in it was pretty fun. I look forward to digging into the new DVD, and thanks to Aldrine for helping me with the part of Guava Jam I couldn't figure out. Please come back next year!
Sorry I don't have any additional photos to post. Thanks for the ones already posted.
Bill

edit: I forgot I took a few photos. My daughter was taking care of her 2nd grade class' pet stuffed animal for the week. She has to write about what she did with the bear, so we took a couple of pics with MGM's ukes, and in Bruddah Mark's booth. We would have taken a pic in the UU booth, but it was always too busy...

The festival was wonderful. Great people, wonderful merchandise, incredible workshops, fun uke groups to listen to and yummy food.
As always Aldrine, Ryan and Aaron were so gracious and patient with everyone. You guys are the best people ever.
I stood back and watch Aldrine in action. He genuinely listens to everyone's personal story about how long they've played uke, or which one of his songs is their favorite, or how they started playing after seeing Jake. He made sure to talk to everyone that approached him, signing ukes and answering questions, taking time with each person. Mama Guerrero should be very proud, she raised a true gentleman.
Very happy I got to meet so many UU peeps in person. Ric Doug, Dominator, MGM, Nerbaden (sp) and a bunch of others.
Pictures coming soon.

http://www.facebook.com/adipasupil?v=photos&ref=profile#/album.php?aid=2022414&id=1547891485

more photos!!!

awesome day! and some awesome jamming!

Thank you UU!!! when are you coming back?

OrangeUke said:

http://www.facebook.com/adipasupil?v=photos&ref=profile#/album.php?aid=2022414&id=1547891485

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"You must log in to see this page."

Sorry, but much as I'd like to see the pics, I refuse to create a Facebook account to do so.

An awesome weekend

Well I had an awesome time at the festival and it was great to see the 3 amigos from UU doing their thing. A huge salute to you guys for living the dream.

Anyhow, I was just in awe to see where the `ukulele has gone over the past 15 years from the days of Ka'au Crater Boys to the awesome virtuosos that I saw playing this past weekend. I'm inspired to get back into the serious game. Thanks Aldrine for the push!

As I mentioned in another thread, I went with my family and had a great time too.

It was a really relaxing time. Everybody was really nice.

My daughter really wanted to go to the uke festival. She made a Gourd Nose Flute at the craft area, watched, danced, experienced.

I thought I'd try to get a shot of Ryan and Aldrine jammin, but it wasn't as easy as I had thought...

UU open mic show... my daughter really liked the Banana Ketchups (not shown)

and Gourd Nose Flute fun from the craft area.

It was lots of fun. I wish I hung out at the booth more, but I wanted my money's worth for the workshops.