Schenectady Uke Fest...

I had a great time at the uke festival yesterday. It was small but so much fun!
Only two vendors this year and hoping for more next year. Flea Market music and Earnest Instruments. Both had a nice selection. Flea Market had some great bargains on seconds instruments. I played both flea and flukes and decided the wood fret board is something I wouldn't want to live without. They only had ukes with plastic fret boards.

I attended 3 workshops. The first with Jim Beloff. He was fantastic taught us lots of tips and tricks to make fretting easier to transition. He was entertaining and informative. Also, He and Liz let Kurt and I have a sneak peak at the list of songs that will be in their new Daily Ukulele Book to be released hopefully the end of October. Yeah. It's going to be a great one!

Then I attended a Chord Melody workshop which I have a LOT of work to do to figure it out and practice and an intermediate workshop.. Also lots of work to do. Excited to have new things to practice and learn!

We took a break for dinner and met up with some folks from our local uke club and meet some Uu members (Stop Lurking and join the fun!)
We had lots of fun conversations.. Talked about Ukes shared about our ukes and lots of chatting too.. fun times!

Then back to Proctors for the concert, It was great fun. The Beloff's are so fun and the concert just got better and better..
Sure hope that there is a second annual Electric City Uke festival..

Thanks for reading!

Aloha Fitncrafty,
Good Morning wow wow you went to the ukie fest...sound like you had a great time and meeting Jim and wife...woo hoo wish I was there.. wow you got the new Daily Ukulele uke book
do tell girl..did ya get it signed by Jim...thank you for sharing...I am so jealous...happy Strummings did ya bring your Luna?

mm stan said:

Aloha Fitncrafty,
Good Morning wow wow you went to the ukie fest...sound like you had a great time and meeting Jim and wife...woo hoo wish I was there.. wow you got the new Daily Ukulele uke book
do tell girl..did ya get it signed by Jim...thank you for sharing...I am so jealous...happy Strummings did ya bring your Luna?

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Didn't get the new Daily Ukulele Book it's not out yet. but we saw the song list.. It's better than the first (in my opinion) more songs I know and will enjoy learning to play.. The did sign my well loved Daily ukulele book though. Such nice people.
Yup I brought my luna.. It's really the only one to bring, not the eleuke and the dolphin is too small and muted from the paint.. I still love it. my hubby is so talented.. )

Unfortunately, I had to miss this year's festival. Long story. I hope to be able to make it sometime in the future if the fest continues on. I'm so glad to hear that all went well! I'm so bummed that I couldn't go....

Carrie and I have both offered to help Eighth Step get a festival together for next year.

The first step will be getting the date set and announced. Part of the problem this year was that the Festival was the organization's first event of the year - and the schedule normally isn't finalized and made public until August. (Eighth Step, the sponsoring organization, is the longest-running non-profit coffee house in the United States. 2012 is the 45th Year of the Step.)

This year, there were 3 pairs of program items (Two workshops at 1:30 pm, two at 3:00, and two at 4:30. The open mic ran from 3:30 - 5:30, and the concert was at 7:30 pm.

So the Open Mic was running against two sets of workshops, and except for 5:30-7:30, when most people were trying to catch dinner, there was no time/place set aside for a strumming circle or jam.

Sponsorship was pretty light, too. Only one of the local music stores was contacted, then they decided they didn't want to send anyone, so no sponsorship.

So we're going to make an attempt to do it again next year,. and make it better.

OK Fitncrafty & Kurt, I am coming out of the shadows and no longer "Lurking" Had a great time at the festival.
Nice meeting you all and I enjoyed the Open Mic and Jam Session. The concert was also great. All those great performers inspired me to keep practicing. I might just have to take another trip up to your area to attend one of your monthly meetups.

- Bruce

I also attended the ukefest yesterday. I was only able to stay for a few hours,unfortunately. I showed up around 3pm and attended the Chord Melody workshop with Joel Eckhaus. It gave me some neat things to work on to make my playing more interesting. I then watched the open mike for a bit then went to the Intermediate Ukulele workshop with Ron Gordon. I don't think I am intermediate yet so I don't think I got as much from this one. The song sheet had some chords on it that I could barely get my fingers to make, never mind try and transition to/from. Sadly I couldn't attend the concert later on. I knew I only had a few hours so I mainly went to support the fest. I hope that it comes back next year with some changes for the better.

Mattypan said:

I also attended the ukefest yesterday. I was only able to stay for a few hours,unfortunately. I showed up around 3pm and attended the Chord Melody workshop with Joel Eckhaus. It gave me some neat things to work on to make my playing more interesting. I then watched the open mike for a bit then went to the Intermediate Ukulele workshop with Ron Gordon. I don't think I am intermediate yet so I don't think I got as much from this one. The song sheet had some chords on it that I could barely get my fingers to make, never mind try and transition to/from. Sadly I couldn't attend the concert later on. I knew I only had a few hours so I mainly went to support the fest. I hope that it comes back next year with some changes for the better.

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Mattypan, I'm sorry I didn't get to meet you.

Don't forget the Electric City Ukulele Club meets on the 2nd Monday of every month at the Moon & River Cafe - next meeting is October 8. Come on down, and join the jam!

If you have any questions before that, I work at the Niskayuna Starbucks. I'm the bald guy.

mailman said:

Unfortunately, I had to miss this year's festival. Long story. I hope to be able to make it sometime in the future if the fest continues on. I'm so glad to hear that all went well! I'm so bummed that I couldn't go....

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Sorry you had to miss the festival. It was small but we had a fine time. I hope that all is well and that you can come next year. There is plans in the works for a festival next year!

Mattypan said:

I also attended the ukefest yesterday. I was only able to stay for a few hours,unfortunately. I showed up around 3pm and attended the Chord Melody workshop with Joel Eckhaus. It gave me some neat things to work on to make my playing more interesting. I then watched the open mike for a bit then went to the Intermediate Ukulele workshop with Ron Gordon. I don't think I am intermediate yet so I don't think I got as much from this one. The song sheet had some chords on it that I could barely get my fingers to make, never mind try and transition to/from. Sadly I couldn't attend the concert later on. I knew I only had a few hours so I mainly went to support the fest. I hope that it comes back next year with some changes for the better.

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GLad you were able to make it to the festival. I have been working on the Spanish Fandango that Ron arranged, I got 'A' down and starting to get 'B' section C. I have a long way to go to intermediate.. I haven't even looked at the chord melody stuff again. Yet..
MAybe we will see you around at the uke night sometime..

brUKEman said:

OK Fitncrafty & Kurt, I am coming out of the shadows and no longer "Lurking" Had a great time at the festival.
Nice meeting you all and I enjoyed the Open Mic and Jam Session. The concert was also great. All those great performers inspired me to keep practicing. I might just have to take another trip up to your area to attend one of your monthly meetups.

- Bruce

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Bruce it was nice to meet you. Glad that you could come up and that you made it home safely. There is talk of another next year we are excited about that.. Keep out of lurking mode. The forums are much more fun that way! Happy Strummings...

brUKEman said:

OK Fitncrafty & Kurt, I am coming out of the shadows and no longer "Lurking" Had a great time at the festival.
Nice meeting you all and I enjoyed the Open Mic and Jam Session. The concert was also great. All those great performers inspired me to keep practicing. I might just have to take another trip up to your area to attend one of your monthly meetups.

- Bruce

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And it was a pleasure meeting you, and plying along with you, Bruce. I think we made the open mic into our own jam Session - there really wasn't one scheduled. Next time, we need to schedule a time and place for one.

Hey Carrie it sound like you had a great time... Nice pic too..

So did you try out any of the fleas or flukes? Didn't come home with one??