Your ukulele and other musical groups

Ukejenny

Ukejenny

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I am wondering what groups, clubs, classes or other associations UU members are in.
 
I belong to a group called The NOTL Ukesters here in our small town of Niagara-on-the-Lake Ontario Canada. Founded in 2012 with a couple of members, it has grown to 40. We meet each week at the local Community Centre and go through standard sets as well as workshopping a new tune. Once each month we have an open mic at a local pub where members can strut their stuff. It is great fun.

Regards,
Bill
 
I'm also a member of the Guitar Noise forum, and the UK-based Acoustic Soundboard and Ukulele Cosmos forums.

Offline, I jam at two local venues in the UK.
 
The Colts Alumni Corps, Dubuque, IA
Westshoremen Alumni, Harrisburg, PA
Turam Turkish Folk Ensemble, Milwaukee
 
I play in an instrumental-only ukulele ensemble at my local music shop, McCabe's - where they also offer lots of beginner-friendly ukulele classes and workshops, and a fantastic uke selection, for those of you anywhere near Santa Monica, CA.
 
I am a member of the Tree Town Ukes club in Ann Arbor, MI. We meet once a month and practice songs that we will do on stage at festivals and such. We also work on new songs as a group. At the end of each meeting we do a short open mic for those that want to show what they've been working on. I attribute the success of this group to the organizers.
 
Within as couple of weeks of when I first started to play ukulele over six months ago, I joined the CC Strummers out of the Culver City Seniors Center near LA. It was formed three years ago by a wonderful leader and full time ukulele performer, Cali Rose. There are about 150 members and we meet for an hour twice a week.

Shortly after, I signed up with this forum and discovered the Westside Ukulele Ensemble while reading a post by Lori Apthorp, one of the founders. It was formed over a year ago out of the more advanced ukulele classes at McCabe's. There are about 12 members who do mostly three part instrumentals, to which I aspire. They meet every other week for 90 minutes, and often have ukulele get togethers at one member's home.

Both groups do gigs from time to time.
 
kohanmike said:
Within as couple of weeks of when I first started to play ukulele over six months ago, I joined the CC Strummers out of the Culver City Seniors Center near LA. It was formed three years ago by a wonderful leader and full time ukulele performer, Cali Rose. There are about 150 members and we meet for an hour twice a week.

Shortly after, I signed up with this forum and discovered the Westside Ukulele Ensemble while reading a post by Lori Apthorp, one of the founders. It was formed over a year ago out of the more advanced ukulele classes at McCabe's. There are about 12 members who do mostly three part instrumentals, to which I aspire. They meet every other week for 90 minutes, and often have ukulele get togethers at one member's home.

Both groups do gigs from time to time.
Click to expand...

Mike - just to clarify, Westside Ukulele Ensemble predates the advanced classes at McCabe's, and has no affiliation with the shop. It was formed out of discussion that started right here on good old UU - a really wonderful example, in my opinion, of the power of this forum!
 
Thanks Jane, I stand corrected. My info was from what I heard in conversations during our rehearsals, obviously too second hand.
 
kohanmike said:
Thanks Jane, I stand corrected. My info was from what I heard in conversations during our rehearsals, obviously too second hand.
Click to expand...

Thanks for understanding. It gets confusing because there is a lot of crossover between the members. But it's important to me first of all that UU gets credit where due for bringing people together in the first place, and secondly to establish the the groups are two entirely unrelated entities. The McCabe's group is a paid class that is led by a professional musician; the WUE group is a more freeform, all-inclusive amateur group.

For the record - I'm the other co-founder of Westside Ukulele Ensemble, although I'm no longer very much involved with the group. There is such a thing as "too much ukulele" :)

(And apologies to the OP for the derail, but I had to set the record straight.)
 
I started and am a member of Middlesbrough U3A ukulele group
I play in a folk band, though mostly flute, recorder and harmonica (we have a guitarist who also plays uke) but am hoping to use my U-Bass - we play for dances in our local area.
I also sing in a choir and play in two recorder groups.
I contribute regularly to Seasons of the Ukulele here on UU
 
I also play recorder and flute. Cool to find people on UU with different interests outside of the ukulele.
Tootler said:
I started and am a member of Middlesbrough U3A ukulele group
I play in a folk band, though mostly flute, recorder and harmonica (we have a guitarist who also plays uke) but am hoping to use my U-Bass - we play for dances in our local area.
I also sing in a choir and play in two recorder groups.
I contribute regularly to Seasons of the Ukulele here on UU
Click to expand...
 
I'm a member of Alabama Winds, a wind band started last year. We play some amazing wind literature.
I play in a recorder ensemble, which is an offshoot of our local recorder chapter.
I started a ukulele club here locally because I wanted a club to play with. We call ourselves the Ukulele Band of Alabama.
Online, I'm on various flute, clarinet, recorder, and saxophone forums.
 
Ukejenny said:
I'm a member of Alabama Winds, a wind band started last year. We play some amazing wind literature.
I play in a recorder ensemble, which is an offshoot of our local recorder chapter.
I started a ukulele club here locally because I wanted a club to play with. We call ourselves the Ukulele Band of Alabama.
Online, I'm on various flute, clarinet, recorder, and saxophone forums.
Click to expand...

You multi-instrumentalist types amaze me :)

I just learned of recorder ensembles (and different sizes of recorders) recently. Really cool!
 
Just about all my associations are ukulele-related:

(1st Sat) Kanikapila at Ku'u Hale in Bellevue (semi-private)
(2nd Sat) Kona-kapila (Hawaiian Spam-n-Jam at Kona Kitchen Restaurant, 9-noon)
(2nd Sundays) SUPA (seattleukulele.org)
(3rd Sat) SEUS (South End Ukulele Society), Kent, 1-3:30p, Kona Kai Coffee
(3rd Sat) Kanikapila at Ku'u Hale (like 1st Sat above)
(4th Sat) Zukulele at Zola's Cafe, Auburn (1:30-3:30p)
(last Sunday) KUG (Kirkland Ukulele Group) St James Espresso 4-6p

then I have a weekly gig at the Memory wing of Skyline at First Hill (Terraces) pre-meal 4:30-5p
and I teach a weekly ukulele class at the Frances Anderson Center in Edmonds, Thurs 7-8:30p
I also teach a class on the 1st Mon in Bellevue for Seattle Hula;
and I will be teaching another monthly class (3rd Tues) at BayView Manor evenings.

Whew! No worries though, I do find the time to eat and rest :)

keep uke'in',
 
At one time, I was attending 3 different uke groups in the Los Angeles area. The Jumpin' Flea Circus Players, The Pluckin' Strummers, and The Canogahana Players (which is not currently active). The problem was, there wasn't a group close to where I lived, and the traffic was making it too difficult to attend. That is when Janeray and I responded to another UU member's inquiry about uke groups on the Westside, and that was the seed that started our Westside Ukulele Ensemble. Founding members include PeeWee, and several people that Janeray knew from McCabes classes (6 founding members in all). The other groups were fun, but I find this group of dedicated and talented folks a great pleasure to play with. Due to time limitations, and finger pain issues, I now only do the WUE and the advanced McCabes class.

–Lori
 
Lori said:
At one time, I was attending 3 different uke groups in the Los Angeles area. The Jumpin' Flea Circus Players, The Pluckin' Strummers, and The Canogahana Players (which is not currently active). The problem was, there wasn't a group close to where I lived, and the traffic was making it too difficult to attend. That is when Janeray and I responded to another UU member's inquiry about uke groups on the Westside, and that was the seed that started our Westside Ukulele Ensemble. Founding members include PeeWee, and several people that Janeray knew from McCabes classes (6 founding members in all). The other groups were fun, but I find this group of dedicated and talented folks a great pleasure to play with. Due to time limitations, and finger pain issues, I now only do the WUE and the advanced McCabes class.

–Lori
Click to expand...

From UU I think it was you, peewee, misterbee, and me! And a couple others from Continuing Uke at McCabe's, who are not on UU, and only one of whom is still playing in either group (and she plays in both regularly). Once WUE got going, that led to enough interest to form the advanced Ensemble class at McCabe's - one good thing led to another :)
 
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