Great end to banjo Uke week
April 24, 2011 at 4:43 am | Posted in Banjo, General | 2 CommentsTags: banjo, banjolele, cigar box, jamming, learning, posts, uke, ukulele
My friend Chris made a video of our uke meeting
thank you Chris for putting it together
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Iucci Banjo Mute
April 24, 2011 at 3:54 am | Posted in Banjo, Gold Tone | 1 CommentTags: banjo, banjolele, jamming, learning, posts, uke, ukulele
Today I had a little ukulele jam session here in Normal, IL and it turned more into a banjo uke session, and that was fine by me, but Dave (Chap on UU) brought the coolest thing.
The Gold Tone Iucci banjo mute
It is genius in what it can do. It really works and brings even the loudest banjo uke down to “normal” uke volume. Dave uses it when he goes and takes classes. It is the only way he does not over power the room.
Just know that it is worth the $25 if you want to play with other ukulele players
From Gold Tone – $25
Amazon – $18.75 with free shipping for prime members
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Ukulele events coming up
September 9, 2010 at 3:32 pm | Posted in Events, Shows | 1 CommentTags: fest, festival, jamming, Open Mic, Play, posts, uke, ukulele
Just thought I would post a quick thing about 2 events I am really excited about that are coming up soon.
The first one is the MilwaUKEe Ukulele festival on September 25, 2010
www.mufest.com
There are going to be a ton of great classes and people to jam with. I learned a ton last year and met so many great people. Beside the classes there are vendors and giveaways. Honestly the best bang for your buck.
The other is the Southern Illinois Ukin’ in the Woods campout and uke fest! October 15-17, 2010
Here is the link to the Ukulele Underground post
I am really excited because this is kind of a UWC thing where people come, camp, and there is an open mic. Should be a blast! I am helping with the shirts on this one, so buy your shirts a head of time and I will give it to you all washed and ready to wear when you show up! (Also you will save a few bucks if you pre-order). I will have some at the event also if you did not buy one before hand. Pre-orders end October 1, 2010.
Hope to see you at both. I will have little ukulele case tags with me also (Free) that I like to hand out. come and say hi if you see me.
Zoom A2.1u Pedal
August 3, 2010 at 3:27 am | Posted in Products | 1 CommentTags: Electric, jamming, learning, Play, posts, review, tuning pegs, uke, ukulele, zoom
Here we have another NAMM acquisition. I must confess that I have owned one of these pedals for 3 years now, but it is not this version exactly. Mine is a little older and I did not get the software with mine. My serial # 000115, the new one is 502105, not that I think 500,000 were made after mine, it is just mine is pretty old in comparison.
While I was on the floor at NAMM I walked by the Zoom booth and just stopped to see if they had anything new, and they do but it is pretty much just for electric guitars, not super useful for ukulele players. I noticed they had the same pedal I have and started to talk to a rep about it and they seemed excited and wanted to send me the new one with the software and all so I could write about it. 3 days after I got back from Nashville, TN it was at my door. I guess they were excited for me to do something with it.
Now a little over a month later I am getting to writing about it. Made a video a few weeks ago but never had the time to write about it.
Why I purchased my pedal; I had just purchased my Risa solid for my 30th birthday and liked it well enough, but it seemed to be a little annoying when I played it just straight out of an amp. Nothing was wrong with the uke, it was just a weird sound and I wanted to take the head off of it and make it sound more acoustic. I tried a few cheap pedals and an equalizer but never was satisfied. That is until I found a Zoom A2.1U in the clearance area at a Guitar Center in Chicago, figured what the hell it was $80. It was exactly what I wanted and more.
I was looking for a way to make my Risa sound acoustic but I got spacey, techno, electric, and like I am in a big empty hall, along with at least 10 different acoustic sounds that I wanted. I love it because manly it lets me experiment with different sounds and the pedal is really fun (Set it to D4 and it is like a whah whah pedal from the future, sounds really cool when I play Flaming Lips songs)
The only thing I am not wild about is how hard it is to come up with your own custom sounds. I have found that it is a lot of work to create something that is different from the built-in effects.
An added bonus that I don’t use very often is the USB port. With it you can record to your computer. It comes with Cubase LE 4 (Cubase LE 5 is out but does not come with the pedal) I have been using an open source product called Audacity for my small recordings. It is free, kept up-to-date, and it has a lot of free plug-ins and sounds. I just found it simpler than Cubase. The pedal will also work with Garage Band if you have an Apple. I found one thing to be surprising , the lag. When you record it is a step behind. So if you want to over dub (Play while listening) and you go back to the tracks it will be a step behind. Not a huge deal, you just move the last track down a bit and all is good.
I have used it at an open mic and it has every output you would need, including a mic 3 prong if they don’t have a regular jack. It was nice to have the tuner built-in and a bypass if I just wanted to hear it straight or with another pedal.
Watch the video below of me wandering through the different sonds.
Places to buy
July Ukin’
June 29, 2010 at 1:48 pm | Posted in Events, Shows | 2 CommentsTags: Bluestone, fest, festival, jamming, Open Mic, posts, uke, ukulele
Although I dont know of any ukulele fests for the midwest in July, it is still going to be a good begining for ukulele playing.
Miss Joni is writing for Nuvo again and has a great post about what is going on at the Bluestone Folk School in the next week or so. A short list is the Meat and Taters Ukulele intensive (July 5-9, 2010), Bi-monthy Bluestone uke meet-up (July 8, 20100), and a Uke only open mic (July 9, 20210). I will be there on the 9th around 7pm.
Here is the link to her article: Independence Week: All ukes, all the time By Miss Joni
I hope to see all of you there!
Ukulele World Congress 2010
June 9, 2010 at 3:51 am | Posted in Events, Shows | 4 CommentsTags: fest, festival, home made, jamming, learning, Martin, Open Mic, Play, posts, uke, ukulele
What do you get when you have a bunch of ukulele players come to an old hippy commune to play a 8 hour open mic, camp, eat and jam all day long?
A FRICK’N GOOD TIME!!
Stage durring the day
I missed last year’s UWC and I was really bummed and I am so happy that I was able to go this year. The atmosphere is like nothing else. The thing is that it is not a festival but more of a large party to celebrate the ukulele and its community. There are no formal classes, but you learn a ton if you want to. There are no headliners waiting backstage to go on and wow the crowd. Trust me there were plenty of people there that could be the headline act at most any ukulele festival (Dominator, Ukulele Zoey and Jodi AKA Gigapus, Flea Bitten Dawgs, Shani Fawni, and Mike from Mainland Ukes to name a few)The great thing about the UWC is that the performers are everyone there. Everyone has a chance to go and play and get a big round of applause no matter how they did. I am a little embarrassed that I screwed up my set on Friday night. I got up there sang a Flaming lips song then tried to do doc of the bay and could not remember it at all and I really wanted to go back on Saturday to redeem myself but by the time I got back to camp the signup sheet was way to full. When I got off the stage I was greeted by Ukulele Zoey and a bunch of others who made me feel like I was not a total screw up and everyone applauded just as loud for me as every other person that went up there. It is a great place to get up and sing for people if you have never done it before.
Dominator and I
Things to know about the UWC, a lessons learned if you will.
1. Come Friday; There are a lot of people there on Friday and the potluck is amazing. Also if you show up Friday you can explore Nashville and all that fun stuff Saturday.
2. Bring some food and plenty to drink, not just beer. At this year’s, like last years, there was a potluck that is made up of food that the locals bring. it was good. Saturday you will more than likely spend away from camp exploring so you can eat in town. So there is no need to bring full meals, just bring snacks and stuff to share with everyone.
3. Be prepared for any weather. If you are camping make sure that you have clothes for Hot, cold, and wet.
4. Sign up for open mic as early as you can. If you wait you will go on at 1am. People are allowed to stay up there as long as they like, most did 3-4 songs.
5. Be prepared to buy a new ukulele. You may tell yourself that you don’t need it. It is hard to not go to Weed Patch or Mainland and fall in love.
6. Be prepared to stay until 4 pm on Sunday. There was a ukulele class from 11 -4. I heard it was pretty cool
7. Get on Ukulele Underground and start participating in it. The UWC is also a place for many people who communicate on the forums to actually meet and have a “family reunion” of sorts. It will help when you get there.
FIRE
I had a great time and hope that it happens again next year. One of my big highlights was going to David Gills house to see his workshop. That story is coming soon.
Please comment below with your experiences or go to the Ukulele Underground forum where people are already posting their favorite moments.
More pics on the facebook group page
Ukulele Player Magazine #12
April 29, 2010 at 1:03 am | Posted in General | 1 CommentTags: fest, festival, home made, jamming, learning, review, Strap, uke, ukulele
I dont know how long it has been out, but like clockwork there is another awesome issue.
New Ukulele Player Magazine Issue
February 16, 2010 at 9:47 pm | Posted in General | 4 CommentsTags: fest, festival, Full review, jamming, learning, posts, review, uke, ukulele
I read every issue cover to cover. This one looks as awesome as the past issues. On a side note, I wish they had a place to sign-up for an e-mail when they have new issues.
Lil’ Rev Drop Baby Drop CD
February 2, 2010 at 3:52 am | Posted in General, Products, Reviews | 1 CommentTags: CD, jamming, learning, review, uke, ukulele
Funny story; I went to the 1st Annual Milwaukee Ukulele Festival last September and as most know that is where Rev lives. Lil Rev and the awesome Milwaukee Ukulele Club put together an amazing festival. I met so many people and reconnected with a million more. I actually sat and talked with most of the artists that performed. While I was there I was handing out these little promo things with my site on it (Gotta plug the site when you can) But before I would even think about handing them out I had to make sure that Rev said it was OK. So I corner him, he was running like a mad man, and asked him about the swag I wanted to give out. Luckily he thought it was great and I was on my way. A few hours later Lil rev finds me and hands me his new CD and asks me to review it. Now why did it take me so long to review it?
I lost it, thought it was in the trunk of my car. Looked everywhere and I thought that maybe the car ate it and it was getting dark. Life happened and I totally forgot about it until I was looking for a one of my electric tuners and I ran across the CD, never found the tuner. And the long of it is what brings me here.
The Review
Drop Baby Drop By Lil' Rev
Click Here to listen to samples on Amazon
The best way to describe the album is written on the back:
“Drop Baby Drop is an enchanting collection of rare blues, rooted originals, novelty, old time country, and rusty old tin-pan alley classics performed on concert, tenor, baritone, banjo, and resonator ukuleles by award-winning Uke master Lil Rev”
It is true that it has all that, but to me this album is a must if you play ukulele. I play more recent songs from the Beatles and maybe throw in a little AC/DC, but I also find myself playing a lot of the songs like the ones on this CD. This CD is a great collection of songs to really learn from. I can’t read music to save my soul so I listen to others play and use it to get the melody, rhythm, and lyrics for when I try to play the songs.
In the course of listening to the CD at least 100 times, since I found it again, I have found a few things that I would improve on. The recording quality is lacking a little, you can tell that it was recorded in a home studio. It might have been intentional to make the vocals and some of the instruments seem like they are far from the microphone or made to sound old. I think it might of needed some more mixing to balance vocals and instruments. The other issue is use of echo on almost every vocal makes it seem faked big room. Just record in a bathroom and it will come across more natural. Please don’t get me wrong these are things to be expected from an independant CD.
All in all this is a must have for any ukulele lover. Each song leads right to the next. I never find myself skipping to other songs in the album. I just put it in, crank it up, and sing a long. Also if you ever have seen Lil’ Rev play live this will bring back all those memories.
Go Buy it NOW!!!1
Events Coming Up
June 24, 2009 at 4:43 am | Posted in Events | 1 CommentTags: fest, festival, jamming, learning, luau, posts, uke, ukulele
These are 3 things I am trying to make it too
1. Ukulele noir in chicago Saturday June 26 @ 8:30 pm – Saw this a while go on ukulalia.com
2. Bushman Ukulele Luau August 27 – 29 in nashville, IN. I went to one and it was a blast. bought my Jenny there also. if you miss it, there will be more. (I think this is the 3rd this summer)
3. Milwaukee Ukulele Festival September 26. Looks like it will be really great learning and jamming experience. This will be the only big one for the midwest in 2009. The windy city comes back in 2010 (I hope, fingers, toes and eyes crossed)
There will be more events posted as I find them. please send me any that you know of and I will be happy to post them.
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