Aloha to the Ukulele faithful!
 
Now that the summer is in full swing, I wanted to share my upcoming performance schedule with you.  I hope to see you there!
 
7/24 – Book ‘em Danno in Concert at Loveland Cherry Pie Days, Loveland Museum, FREE to the public! 5 – 6:30 pm
7/28 – Book ‘em Danno in Concert at Wheat Ridge City Concert, Anderson Park, 4355 Field St. Wheat Ridge CO, FREE to the public! 6:30 – 8 pm
 
Don’t forget that Jake Shimabukuro is coming to town:
 
6/26 6/29 – Jake Shimabukuro in Concert, Chautauqua Amphitheatre in Boulder, 7:30 pm

If you're lucky enough to be in Hawaii on May 1st, you'll get to experience "May Day" in Hawaii.  It's a celebration of the "Lei" culture that is at the core of what it means to be a kama'aina.  You get to see lots of beautiful hand-crafted leis that are temporal works of art.  They are made of all types of fresh flowers and plants woven into the signature circle or open configuration leis.  There's even a song written just after this holiday was conceived called "May Day is Lei Day."  This year is the 83rd celebration of the holiday, and I hope to be there for the 84th annual event.  (We're trying to arrange a "Book 'em Danno" trip to the Hawaiian Steel Guitar Association convention in Waikiki next year.)

If you have a hankering for a fresh flower lei, you can visit the "Little Grass Shack" on Santa Fe Drive in Denver.

Here's an easy and convenient way to schedule a lesson online.  It's as easy as 1 - 2 - 3 (click on each step):

1. Create an account
2. Login to your account
3. Schedule a lesson

If you have any questions or problems, contact us or call: (970) 231-3235.

The Big News for ukulele fans: Jake Shimabukuro is coming to Boulder on Tuesday, June 29, 2010 at the Chautauqua Auditorium (big Mahalo to Debbie Turner for alerting me to this event!).

If you're interested in getting tickets as a group, let me know.  There's a 25% discount for a group of 10.

The winners have been picked for the March Madness Give-away.  You can check to see if you've won on Random.org.

Mahalo to the Denver Folklore Center for co-sponsoring this month's drawing!

To enter the drawing for April, just come in for a lesson or email me.

Keep on playing that ukulele!

Last month's give-away got plenty of positive feedback, so I'm kicking it up a notch by having TWO give-aways in ONE month!

Here's the deal: just like last month, all you have to do to enter is schedule an ukulele lesson or send me an email to let me know you'd like to enter this month's contest.  At the end of the month I'll draw TWO email addresses using Random.org.  Once I've finished the drawing, I'll contact the winners by email or phone.

This month's drawing is co-sponsored by the Denver Folklore Center.

We just held our February drawing for the Hal Leonard Ukulele Chord Finder book.  I'm happy to announce that ukulele student Andrew Harris is the lucky winner!

If you entered the drawing (all you had to do was sign up for a lesson or send me an email asking to enter), you can check to see how the drawing was conducted:

This drawing was held in a fair and unbiased manner using RANDOM.ORG's Third-Party Draw Service. For details, please see the drawing's record.

The March give-away will be a set of Aquila ukulele strings.  So keep coming by for lessons, or just let me know if you want to be entered in the contest!

I played with Book 'em Danno this past weekend (August 16) at the New West Fest.  The music was sponsored by the Bohemian Foundation, and they did an outstanding job.  Props go out to Courtney and Carson and the sound guys at the Old Town Square stage.

The day was perfect: sunny skies, temperature in the mid-70's, a covered stage (it's the little things that count), and very cool artist passes.  Everyone made us feel like we were special.  The sound crew worked hard to make us sound great, and there was even a green room catered with very ono grinds.

We've started recording our next, still untitled CD.  I'll be blogging as we make progress, and even post a few snippets of songs we're working on.  The first one you see above is a Hawaiian language tune called "Papalina Lahilahi."  We perform it pretty traditional Old School style, but we add in a nice swing backbeat inspired by a version by Peter Moon.  I've shamelessly stolen some of his licks, too.

We've laid down the backing tracks (scratch track, rhythm ukulele and guitar, bass), and we've got a pretty good steel guitar recorded, too.  I'm sure it'll be a few more takes until we're happy with the leads, and then it'll be time to records the vocals.

Let me know if you have questions about the recording process, and I'll share my experiences with you.