Saturday, December 19, 2015

Red Kettle 2015

December 19, 2015  Salvation Army Red Kettle bell ringing with ukuleles:

Monday, December 7, 2015

Something seasonal:
Aint no chimney in the projects:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N3jvDeHLkgo
and the lyrics of course


Lyrics:
When I was a child, I used to wonder
How Santa put my toys under the tree
I said, "Mama, can you tell me how this can be
When there ain't no chimneys in the projects?"

Ain't no chimneys in the projects (not in the ghetto)
Not in the projects
Ain't no chimneys in the projects

Mama sat me down and said, "Baby, Santa Claus does magic things."
As soon as you're asleep, a chimney will appear
And in the morning you will see all he brings.
Don't you worry that there ain't no chimneys in the projects."

Ain't no chimneys in the projects (not in the ghetto)
Not in the projects
Ain't no chimneys in the projects

Now I'm all grown and I see
It wasn't Santa who got that magic done
Mama, now I know you were the one
There ain't no chimneys in the projects

Ain't no chimneys in the projects (not in the ghetto)
Not in the projects
Ain't no chimneys in the projects

Music
"Ain't No Chimneys In the Projects" by Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings (iTunesAmazonMP3)
Category  Music
License  Standard YouTube License
How many days of --
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lbM6U4ryn6o 


Wednesday, November 25, 2015

Monday, August 10, 2015

WGC truck

WGC truck disguised asa contractor's van.

Sunday, August 9, 2015

August 9th, 2015 at the Farmers Market - and yes, I am keeping my day job.

Sunday, August 2, 2015

Thursday, July 30, 2015

You'll lava this

http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/movies/2015/07/30/pixar-short-lava-exclusive-clip/30869763/

From the interview:

“I actually wrote this to myself in my ukulele case on a Post-It: ‘Remember: perform it, have fun with it and put yourself out there.' Because that’s what John wants,” Murphy says.

“The biggest fear for me to overcome was to not be shy, to not be reserved, to go ‘Alright, this is it. Give it everything you’ve got. This is your moment.’ ”

Tuesday, July 14, 2015

Iceland has cool ukes !

Wait, is that a squeeze box ? (micro accordion?)
And shells ?


Thanks, Marc.

Monday, July 13, 2015

2015 July 11 Farmers Market

Filling up the gap between performances (and no food demo), a harmonica player came up to join me and played for several songs.   Come back and play more soon !



Sunday, February 22, 2015

Ukulele in Weston




Ukelele strikes a major chord among all ages

Norman Nichols plays his part at Weston’s Council on Aging class.
By Steve MaasGLOBE CORRESPONDENT FEBRUARY 22, 2015

Outside on this particular Tuesday afternoon, the temperature was stuck in the 20s. But inside, it was a different story.

“Summer camp for old people,” said Arthur Goldstein, before quickly correcting himself. “Older people.”

It was the weekly ukulele class in the Weston Council on Aging’s quarters on Alphabet Lane, where up to 15 or so enthusiastic pluckers polished renditions of songs ranging from “Amazing Grace” to “Yes Sir, That’s My Baby.”

Thursday, February 5, 2015

power of the ukulele


The Rise and Fall (and Rise) of the Ukulele

The little instrument has gone from being an exotic new trend to the embodiment of kitsch since it arrived on Hawaii 125 years ago, but is currently enjoying a revival.
Wikimedia
With its chunk-a-chunk sound, whispery nylon strings, and diminutive body, the ukulele is having a moment. Or maybe even a decade. Zooey Deschanel strums one while crooning sweetly with Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Tony Blair disrupts Labour Party conventions with one. When Eddie Vedder impulse-bought one on a trip to Hawaii, he was compelled to record a whole album of Ukulele Songs. (It won a Grammy, of course.) And then a Hawaiian ukulele prodigy played a Beatles cover in Central Park, and the video went viral—but more on that later.

Wednesday, January 7, 2015

Thursday, January 1, 2015

Music: on the inside

https://www.bostonconservatory.edu/music/karl-paulnack-welcome-address

Got this from Linda today. It is a welcome to an entering class at the Boston Conservatory, both students and their parents.  "...music was seen as the study of relationships between invisible, internal, hidden objects. Music has a way of finding the big, invisible moving pieces inside our hearts and souls and helping us figure out the position of things inside us."  Enjoy !

=================
Karl Paulnack Welcome Address
Home/ Karl Paulnack Welcome Address

One of my parents' deepest fears, I suspect, is that society would not properly value me as a musician, that I wouldn't be appreciated. I had very good grades in high school, I was good in science and math, and they imagined that as a doctor or a research chemist or an engineer, I might be more appreciated than I would be as a musician. I still remember my mother's remark when I announced my decision to apply to music school—she said, "you're wasting your SAT scores!" On some level, I think, my parents were not sure themselves what the value of music was, what its purpose was. And they loved music: they listened to classical music all the time. They just weren't really clear about its function. So let me talk about that a little bit, because we live in a society that puts music in the "arts and entertainment" section of the newspaper, and serious music, the kind your kids are about to engage in, has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with entertainment, in fact it's the opposite of entertainment. Let me talk a little bit about music, and how it works.

One of the first cultures to articulate how music really works were the ancient Greeks. And this is going to fascinate you: the Greeks said that music and astronomy were two sides of the same coin. Astronomy was seen as the study of relationships between observable, permanent, external objects, and music was seen as the study of relationships between invisible, internal, hidden objects. Music has a way of finding the big, invisible moving pieces inside our hearts and souls and helping us figure out the position of things inside us. Let me give you some examples of how this works.