The Sensational Marietta Ukulele Group has taken over the libraries of East Cobb, and they’ve got two Christmas concerts scheduled to perform and entertain.
The shows are:
Saturday, December 13th at 2 p.m.
Sewell Mill Library
2051 Lower Roswell Road
Marietta, GA 30068
Thursday, December 18th at 3:45 p.m.
Gritters Library
880 Shaw Park Road
Marietta, GA 30066
They’ll be part of each library’s Winter Festival.
With Halloween less than a week away, here are some links to Halloween songbooks around the web.
One of my favorites is the Spookelele collection by the UK’s Moselele group. Alongside favorites like Dusty Springfield’s “Spooky” (covered by Atlanta Rhythm Section) and Ghost Riders in the Sky, there are chords for Blue Oyster Cult’s “Don’t Fear the Reaper” and “Bela Lugosi’s Dead” by Bauhaus, among others.
Of similar quality is Stretford Uke’s Big Horror songbook. Some tracks I don’t see in other books here include Beck’s “Devils Haircut” and CCR’s “I Put a Spell on You”. Notably, you can download this one in either portrait or landscape orientation.
Staying in the UK, we’ve got the Ukulele Wednesdays Halloween Songbook from 2019, which includes Rockwell’s 80s hit “Somebody’s Watching Me”, Duran Duran’s “Hungry Like the Wolf”, and “Ghost Town” by The Specials, among many others.
A little closer to home, there’s a Halloween-themed songbook I just found this month from the Music and More site out of Huntsville, Alabama. This one includes several pages that were very spookily left intentionally blank, and 46 songs in all. Have you been searching all over for “Hoist the Colors High” (from “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End”)? Look no further! Also, Pink Floyd’s “Brain Damage”, Golden Earring’s “Twilight Zone”, and to really terrify the kids, “Señor Don Gato.”
A final entry, if a little plain, is from the Stillwater Ukulele Association in Oklahoma. Picked this one because it’s got Loudon Wainwright’s “Dead Skunk in the Middle of the Road,” which I recently performed at a Waikikie BBQ Sunday Strumalong.
Links:
• Ukulele Wenesdays | Halloween Songbook 2019
Got A Ukulele | Kala Pan Pacific Deluxe Soprano Ukulele (KA-F8D-KOA-S) – REVIEW | YouTube Version
Barry Maz this week reviews a new Kala I’ve been enjoying for about 6 weeks, after being blown away by one of the first to arrive at Uke Republic around the end of August. It’s a limited edition model, part of Kala’s 20th Anniversary celebration, and it’s a koa soprano that seems to hit way above its $499 pricing. There are two models, the Deluxe with maple and rosewood rope purfling, wood binding front and back, an ebony fretboard, and gold planetary tuners, and a Standard model that sells for $100 less without the upgrades and with silver tuners.
They’re called the Pan Pacific because they harken back to the ukulele as it existed at the time of the San Francisco Panama-Pacific Exposition in 1915, which essentially introduced Hawaii and the ukulele to continental America. It’s a Figure 8 body with a narrow waist and a 12-fret fingerboard that ends at the body. Strings are by Savarez, and both models include a custom, well-padded gig bag with red lining and an emblem that matches the headstock (two men arm/wrist wrestling, a nod to Kala’s home town of Petaluma hosting the sport’s world championship),
Barry in a nutshell says Kala “knocked it out of the park” with this one, and tips it as an early candidate for his ukulele of the year. He gives it a 10 out of 10 for value.
It’s a very lightweight instrument, and the back tapers to the neck. The tuners are from Der Jung, and they combine the old-time rear tuner look with modern gearing for quick, easy tuning.
I don’t know exactly how to describe the Pan Pacific’s sound, but it projects very well and it just sounds “put together” in a way that again, I can’t really describe. There are songs I play where the resonance makes certain chords feel like this little uke is kicking me in the forearm. There are a couple of clips of better players than me playing it linked both above and below. Barry hits all the good ukulele tone words: “punch”, “bark”, “shimmer”, and even “sustain.”
I was at Uke Republic on Saturday, and Mike said he thinks he’ll get in one more Standard and one more Deluxe, and that’s it for this run. If you love sweet-sounding sopranos, you should seriously consider hopping on one of those.
Barry mentions in his review that Kala is considering adding a similar solid mahogany model after this limited koa edition, and I guess we’ll see how those stack up (and how they compare to Ohana’s similar mahogany SK-28) when they appear.
The provided case is one of the best padded gig bags I’ve seen included with an instrument. Nevertheless, I bought a standard Kala soprano hardcase for my Pan Pacific. I had to customize the fit a bit, by using the supplied spacer blocks and gluing them to the narrowest part of the waist inside the case. With that modification, the Pan Pacific fits snugly in place.
Some other links with sound samples:
Uke Republic | Kala KA F8D KOA S Solid Koa Figure 8 Soprano Ukulele Demo by UKE Republic
Southern Ukulele Store | KALA 20TH ANNIVERSARY UKULELES – Limited Run Koa Specials