All shapes and sizes - the LotSU story

All shapes and sizes Keith Wallis

Mention ukuleles and a lot of people turn off immediately.  It either conjures up George Formby, all teeth and brylcreem, or Hawaiian maidens in grass skirts from old ‘B’ movies.   But as the song goes – ‘it ain’t necessarily so’.  

The ‘Last of the Summer Ukuleles’ ‘was set up in 2013 by Stephen Robson, and a few retired friends, as an opportunity for a daytime jam session.  Beginning as just a group of strummers  (basically anyone who turned up with a ukulele) who wanted something to do once a month (in a pub) and to have some fun.  When I joined up, some months later, with my vintage banjo-ukulele, knowing 3 chords, they had grown to maybe 20 players.  They were a welcoming bunch and, though I was very apprehensive about going, I found I loved the sense of camaraderie and the opportunity to extend my playing ability.  

It wasn’t long before people who heard the lunch time jam sessions started asking us to play a set at lunch clubs or similar functions.  As a lot of ukulele groups are populated by people who are still working, daytime ‘concerts’ for groups of older folk, or those with special needs of one kind or another, was a space we could fill. Seeing this as an opportunity to raise money for charity, we began accepting bookings.  The first full year we raised over £1200 for Houghton Helpers, the second year over £1600 for Kingfishers respite care home.   2017 we were supporting 'Houghton & Dunstable Hospice at Home Volunteers' and raised £2232.

Our 2018 charity was 'Music for my mind' for which we raised £2775.
 2019 we again supported Houghton & Dunstable Hospice at Home Volunteers to the tune of a whopping £3583 !
2020 & 2021 we departed from our norm of changing charity annually and are continuing to support Hospice at Home Volunteers (generally, 2020 got ambushed by Covid19).

We haven’t kept to the ‘traditional’ sing-a-long format of most ukulele groups, nor embraced modern songs, though both are within our repertoire.  We bring a kind of self effacing lunacy and banter into our performances – this is possible because we don’t take ourselves too seriously and get as much fun out of our performances as our audiences do.  Songs from the 1920’s to the 1960’s dominate our sets but we drop in some more contemporary songs too .

At the beginning of 2020 Stephen Robson handed over the reins to Jeremy, Nigel and  me, while still participating and keeping an active eye on LotSU.

We are reaping the benefit of our performances as we are frequently rebooked almost immediately. The lunch time pub ‘jam’ has stretched from one  a month to every Wednesday of the month. Venues vary on available space in the pubs but are advertised on our facebook page.

  Numbers have grown for those sessions and we have hit 40+ strummers on occasions.  Needless to say these jam sessions embrace all standards of musicianship.  Our public performances have somewhat fewer players and we most often sport a line-up of around 15. 

 

It’s not just the soprano ukulele, which you would recognise from the movies, that features in our line-up.  I didn’t realise how many versions of the instrument existed until I joined the group – so we may feature Soprano, Concert, Tenor, Baritone, Bass, Guitarlele, Banjo-ukulele, four string, six string, eight string, all from the ukulele family. Filling out the sound with cajon, kazoo, mouthorgan and mandolin and sometimes with guitar, not to mention some homemade instruments as yet unnamed !

We have a presence on Facebook

and this blog thesummerukuleles.blogspot.co.uk

(with pictures and links to videos as well as contact particulars should you contemplate booking us).