On a warm Thursday evening, 130+ ukulele players got together for a wonderful evening of learning, singing and strumming. We were thrilled to have many local regulars and plenty of first-timers, including visitors from Iowa, Minnesota and Venezuela. As usual, we kicked off our evening with introductions and local ukulele event news, before launching into our ever-optimistic warm-up song, “Three Little Birds.”

The Beatles have a fantastic array of songs, many of which are well suited to ukulele covers and big group play-alongs. So it’s no wonder that every couple of years we find ourselves revisiting The Beatles’ catalog and choosing one of their well-loved tunes for our featured song. For our May song, we learned “Across the Universe,” from their last studio album, Let It Be, in 1970.

Bob shared an overview of his arrangement of “Across the Universe,” before performing a lovely demonstration of it. With Bob’s terrific guidance, we enjoyed practicing the chord progressions, strum styles, finger-picking and harmonizing options. Then we put the song together and played it through a couple of times, getting better with each try!

We took a break to enjoy terrific open mic performances by Kelly, Jack, Spencer and Jay. We’re always so impressed by the array of talent shared during this portion of our evening!

Afterward, we practiced “Across the Universe” a couple of more times and recorded it for you to enjoy and play along with. Look for it soon on our YouTube channel. We hope you’ll enjoy our video performance as much as we enjoyed making it.  🙂

To play along with us, you can download the lyrics and chords for our arrangement of “Across the Universe” or download a copy of the presentation and instruction guide (what we project on the screen for all to follow along, including exercises and drills).

We are thankful to Aaron Lewis for joining us on bass and to our amazing volunteers who do so much to make the evening successful. Your support is greatly appreciated!

Looking forward to seeing you at our next in-person meeting, Thursday, June 8! Until then, keep strummin’! 🙂

For more downloadable music, visit our Ukulele Music Library. For more Austin Ukulele Society videos, check out our YouTube Channel.

We appreciate your support and interest. If you’d like to make a donation to the Austin Ukulele Society (a 501(c)(3) organization), visit our Square Donation site. If you would like to be added to our mailing list, please fill out our this short sign-up form. For any other inquiries, please contact us or shoot us an email if you have previous correspondence with us.

Ukulele Society T-shirts!
We are proud to unveil our latest shirt, new for 2022: the “AUS Classic Ukulele,” design, hot off the presses! All of our shirts are thoughtfully designed by the talented Lyda Guz!

The shirts are silk screened here in Austin at a fantastic locally-owned print shop and are available for purchase. The new “AUS Classic Ukulele” design, “Ukulele Around the World,” “10th Anniversary,” Mermaid, Cowboy,” “Austin Lasso” and other shirts are $25. We also have vinyl decals with the AUS logo for $1 each. We can accept cash or a check made out to Austin Ukulele Society; you can also make payment via Venmo or PayPal. Please drop us a line if you’d like to purchase a shirt (or two or three). 🙂 At this time, we can only ship orders within the U.S.

Our April 13 in-person meeting was a wonderful one, with over 110 uke enthusiasts in attendance. We kicked off the lovely evening with introductions and local ukulele news, including reminders about upcoming special events, including Jim D’Ville’s  workshops on April 28. Then Bob led us through our always cheerful warm-up song, Bob Marley’s “Three Little Birds.”

Every so often we love to show off what a versatile instrument the uke is, and rockin’ out to a mega-rock hit is one way we particularly enjoy. So this month we learned our first-ever Bon Jovi tune, and it’s a great one at that: “Livin’ on a Prayer.” Widely adored by fans around the world, it’s considered the band’s signature song.

Bob shared some information about “Livin’ on a Prayer” and performed it for us, to introduce his great arrangement. Then he took us through some terrific exercises to help us get comfortable with the strum styles, the chords and chord progressions, the optional finger-picking, and harmonizing options, too. By the time we put the song together, we were sounding quite good!

We put our playing aside to enjoy the talents of our fabulous open mic participants. Ronald and his daughter performed a lovely duet in Spanish, Kaia impressed us with a beautiful tune, and Jack and Pastor Cynthia inspired us with a terrific duet on “I’ll Fly Away.”

We then spent some time honing our skills on “Livin’ on a Prayer” and recorded a terrific cover for you to enjoy. Look for it soon on our YouTube channel. We hope you’ll rock out with Bob and the rest of us, from the comfort of your home. 🙂

To play along with us, you can download the lyrics and chords for our arrangement of “Livin’ On a Prayer” or download a copy of the presentation and instruction guide (what we project on the screen for all to follow along, including exercises and drills).

We are thankful to Aaron Lewis for joining us on bass and to our amazing volunteers who do so much to make the evening successful. Your support is greatly appreciated!

We look forward to seeing you back with us at next month’s in-person meeting: Thursday, May 11, at 7pm, at the Memorial United Methodist Church. Until then, keep strummin’! 🙂

For more downloadable music, visit our Ukulele Music Library. For more Austin Ukulele Society videos, check out our YouTube Channel.

Contact Us if you have any questions or would like to be added to our mailing list!

Ukulele Society T-shirts!
We are proud to unveil our latest shirt, new for 2022: the “AUS Classic Ukulele,” design, hot off the presses! All of our shirts are thoughtfully designed by the talented Lyda Guz!

The shirts are silk screened here in Austin at a fantastic locally-owned print shop and are available for purchase. The new “AUS Classic Ukulele” design, “Ukulele Around the World,” “10th Anniversary,” Mermaid, Cowboy,” “Austin Lasso” and other shirts are $25. We also have vinyl decals with the AUS logo for $1 each. We can accept cash or a check made out to Austin Ukulele Society; you can also make payment via Venmo or PayPal. Please drop us a line if you’d like to purchase a shirt (or two or three). 🙂 At this time, we can only ship orders within the U.S.

We were thrilled to host our first virtual meeting of 2023, with a fabulous turnout of over 160 players from Victoria, British Columbia, Canada to Victoria, Australia and many points in between. We enjoyed having many old friends join in and plenty of first-timers, too. For our featured song, we brought back to a very popular AUS repertoire song from four years ago: “Can’t Help Falling In Love,” made famous by Elvis Presley. We loved getting familiar with this ever-popular romantic ballad and learning it together!  💓

Bob kicked us off with ukulele news and our warm-up song, Bob Marley’s “Three Little Birds.” Then he performed his terrific arrangement of “Can’t Help Falling In Love.” Bob led us through helpful exercises to teach us the chords, chord progressions, strum pattern, and picking options. He also introduced some vocal harmonizing options. We really enjoyed learning the song, part by part, and putting it all together to play through a few times. Before we said good night, we played our swan song, Willie Nelson’s “On the Road Again. Afterward, we continued to chat and watch some of the Austin Ukulele Society’s wonderful videos, including collaborative ones produced by Marty Porter and Paul Butler.

You can download the lyrics, chords, and tab for “Can’t Help Falling In Love,” or download a copy of the presentation and instruction guide, including exercises and drills. You can also watch a replay of the March 23 live stream. Watch the entire show or jump to the part you most want to see!

As always, we thank Jen Richardson for moderating the chat and helping get questions addressed in real time and to Lyda Guz for her fantastic projectionist skills.

Check out our most recent group effort, “Octopus’s Garden”:

Thank you for joining us, sending in your selfies, and staying connected!

We look forward to having you all with us again at the virtual meeting on Thursday, June 22! Keep an eye on the Austin Ukulele Society’s YouTube channel. 🙂

For more downloadable music, visit our Ukulele Music Library. For more Austin Ukulele Society videos, check out our YouTube Channel.

Contact Us if you have any questions or would like to be added to our mailing list!

Ukulele Society T-shirts!
Austin Ukulele Society t-shirts are available for purchase at our in-person meetings, via mail order (U.S. orders only), and Austin-area porch pick up, including our latest “Classic Ukulele” design.

The shirts are silk-screened here in Austin at a fantastic locally-owned print shop.  T-shirts are $25 each (plus tax, where applicable). All of our shirts are thoughtfully designed by the talented Lyda Guz! You can have a look at all of our shirt styles on the “Shop” page. Drop us a line if you’d like to purchase a shirt (or two or three). 🙂

On a mild March evening, a wonderful group of 110+ ukulele players gathered to make music together. We enjoyed having many of our regular Austin-area folks in attendance, as well as plenty of first-timers, including a group of friends from the Galveston Ukulele Society, Guillermo and Kathryn from Chicago, Kelly from Prince Edward Island, Canada, and Alan from the UK.

With this year’s meeting date falling between International Women’s Day and St. Patrick’s Day, it was the perfect time to learn the beautiful acoustic rock song “Linger” by Irish band The Cranberries. The late great Dolores O’Riordan wrote the lyrics and gorgeously sings the vocals on this tune.

We kicked off the meeting, as usual, with introductions and our warm-up song: Bob Marlely’s “Three Little Birds.”

Bob G. then introduced his terrific arrangement of our song of the month: The Cranberries’ “Linger,” with a lovely performance. He shared some more about the song and its popularity, and then began teaching us the song. Bob took us through chord progressions, strum styles, picking and harmonizing options. We sounded great when we played it through!

We took a break to enjoy terrific open mic performances. The Galveston Ukulele Society, our own Jay, Alan from the UK, Kelly from PEI and Angela (first time at an open mic!) all did fabulous performances. We truly appreciate their willingness to share their music with us.

After the enjoyable open mic performances ended, we worked a bit more on “Linger” and recorded a video for you to play along with and enjoy. We hope you’ll check out the video, coming soon to our YouTube channel.

To play along with us, you can download the lyrics and chords for our arrangement of “Linger” or download a copy of the presentation and instruction guide (what we project on the screen for all to follow along, including exercises and drills).

We are thankful to Aaron Lewis for joining us on bass and to our amazing volunteers who do so much to make the evening successful. Special thanks to the women who came up to join Bob in leading the vocals on “Linger.” Your support is greatly appreciated!

We’re looking forward to our virtual meeting on Thursday, March 23, and having you back in person with us on Thursday, April 13, at 7pm! See you there!! 🙂

For more downloadable music, visit our Ukulele Music Library. For more Austin Ukulele Society videos, check out our YouTube Channel.

Contact Us if you have any questions or would like to be added to our mailing list!

Ukulele Society T-shirts!
We are proud to unveil our latest shirt, new for 2022: the “AUS Classic Ukulele,” design, hot off the presses! All of our shirts are thoughtfully designed by the talented Lyda Guz!

The shirts are silk screened here in Austin at a fantastic locally-owned print shop and are available for purchase. The new “AUS Classic Ukulele” design, “Ukulele Around the World,” “10th Anniversary,” Mermaid, Cowboy,” “Austin Lasso” and other shirts are $25. We also have vinyl decals with the AUS logo for $1 each. We can accept cash or a check made out to Austin Ukulele Society; you can also make payment via Venmo or PayPal. Please drop us a line if you’d like to purchase a shirt (or two or three). 🙂 At this time, we can only ship orders within the U.S.

The Austin Ukulele Society had a love-ly time getting into the mood for Valentine’s Day, as we took on the fantastic and timeless tune of romance, “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You,” at our February meeting. Over 120 members gathered with smiles on their faces and ukes in their hands, as we got in our introductions and warmed up with Bob Marley’s “Three Little Birds.”

Bob G. then shared some information about his arrangement of “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” and gave us a great demonstration performance of it. He then taught us how to play, pick and sing this infectious song, with helpful exercises on the strum patterns, chords and chord progressions, and picking options. Thanks to Bob’s step-by-step approach, we sounded good from the first time we played it through – and we only got better each time we practiced the song.

We took a break to enjoy the talented performers who participated in the open mic portion of the evening. Kelly & Tilly, Mike, Kaia, Cynthia, and Ronald played a terrific selection of cover tunes, that spanned several musical genres.

After the enjoyable open mic performances ended, we practiced our song again and recorded it for your listening and play-along pleasure. We hope you’ll check out the video, coming soon to our YouTube channel. We hope you will enjoy listening and playing with us!

To play along with us, you can download the lyrics and chords for our arrangement of “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” or download a copy of the presentation and instruction guide (what we project on the screen for all to follow along, including exercises and drills).

We are thankful to Aaron Lewis for joining us on bass and to our amazing volunteers who do so much to make the evening successful.

We’ll see you back in the same place on Thursday, March 9, at 7pm! See you there!! 🙂

For more downloadable music, visit our Ukulele Music Library. For more Austin Ukulele Society videos, check out our YouTube Channel.

Contact Us if you have any questions or would like to be added to our mailing list!

Ukulele Society T-shirts!
We are proud to unveil our latest shirt, new for 2022: the “AUS Classic Ukulele,” design, hot off the presses! All of our shirts are thoughtfully designed by the talented Lyda Guz!

The shirts are silk screened here in Austin at a fantastic locally-owned print shop and are available for purchase. The new “AUS Classic Ukulele” design, “Ukulele Around the World,” “10th Anniversary,” Mermaid, Cowboy,” “Austin Lasso” and other shirts are $25. We also have vinyl decals with the AUS logo for $1 each. We can accept cash or a check made out to Austin Ukulele Society; you can also make payment via Venmo or PayPal. Please drop us a line if you’d like to purchase a shirt (or two or three). 🙂 At this time, we can only ship orders within the U.S.

The Austin Ukulele Society was thrilled to kick off its 13th year of monthly meetings with a crowd of 120+ members from the Austin area and beyond! We’re very grateful for all of the enthusiasm and support we’ve had, and we loved seeing familiar faces and meeting new friends. We got the evening started with introductions and local ukulele news, before launching into our warm-up song: Bob Marley’s “Three Little Birds.”

Bob then introduced us to his arrangement of Dire Straits’ terrific and timeless tune, “Walk of Life,” by performing it for us. He guided us through the helpful exercises he’d prepared to help us learn the picking and strumming options, the chord progressions and the vocal harmony options. We sounded better and better, as we pieced the tune together, and we enjoyed playing it through before taking a break for the open mic portion of the evening.

Thank you to our open mic performers! It was a treat to hear Rich perform a beautiful cover of “The Wichita Lineman” and Jack Pott and Deb play a rockin’ and humorous original.

We got back to practicing “Walk of Life,” and we got so good at it that we made a recording to share with you. Be on the lookout for the video of our performance, coming soon to our YouTube channel. We hope you will enjoy listening and playing along with us! Many thanks to Aaron Lewis on bass for rounding out our rhythm.  🙂

To play along with us, you can download the lyrics and chords for our arrangement of “Walk of Life” or download a copy of the presentation and instruction guide (what we project on the screen for all to follow along, including exercises and drills).

As always, we appreciate all of the volunteer support we get to help us set up and break down and have a wonderful time.

We’re looking forward to getting the Valentine’s Day spirit going as we learn a love-themed song at the February 9 meeting. See you there! 🙂

For more downloadable music, visit our Ukulele Music Library. For more Austin Ukulele Society videos, check out our YouTube Channel.

Contact Us if you have any questions or would like to be added to our mailing list!

Ukulele Society T-shirts!
We are proud to unveil our latest shirt, new for 2022: the “AUS Classic Ukulele,” design, hot off the presses! All of our shirts are thoughtfully designed by the talented Lyda Guz!

The shirts are silk screened here in Austin at a fantastic locally-owned print shop and are available for purchase. The new “AUS Classic Ukulele” design, “Ukulele Around the World,” “10th Anniversary,” Mermaid, Cowboy,” “Austin Lasso” and other shirts are $20. We also have vinyl decals with the AUS logo for $1 each. We can accept cash or a check made out to Austin Ukulele Society; you can also make payment via Venmo or PayPal. Please drop us a line if you’d like to purchase a shirt (or two or three). 🙂 At this time, we can only ship orders within the U.S.