The Austin Ukulele Society’s September meeting warmly welcomed friends from near and far, regulars and first-timers, and experienced players and beginners to our lovely space at St. John’s UMC. We kicked off the evening with some local uke news including the upcoming the Uke Stars concert as well as introductions.

This month, we learned to sing and strum the rock ‘n’ roll classic, “Handle With Care.” It was a 1988 global hit by one of the greatest supergroups of all time, the Traveling Wilburys. Composed of British and American all-stars including George Harrison, Bob Dylan, Tom Petty, Roy Orbison and Jeff Lynne, Traveling Wilburys made two terrific albums and we thoroughly enjoyed playing this tune!

After we played our warm-up song, Bob Marley’s “Three Little Birds,” Bob G. played through his lovely arrangement of “Handle With Care.” Then he taught each component of the song, including the chords, chord progressions, strum styles, picking options, and vocal harmonies.

We enjoyed practicing each part and ultimately putting it together to play through. We sounded better and better with each practice!

The group took a break from their learning to enjoy the talented open mic participants. We were delighted by a terrific variety of covers from Walter Minkel, Angela Morris and mom and daughter duo “Like Mother, Like Daughter” (Kelly and Kimberly).

After, we resumed work on “Handle With Care” a bit more. We were sounding even better, so we made a recording of it. We hope you’ll enjoy playing along with us on our YouTube channel. 🙂

To play along, you can download the lyrics, chords, and tab for Bob’s arrangement of “Handle With Care” 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’re immensely grateful to Aaron for his accompaniment on U-bass and to Jen, Lyda and all the AUS volunteers, for their hard work.

We look forward to seeing you soon and especially at our Thursday, October 10, in-person meeting at St. John’s United Methodist Church. Be well and keep strumming!  🙂

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 2024: the “AUS Grackle 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 Grackle Ukulele” design, “”Classic Ukulele” 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.