On a balmy Austin mid-May evening, Austin Ukulele Society participants, young and old, seasoned and new, visiting from as far as Oregon, and more, all came together to enjoy a terrific evening of learning, singing, and strumming!    

We started the evening with some ukulele news, and we introduced our friend Neal Kassanoff, founder of Groundwork Music Project. Together with support from the Austin Ukulele Society and EdUkeCation, Groundwork is hosting the first Central Texas Ukulele Festival from July 9 – 12! Please plan to join the fun; find out more and sign up for the email list, purchase workshop tickets, and more on the Festival’s website.  

Then we got the music-making started by playing our always uplifting warm-up song, Bob Marley’s “Three Little Birds.”

Bob (with support on bass from Aaron) gave us a lovely performance of the song we’d be learning. We moved some decades into the future from the Beatles era that we explored in April, with East Sussex’s alternative rockers Keane, to cover their 2004 smash hit “Somewhere Only We Know.” This tune is a lovely, catchy, and piano-driven rock ballad which was also a #1 hit for Lily Allen when she covered it in 2013. 

Everyone did great, learning the strum style, tab, harmony options, and more, as we practiced Bob’s great arrangement and helpful exercises. 

By the time we recorded the song, we sounded terrific. We hope you’ll play along with us from wherever you are! Look for our video performance of “Somewhere Only We Know,” coming soon to our YouTube Channel! 

To play along, you can download the lyrics, chords, and tab for Bob’s arrangement of “Somewhere Only We Know” or download a copy of the presentation and instruction guide (what we project on the screens for all to follow along, including exercises and drills).

We’re immensely grateful to Aaron Lewis for his bass accompaniment. Many, many thanks to all the fabulous AUS volunteers for their hard work.  

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We’re looking forward to seeing you again at our next meeting on June 11th at St. John’s United Methodist Church. Keep on strumming until then!  🙂

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.

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Ukulele Society T-shirts and Merch!

We’re very excited about our 2026 Austin Ukulele Society t-shirt, “Ukin’ Armadillo,” designed by Lyda Guz. This cool design features a rockin’ and rollin’ armadillo happily strumming his favorite ukulele decorated with 16 stars to celebrates the Austin Ukulele Society’s 16th year of making music together. As always, the shirts are silk-screened right here in Austin at a fantastic locally-owned print shop.

Our new “Ukin’ Armadillo” design, “Circle of Stars,” “AUS Grackle,” “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.