My original intention was to go to this festival and attend UF's song-writing workshop as a show of support to the man and his music. I actually got to bed kind of early and had a good night's rest, which has lately been unusual for me. I got up at 8 AM-which meant that I would have to rush if I were to get to the fest by 10.
Alas, I didn't make it. I got there just as UF's workshop was ending. He said that about 20 people showed up. Most participants thanked him throughout the day as he milled about. He will repeat the workshop tomorrow at 1 PM, at this workshop-starved festival.
So I guess that is one complaint: a lack of workshops. But there were many improvements over last year.
First of all, to compensate for the lack of rooms, there were a few awnings set out for workshops and performances. And, while there were fewer workshops, there were plenty of performers. A group of kids performed very nicely, rocking out to the likes of Van Morrison. Some might have thought that there were too many amateurs, but I found most of those acts pretty charming.
I would have liked more seasoned pros, however-like Lyle Ritz, Bill Tapia, and Janet Klein. Daniel Oh played a few songs,as did Ian Whitcomb. Whitcomb was under the weather so he didn't play much. He spun a few songs from a CD player and played along a couple of times. I gathered that he was ill, and perhaps had a sick relative on his mind. Daniel Oh was very good.
The view at this location, a local small theater at the Coronado Ferry landing, was beautiful. But I would have traded the view for a larger venue with actual restrooms with plumbing, if you know what I mean.
Last year, the Woman who ran the show kept a much too high profile, offering her over-priced uke paintings for sale, interrupting acts if they went overtime, she was just everywhere. She was a little less high profile this year, but still somewhat intrusive. I got the feeling that she just didn't know how to respect the performers or quietly let them know that their time was almost up. The Cerritos Ukulele Festival is much larger and you barely feel the organizers' presence.
which reminds me, the price of entry is steep for what's offered. This two-day festival offers about half (if that) of what the Cerritos offers in one day, yet charges $25 for admission. At Cerritos, you can get a full day of uke fun, with several choices, for $18. The evening luau and concert each bring the price up, if you want to extend your fun. It seems to me the San Diego fest could charge a daily price for those who plan on attending just one day.
By the way, the best part of the day for me happened about ten minutes after I got out of my car. At the vendors' area, as I passed Jumpin' Jims booth, I saw that he was selling discontinued Flukes for $99! I picked one up just as one gent said "I'll take them all" (there were four). I immediately claimed the one I held and wrote a check. Turned out to be one-of-kind. They never marketed this one. It has a flower design painted around the soundhole. Not as brightly colored as some of the others, but it plays nice.
One group of elderly musicians, called the Fun Timers, played some great old songs. One dour man, played many instruments, including the bones. He never seemed especially happy, until he stepped off the stage and wandered around the audience, snapping his bones.
This group also had a junk bass-player named Yo-Yo. She snapped the string enthusiastically, but I couldn't tell if she was really playing anything or was just for show. There was a guitarist playing a bit behind the band and it sounded like he was actually playing the bass line. Yo-Yo's bass had no mike and she seemed to be playing it backwards.
Maybe HH can help me here. This bass was like a washtub bass, except, instead of a tub, she used a trash can. There was a broomstick-like pole and a string stretched from the pole to the trash can. Now, I always assumed that you made different notes by moving your pole hand up and down while gripping both pole and string-kind of like what your would do on the neck of a real stand-up bass. Yo-Yo kept her pole hand in one place, but move her string hand up and down the string, apparently plucking the string in different places to get different notes.
So, was she a fake?
7 comments:
Sounds fake to me. Maybe it was a Theremin Washtub possessed by the spirit of Mario Lanza. As for the Cerritos/Coranado admission prices: What was the view like at Cerritos?
xo
billy
It was a nice park. Most of the workshops were inside.
Cerritos may have been nice, but it weren't no Coronado. No Pacific Ocean. No seagulls. No ocean breeze. The only thing you can see from Cerritos is Norwalk. Hence the cheaper prices.
Definitely sounds like she was either just faking or just lumping out a beat rather than notes.
Bearing in mind that there are as many variants on the washtub bass as you can dream up, on the "classic" designs one changes the notes by moving the pole to tighten or loosen the tension on the string.
As far as the expense goes, all ukulele fests are somewhat on the overpriced side. I go every year to a science fiction convention called Norwescon. Their official activities (i.e. not including private room parties and such) start around 3pm Thursday afternoon and continue practically non-stop until closing ceremonies at 5pm on Sunday.
You have between a dozen and two dozen choices for nearly every hour in between those times (from about 2am 'til 8am things quiet down a bit)... panels, seminars, demos, dances, gaming, etc. and, once again, that doesn't include the private party stuff.
All of this costs (this year) $75 for your con membership.
HH
Maybe I should change hobbies. I guess it all depends on the expense/fun ratio, which is all subjective.
So far, in my musical weekend adventures, the Summer Equinox Folk Fest has been the best value.
I dunno, ya gotta look out for that Trekkie/pedophile connection!
Can't tell if she was a fake, but it's true that you can play a washtub bass without moving your hands up and down the stick, just by changing tension.
I think the pole, stick, shaft, whatever you want to call it, stayed erect. I think that her only contribution was being an elderly woman who looked like she was playing a washtub base. Little, if any, actual musical contirbution.
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