Aloha! The inaugural Nutmeg Ukulele Festival returns with FIVE new teaching artists for 2024! Teaching artists this year are Anne Ku, Armand Aromin, Abby Lyons, Jim Beloff and Jim Lenn.
The one day, eight hour festival includes 4 workshop sessions, a silent auction, vendors and lunch!
Registration opens at 8:00am. Group warmup begins at 9:00am. Workshop materials, day of instructions, and the festival schedule will be emailed to ticket holders the week of the event! Lunch will be provided but please feel free to BYO snacks and refreshments for your enjoyment for throughout the day!
🎵SPECIAL WORKSHOP OPTIONS THIS YEAR TO INCLUDE🎵:
Taylor Swift Songs
Clawhammer Ukulele
Baritone
Event Details: Tickets cost $100.
ALL TICKETS ARE NON-REFUNDABLE.
MEET THE ARTISTS
Anne Ku
Born in Brunei and raised in Taiwan and Okinawa, Anne Ku embraced music at a young age, traversing various instruments until she discovered the ukulele on Maui. After earning her music degree in composition and teaching diploma in piano (on sightreading) from Utrecht Conservatory in the Netherlands, she performed widely as a chamber musician in duos with classical guitar, French horn, and cello. She taught music (class piano, music theory, music history, world music, and instrumental ensemble) at the University of Hawaii Maui College before moving to Boston where she started a ukulele club. Having written her MA in Music thesis on ukulele song sheets and participative music making, Anne believes the ukulele is the fastest way to making music and staying connected. She hosts 3 Chord Thursday, a song session in Zoom she founded at the beginning of the pandemic lockdown, reaching more than 3,000 members on Facebook.
Armand Aromin
In chronological order, Armand Aromin is a queer Filipino American musician, percussive dancer, singer, and violin maker now enmortgaged in Riverside, Rhode Island. More importantly, if you can say “Arm & Hammer” you’re pronouncing his name correctly! Like many who came before him, Armand’s ukulele journey, too, began with the Irish fiddle in high school. After a text message break up his senior year (he’s doing fine.) his heart told him, “The only way to heal is to stress-purchase a 5-string banjo.” And so he did. But while contentedly clawhammering his way through college, he beheld his first ukulele, and thus his eyes were truly opened. It was as if a banjo-shaped weight was lifted from his shoulders! Now, lo these many years, the clawhammer’s twang has graced/grazed many an ear with a growing repertoire of tunes and songs that continue to wonderfully confound the writer of this bio. Armand is one-half of The Vox Hunters, a quarter of Eight Feet Tall, and at least a third of The Ivy Leaf. He proudly owns Aromin Violins, a tiny workshop within five paces of his bedroom. He also regularly teaches private lessons at his home, as well as group classes at the Blackstone River Theatre in Cumberland, RI.
Abby Lyons
Abby Lyons is a singer-songwriter with a following of over 75k subscribers on YouTube, where she shares her original songs, covers, and music tutorials. She is recording her third studio album of original songs, which was funded through a successful Kickstarter campaign that raised over $10k. The release date for the third album is set for September 2024. She has performed and taught workshops at many venues and festivals, including the Los Angeles International Ukulele Festival, UkeCon, the Wonderfront Festival, and the Square Roots Festival. Lyons is also known for her ukulele playing and teaching as an instructor on the Fender Play platform. Behind the scenes, she wrote hundreds of lessons and assisted in curriculum design. Currently she teaches ukulele, songwriting, and piano at the legendary Old Town School of Folk Music in Chicago. Lyons also records vocals for Grammy Award-winning film composer, Lorne Balfe, and her singing can be heard most prominently on the shows, Life On Our Planet with Morgan Freeman on Netflix and The Wheel Of Time on Amazon Prime. Other work in television includes writing the lyrics for the song, “Candlesticks and Caravans,” which is featured on the British crime show Pennyworth. Her original song, “Nightmare in the Morning,” is part of an animated short that was featured in Shortnitemares, an online film festival hosted by Epic Games in the game Fortnite Party Royale. The animation was broadcast on Disney XD in 2017 and chosen as Vimeo’s Staff Pick in 2016. Currently Lyons lives in Chicago and spends her time performing, recording, and teaching
Jim Beloff: (pronounced bee-loff)
Jim Beloff is the author of The Ukulele—A Visual History (Backbeat Books) and author, arranger, and publisher of the Jumpin’ Jim’s series of ukulele songbooks with over 1,000,000 copies in print. This series is available worldwide and includes The Daily Ukulele, one of the biggest and best-selling ukulele songbooks ever published. All Jumpin’ Jim’s songbooks are distributed by Hal Leonard LLC. In December 2021, Backbeat books published Jim’s memoir, UKEtopia—Adventures in the Ukulele World. Jim produced Legends of Ukulele, a CD compilation for Rhino Records, and has made three how-to-play DVDs for Homespun. He is also an active songwriter and has released a number of CDs. His two-CD set, Dreams I Left in Pockets, features 33 songs he wrote or co-wrote with uke legends, Herb “Ohta-san” Ohta and Lyle Ritz. His most recent album, The Wind and Sun, was released in August 2020. In 1999, Jim composed and premiered Uke Can’t Be Serious, a concerto for solo ukulele and symphony orchestra. Since then, the piece has been performed with both high school and professional orchestras, including the Michigan Philharmonic in 2016. He has also performed it many times with a string quartet. His second concerto for ukulele and orchestra, The Dove Tale, premiered in 2017 with the Wallingford (Connecticut) Symphony Orchestra. Jim and his wife, Liz Maihock Beloff, own Flea Market Music, Inc., a company dedicated to the ukulele and they play their family’s Fluke, Flea and Firefly ukes. They have toured Japan, Australia and Canada and believe in their company’s motto, “Uke Can Change the World.” Visit Jim online: Here.
Jim Lenn
Jim Lenn grew up in southern California. Starting music at the age of eight and after hearing The Beatles at 12, he knew music would play a big part in his life. Upon relocating to the East Coast in 1999, Jim needed to travel for work and the friendly, portable ukulele became a mainstay of his travels. After being asked to teach ukulele for the Windsor Adult Education program in 2015 the New England Ukulele Ensemble was formed. Along with this larger ensemble the ukulele quartet Snapback was created and after opening for the Hartford Symphony, they released their well-received Christmas CD “Uke Tide Carols.” During this time Jim was also teaching ukulele for the Granby Library and a group in Simsbury. With the difficulties brought on by the Covid 19 Pandemic it was decided that all these groups could be brought together to form what is now the Kinetic Ukes performance ensemble. For the past 3 years Jim has directed the Kinetic Ukes based out of Simsbury, Connecticut. Besides performing solo acoustic shows throughout New England, Jim is involved in the James Hill Ukulele Initiative and is most happy when teaching and sharing the love of ukulele and music with anyone interested!
Third Annual Nutmeg Ukulele Festival Workshops
ANNE KU
How to personalize the Happy Birthday song - Intermediate
One of the songs every ukulele player should know by heart, happy birthday is a three chord song that has great potential. Personalize your birthday greeting by adding your own introduction, riffs, chords and other musical elements.
Hawaiian vamp in Hawaiian songs - Advanced
The famous three-chord progression to introduce a song and interlude between verses and refrains is based on the Circle of Fifths. The exact chords depend on the key of the song. Learn the Hawaiian vamp in the most popular keys and the strum and fingerpicking patterns to make it authentic.
Ode to Joy for ukulele - Beginner to Advanced Beginner
2024 is the bicentennial of the premiere of Beethoven's last symphony which contains the famous "Ode to Joy" in the final movement. In 1985, it was adopted to become the European Union anthem. Learn the different parts to play this piece together. You can finger pick and strum.
The Two Most Important Chords in Every Key - Beginner
What are the 20% of chords and 20% of the keys that are used 80% of the time? Here's a shortcut to learning and accompanying most of the songs you'll ever play. We will cycle through these chords and dozens of songs you already know in this workshop, for all levels. Beginner players will practice fingering and switching between chords and learn new strum patterns. Advanced players can fingerpick the melodies as well as add riffs to ornament.
ARMAND AROMIN
Intro/int/adv Clawhammer Ukulele - Beginner
Learn foundational technique.
Fingers to Spare? Try Chord Embellishments! - Advanced
Bored with your chords? We’ll use free fingers to embellish the chords you (possibly) already know!
Uke accompaniment for folk music and how to make it groove- (with fiddle accompaniment) - Intermediate
Any level, working on rhythmic and chordal ideas to accompany Irish/old time/etc tunes, and how to make it fit the style
ABBY LYONS
Ukulele 101 - Beginner
So you just picked up a ukulele, hooray! Let’s learn how to hold the ukulele, how to strum, the 4 most common chords, and a couple of simple songs.
Fingerpicking - Beginner/Intermediate
New to the world of fingerpicking? Come to this workshop to learn 3 common picking patterns that you can apply to many songs!
Taylor Swift songs - Beginner
Learn how to play 22 easy Taylor Swift songs on your ukulele. Chords include C F Am and G. Tracklist: Out of the Woods, Shake It Off, All Too Well, Blank Space, and many more!
Musical Theater songs - Intermediate
Learn how to play musical theater songs on your ukulele! This genre of music explores complex harmonies, so there will be a large variety of chords. Tracklist may include: Tomorrow from Annie, For Good from Wicked, and Memory from Cats.
JIM BELOFF
Jazzing Up The Ukulele - Advanced
How to use chord substitutions to “jazz up” a simple 4 or 5 chord song. Based on the 2015 Flea Market Music book. We’ll also play through several Lyle Ritz classic jazz arrangements.
JIM LENN
The Baritone Ukulele
Do you play the baritone ukulele ?? Have you thought of getting a baritone ukulele but are not sure how it fits into the standard ukulele world, especially at group events when only standard ukulele chords are shown on the music or projected on the screen ?? The baritone ukulele is the unsung hero of the ukulele world !! In this class we will explore the many benefits and uses of this fantastic instrument not only in group play but also as a solo instrument - We will look at some techniques to get the most out of the baritone ukulele and some ways to make it easier to participate in group events – So grab you're baritone ukulele, or come to see if adding a baritone ukulele to your musical journey is right for you, and let's play!