Our shows
The ukulele brings us so much joy and we want to share those good vibes with others. We have a very large group. At Fiesta La Ballona (Culver City’s County Fair) and The Culver City Senior Center Holiday Show we can be 60 players strong. But mostly we have done shows for smaller audiences in senior communities, for folks with dementia and other issues at Opica Adult Day Care Center, we have played for runners at The Culver City Screenland 5K race, at our local Farmers Market and at the opening of the Expo Metro Line, The Culver City Woman’s Club, The Retired Teachers of Santa Monica and for other groups and organizations. We have frequently included a “teaching segment” in our shows, giving a couple people from the audience a chance to learn a song on the ukulele while everyone else sings along. Ukulele joy is contagious!
We teach children how to play
Before the pandemic, several CC Strummers took the initiative and set up a teaching program at nearby Marina del Rey Middle School. Ukuleles were purchased or donated, one of the school teachers (who was also a CC Strummer) opened her room at lunch time and oversaw the class. We had a rotating team of volunteer teachers from our group who brought music education, via the ukulele, to our neighborhood children. The program grew in popularity and at the end each semester the kids “put on a show.”
The science is in. We know how learning music at a young age benefits us throughout our entire life and The CC Strummers are proud to have initiated and been part of this program. Many hands. Many hearts.
We are all students. And teachers. Our players teach their grandchildren to strum their first ukulele. They teach their friends, neighbors and the list goes on. As I like to say, the best way to learn something is to teach it to someone else.
We volunteered at the UCLA Mattel Children’s Hospital
Our players have big bold ideas and they bring energy and enthusiasm to the table. That’s how we learned about The Ukulele Kid’s Club (UKC), an organization that donates ukuleles to pediatric hospitals in North America and now Europe. One of our members wanted to send a donation in our name and UKC asked if we have a designated hospital. We landed on UCLA. It’s close by, they were about to launch their music therapy program and we got in on the ground floor. Our donations paid for ukuleles and tuners. One of our CC Strummers put a whole songbook together so the kids could keep learning new tunes and chords.
Every other month a team of six players would carpool to UCLA to sing for patients in pediatrics and pediatric ICU. We also taught kids (and parents) to strum and presented them with a ukulele. For keepsies. Our CC Strummers continue to donate money to The UKC, keeping UCLA well stocked with ukes. In fact the ukuleles have become an integral part of the music therapy program, which is also growing and now includes internships. Over the years, so many of our players participated in this program and for some, it was life-changing. Music brings healing to the heart and lightness to our spirit. When we gifted a kid with a ukulele, their joy was “wow, wow, wow!” Parents would weep. When we played and sang “Stand By Me” at the nurses stations, you could see their hands unclenching, just a little. That’s what music does.