{"id":850,"date":"2013-08-30T17:11:34","date_gmt":"2013-08-31T00:11:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/calirose.com\/blog\/?p=850"},"modified":"2013-08-30T17:11:34","modified_gmt":"2013-08-31T00:11:34","slug":"bacon-lemonade-and-smokin-ukuleles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/calirose.com\/wackyworld\/bacon-lemonade-and-smokin-ukuleles\/","title":{"rendered":"BACON LEMONADE AND SMOKIN’ UKULELES"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Photo by Craig Brandau<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Welcome to the land of bacon lemonade, spam musubi and rows of Porta Potties sponsored by Sees Candy. It\u2019s\u00a0Fiesta La Ballona<\/a>\u00a0time in Culver City, California and Sunday morning, forty-five of The CC Strummers arrive early for our \u201creally big show.\u201d<\/p>\n

We bring our music stands and ukuleles, husbands, wives, friends and neighbors. We wear aloha shirts, leis and flowers tucked behind either the \u201cI\u2019m-Taken or I\u2019m-Not\u201d ear.<\/p>\n

The CC Strummers have been practicing our thirty-minute set every Monday and Thursday for weeks because that\u2019s what it takes to get this stuff under our fingers.\u00a0Repetition<\/em>\u00a0is key to becoming a good musician. I call it\u00a0wood-shedding<\/em>. Doing the grunt work. Playing that new chord or fancy lick\u00a0five hundred times<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Five hundred times\u2026 If we\u2019re lucky.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Photo by Debbie Cahill<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Beginning with our CC Strummers\u2019 theme song we launch into a music mix that is joyfully eclectic. Sure we do our version of Iz\u2019s version of\u00a0Somewhere over the Rainbow<\/em>, but we also scat on I Got Rhythm and get the audience \u201cwhoo-whooing\u201d with us on\u00a0Opihi Man<\/em>. We sing a song in Japanese.\u00a0Sukiyaki<\/em>. Because we can.<\/p>\n

Then we perform the fabulous tune,\u00a0Sway<\/em>. Also known as\u00a0Quien Sera<\/em>. This song has been translated into almost every language on Mother Earth. We tackle it in English and Spanish. I enlist my husband,\u00a0Craig Brandau<\/a>, to man the video camera, which is his little blue phone.\u00a0Click here<\/a>\u00a0to see our smokin\u2019 arrangement that includes rrrr-rolling and an exquisitely placed grunt. (Thank you The Northern Virginia Ukulele Society for the “grunt” idea).<\/p>\n

One of our favorite songs to play together is\u00a0Ghost Riders in the Sky<\/em>\u00a0and of course we invite the audience to \u201cyippee-yi-ay\u201d with us. Our mistress of percussion, Marilyn, hauls a sack of\u00a0clicking, clacking<\/em>\u00a0instruments along and she let\u2019s \u201cdem ponies\u201d run free on this one. Would you like to channel your inner cow\u00a0person<\/em>\u00a0and join the fun?\u00a0Click here<\/a>\u00a0to watch.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Photo by Debbie Cahill<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We end the show with the reprise of our theme song and the audience applauds. And applauds. Then they stand up and keep on applauding. I\u2019m stunned. We are all stunned. Not that we don\u2019t deserve this\u2026but\u2026like\u2026WOW! The CC Strummers suddenly stand up too. It\u2019s the sweetest thing. I don\u2019t have to replay it in my mind because hubby captures the whole\u00a0standing-up-thing<\/em>\u00a0on video and believe me, I\u2019ve watched it over and over.<\/p>\n

And it doesn\u2019t take long to identify the \u201cring leaders\u201d in the audience. First I see the\u00a0husband<\/em>\u00a0of one of our CC Strummers cajoling others around him to get on their feet too. With manly gusto, he sweeps his arms up. Up! UP! And there\u2019s Debbie, our treasured Senior Program Specialist from\u00a0The Culver City Senior Center<\/a>, bouncing up and down as she moves towards the stage. Witness the sheer power of personality and a smile soaked in ukulele joy as she takes aim with her camera and rouses everyone else to\u00a0show their appreciation<\/em>. The announcer,\u00a0Ronnie Jayne<\/a>, implores the audience with her warm persuasive voice to \u201cgive it up, give it up for them.\u201d<\/p>\n

You see, it takes a village\u2026 \u00a0And voila! Standing ovation!\u00a0Click here<\/a>\u00a0to watch the panorama unfold.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>There is no other musical instrument that engenders this kind of \u201cjoy\u201d and sense of ohana\u2014family\u2014than the four-stringed wonder. Whoever you are and wherever you live, if you are willing to do a little wood-shedding and learn a few chords and strums, you too can snag some joy and make music that does the heart and body good.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Welcome to the land of bacon lemonade, spam musubi and rows of Porta Potties sponsored by Sees Candy. It\u2019s\u00a0Fiesta La Ballona\u00a0time in Culver City, California and Sunday morning, forty-five of The CC Strummers arrive early for our \u201creally big show.\u201d We bring our music stands and ukuleles, husbands, wives, friends and neighbors. We wear aloha shirts, leis and flowers tucked behind either the \u201cI\u2019m-Taken or I\u2019m-Not\u201d ear. The CC Strummers have been practicing our thirty-minute set every Monday and Thursday … Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","kt_blocks_editor_width":"","_kad_blocks_custom_css":"","_kad_blocks_head_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_body_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_footer_custom_js":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-850","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blogentry"],"taxonomy_info":{"category":[{"value":2,"label":"blog entry"}]},"featured_image_src_large":false,"author_info":{"display_name":"Cali Rose","author_link":"https:\/\/calirose.com\/wackyworld\/author\/crbauthor\/"},"comment_info":0,"category_info":[{"term_id":2,"name":"blog entry","slug":"blogentry","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":2,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":0,"count":138,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":2,"category_count":138,"category_description":"","cat_name":"blog entry","category_nicename":"blogentry","category_parent":0}],"tag_info":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/calirose.com\/wackyworld\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/850","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/calirose.com\/wackyworld\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/calirose.com\/wackyworld\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/calirose.com\/wackyworld\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/calirose.com\/wackyworld\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=850"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/calirose.com\/wackyworld\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/850\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/calirose.com\/wackyworld\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=850"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/calirose.com\/wackyworld\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=850"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/calirose.com\/wackyworld\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=850"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}