It can't have escaped your attention that the ukulele is 130 years old this year. It has? Oh.
On August 23rd 1879 the Ravenscrag docked at Honolulu after a long and traumatic voyage bringing Portuguese immigrants from Madeira. So happy were the Portuguese to arrive in Hawaii after weeks cooped up in a creaking, stinky, cramped old puffer of a ship with creaking, stinky, cramped old puffers of people, that one of them leapt onto the quayside, whipped out his machete (a Portuguese stringed instrument, not to be confused with a sharp cutting tool - it's a mistake many have made; often with grisly consequences) and began to play.
Watching locals at the harbour were entranced by the performance, and, according to legend, as the player's fingers skipped around the fingerboard began to point and call out "uku lele", meaning 'jumping flea'.
Three Portuguese cabinet makers began to produce simplified versions of the machete on the islands, which became the ukulele - an instrument which, 130 years on to the day, is enjoying almost unprecedented global popularity - including in Ireland.
It's not often you get the chance to attend a 130th birthday party; hence Bewley's Café Theatre presents Happy Birthday To Uke, the hottest ukulele birthday party happening anywhere in Dublin that day. Hell, yeah. One hundred and thirty years to the day after a Portuguese musician dazzled some Hawaiians and sparked the creation of the ukulele, some of Dublin's finest ukulele folk tip the trilby to the jumping flea.
Happy Birthday To Uke
Sunday 23rd August 2009, 8pm
Bewley's Café Theatre, Grafton Street, Dublin
€10
Featuring
The Sick And Indigent Song Club - long established as one of Dublin's best live acts, their irresistable blend of old-time, country and roots is no better exemplified than on their forthcoming new album. Their live reputation is second to none, and that's thanks in no small part to ukulele maestro and songbird Angie McLaughlin, Ireland's top ukulele performer. Every gig is a party to the Sick and Indigent, so who better to help celebrate the 130th birthday of the ukulele in appropriate style? http://www.myspace.com/sickandindigentsongclub
Charlie Connelly - Award-winning broadcaster, bestselling author and ukulele ambassador Charlie Connelly takes us on an entertaining musical journey through the history and culture of the ukulele, a ride that takes in a range of unexpected characters from Marilyn Monroe to Laurel and Hardy via Pearl Jam, Rupert Brooke and Tony Blair. Having performed across the world from London to New York to Hawaii there's no better guide to the quirky, idiosyncratic world of the uke than Charlie. http://www.charlieconnelly.com
Other acts TBC
Admission includes slice of ukulele birthday cake (if we can get one big enough).
Tickets available online soon.
More info - feedback@charlieconnelly.com
