Seasons of the Ukulele

A weekly song challenge for ukulele players - all welcome. Find out more here

Season 683 - Music from Laurel Canyon

DelGriff

joo

Watch Joo’s wrap everyone - you won’t regret it! 😆

[deleted]

thank you for this week Brian xo

a Jackson Browne song

AlanDP

Here's an old one that fits the current theme. Like Bernie's song, this was also for season 380. I spent a lot of time on it, so I think it's worth recycling.

DelGriff

This is a song co-written by Carole King (with Howard Greenfield). I first heard it (and loved it) on an A-ha album in the 1980s - I had no idea at the time that it dated back to the early ‘60s. It was only when the glorious and much-missed Liz Brinker suggested we might collaborate on a version of it for a Season a few years back that I learned the truth about it.

Baritone uke with synth bass, pads, piano instrumental break, homemade drum track and harmony vocals.

Crying In The Rain - cover of a song by Everly Brothers, A-ha and others (SOTU 683)

[deleted]

a song from Judy Collins' beautiful album, 'Baby's Bedtime'

bonesoup

Hello all, I think CSN lived in or had ties to this area, so here is Military Madness from Graham Nash's first solo album, Songs for Beginners. Happy spring, or autumn if you're below the equator!

dr_mitch

Time for my second this season - This Wheel's on Fire, by the Band (with Bob Dylan). There are a couple of Laurel Canyon connections. The first is that this was covered by Laurel Canyon band the Byrds. And the Band recorded their second album in Sammy David Junior's house, which is at least adjacent to Laurel Canyon.

This theme is incredibly wide open with a little bit of homework!

[deleted]

last one from me, another sweet ol children's bedtime song

from Judy Collins. thanks a lot Brian xo

UkeFoote

keep the submissions flowing, folks… two days to go! Remember you can also post a single from Seasons past. Here’s mine, with daughter Ani on keyboards and Borfus on the bass… Fleffikon’s rendition of the Doors “End of the Night”

Playlist up to date. 👍

YorkSteve

Here's one with quite a few Laurel Canyon connections. The words were originally written by a Welsh poet, Idris Davies, and they were put to music by Pete Seeger. Since then it has been recorded by The Byrds, (plus solo versions by Roger McGuinn and Chris Hillman), Judy Collins, Gram Parsons, and heaps of others from elsewhere. But nearly all of them pronounce Rhymney incorrectly. It's Rum-nee.

AlanDP

A song inspired by the house that Jim Morrison and Pamela Courson lived in, for a time, in Laurel Canyon. With overdubs of ukulele, melodica, and Roland AE-01 playing an "organ" sound. I couldn't come up with a sound that sounded like a real Farfisa.

Bystander

uke4ia

"Sail On Sailor" by the Beach Boys. I broke out the tiple for the first time in a LONG time, because this is the song that I have always found works best on it. Somehow I've never done this one for the Seasons before.

If you're not familiar with the tiple, it's a mutation of the ukulele with 10 steel strings. I think the Martin Co. decided a hundred years ago that there needed to be a uke equivalent to the 12-string guitar. Mine requires tuning before every take, and even then one of the strings is likely to drop a full tone during the song. The tuning is (capital letters are an octave lower):

gG cCc eEe aa

It's hard to get all three of the E or C strings fretted properly because the string in the middle is much thicker.

uke4ia

And here's my old song for the week, "The Loner", from a Neil Young theme in Season 141. (I miss having that much hair.)

Barbablanca

Finally I wrote a new song especially for this Season. My wife says I see resemblances in people too easily, but this one was way beyond that. The likeness was truly uncanny.

Hope you like:

uke4ia

I've got a fever, and the only cure is MORE TIPLE!!! Here's my 3rd video for the Season. This is a Crosby, Stills & Nash song called "Carried Away" that was written by Graham Nash. It was on the album that had "Just a Song Before I Go".

Joko

I'm not sure if this song is from the days when JM was living and writing there in the canyon, but I've always liked this song. It speaks to me.

dr_mitch

I've played this one before for the Seasons relatively recently, but here's a new recording. I couldn't resist some Jefferson Airplane.

OnlyUkeThatMatters

Back in the 90s, the indie rock scene here in Portland, Oregon felt like home to me. It was a wonderful, supportive creative community. While no one broke through to mainstream success, it felt special to be there at that time.

Graham Nash was right in the center of the Laurel Canyon scene, connected to so many of his fellow musicians in so many ways.

Nash's song "I Used to be a King" captures that feeling we get when we realize our scene isn't the same anymore, and it won't ever be like it once was.

UkeCan1

I'm a few minutes late, but this song's entire reason for being was to be a twofer, so I hope you enjoy it anyway.

Sheryl Crow's "All I Wanna Do" spent 6 weeks at Billboard's #2, and prominently mentions Santa Monica Blvd, which is tantalizingly close to Laurel Canyon and nearly intersects LC Blvd ... close but no cigar.

I saw that the Beach Boys had a song by the exact same title I might mash it up with ... but I don't know it.

So I chose the Byrds' "All I Really Want to Do" instead.

This actually made it easier, because I have no idea how the verses go in the Sheryl Crow song ... but everybody knows the chorus, right?

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