On Thursday April 23rd, 2020, about 30 participants from Hawaii to Italy gathered online in ZOOM to sing and play the ukulele. The theme for this one-hour session was songs of names of boys or guys, as the previous one was about girls. This series called “Three Chord Thursdays at Three” meets every Thursday at 3 pm EDT.
How does one make a community when you can only hear one person sing and play the uke at any one time? The online zoom session, even if optimized for music, doesn’t allow two people on two different microphones in two locations to play together.
We decided to try something different.
“Did everyone bring their sunglasses? Let’s put them on and hold our ukuleles up.”
“Hold on,” said one participant in Cambridge, Massachusetts. “Let me get it from the other room.”
“I count to three and everyone say, ‘Three Chord Thursdays at Three’ !”
Somehow doing things together and being able to see everyone else doing the same made a difference. There was a sense of community, even though we were isolated in our homes across continents and oceans.
We were able to do all of the following songs except Tom Dooley. Bolded song titles refer to those song sheets that can easily be transposed.
- Da Doo Ron Ron – a song about Bill – Anne (UK), Adrienne (TX)
- Charlie on the MTA (or is it Charlie AND the MTA)
- Me and Bobby McGee
- Frankie and Johnny – Jerry (MA)
- Johnny Be Goode
- Louie Louie – Marisa (MA)
- Mack the Knife – June (MA)
- Hey Mickey – Toni Basil – uses the Z-chord (percussive mute with left hand)
- Sloop John B – Steffi (MA)
- A Boy Named Sue – recited rather than sung – Jerry (MA)
- Tom Dooley – a two chord song
Pingback: Three Chord Thursdays at Three –Anne Ku