A lively and entertaining evening with SEVEN ukulele greats! An amazing amount of talent takes the stage to offer swing, jazz, blues, bluegrass, Latin, folk, rock, and lots of laughs, presented as part of the Ashokan Concert Series.
Daniel Ward’s unique style is a product of a lifetime career as a versatile guitarist. Known primarily for his virtuosic command of flamenco and Latin styles, he has toured with renowned dance companies including Maria Benitez, Yjastros, and Dance España as well as world tours with pop-phenomenon Ottmar Liebert. His skills on the electric guitar in jazz, rock and world styles have taken him to the Telluride Jazz Festival with his group Caribe, and his playing can be heard on Robbie Robertson’s “Music For The Native Americans.” In 2015 he released his first solo ukulele album, “El Ukulele.”
Heidi Swedberg has been messing around with a ukulele since she was 5. Born in Hawaii, she received her first instrument from the Easter Bunny. In her 20 years as an actress in the TV/Film industry she’s had occasion to play uke, baritone and tenor guitar. She taught the cast of SEINFELD to play “Happy Birthday” when she worked with them playing Susan, George’s ill-fated fiancée. She and her partner Daniel Ward perform for families as Sukey Jump Band and for sophisticated adults as The Smoking Jackets.
Kevin Carroll is a performing and recording artist and teaches uke to all ages and levels. He has launched a ukulele-based music education company called edUKEcation.com, which brings curriculum and instruments to schools and students. He has played guitar and toured across the globe with Americana artists such as the Flatlanders (Joe Ely, Butch Hancock and Jimmie Dale Gilmore), Jimmy LaFave, Alejandro Escovedo, Robyn Ludwick, Charlie and Bruce Robison and many others.
Fred Sokolow is best known as the author of nearly 200 instructional books and DVDs for guitar, ukulele, banjo, Dobro, mandolin and lap steel. Fred is a well-known West Coast multi-string performer and recording artist. He has toured and recorded with Bay Area-based hippie rock band, Notes From the Underground and has performed with R&B, rock, country and bluegrass bands including John Herald, Frank Wakefield and Jerry Garcia. He has opened for the Dead, the Doors, B.B. King, Country Joe and the Fish and countless others. He teaches lessons at music camps and music stores, including the renowned McCabes in Santa Monica. Fred currently performs with some of LA’s finest musicians and he’s active on the studio scene, playing on numerous albums and soundtracks. Whether Fred is playing Delta bottleneck blues, bluegrass or old-time banjo, 30s swing guitar or screaming rock solos, he does it with authenticity and passion.
Lynn Sokolow has been playing stand-up bass with the ukulele community ever since her husband Fred carried her over the uke threshold! Although she began playing electric bass in rock and R&B bands, (and currently plays upright bass in several bluegrass bands), Lynn has since come to her senses and jumped on board with ukulele bass. The primary focus in all of her musical endeavors is to generate as much fun out of playing as is humanly possible!
Gerald Ross is comfortable with just about every type of “roots” music there is, from western swing, bluegrass, Hawaiian, blues, jug band music, jazz standards, Tin Pan Alley, New Orleans rhythms to boogie-woogie, and he plays it all on guitar, lap steel, Dobro and ukulele. He’s performed in concert with Bonnie Raitt, Arlo Guthrie, Doc Watson, Johnny Gimble, Riders In The Sky, Brownie McGhee and many others. Gerald won the Solo Artist Category of the 1993 WEMU Jazz Competition and has appeared many times on “A Prairie Home Companion.” These days, Gerald is one of America’s best-known performers on, and advocates for, the ukulele and lap steel guitar; he’s released several CDs of ukulele music, published instructional materials, and is very much in demand as a camp instructor.
Ben Hassenger’s musical career began in the early 1970s when he was arrested for playing “Smoke on the Water” on accordion and singing in animal sounds in the cafeteria at Lansing Community College. He is a music facilitator with Special Education, teaches ukulele in schools and senior centers, and private lessons at Elderly Instruments, Interlochen, and Michigan State University. He plays guitar and ukulele in the bands Blue Jello and The Ukulele Kings and is the cofounder of the Lansing Area Ukulele Group and the organizer of the Mighty Uke Day festival, Interlochen’s Uketoberfest, and the Midwest Uke Camp in Olivet, Michigan. He is also a prolific songwriter, with two of his songs about the Detroit Tigers enshrined in the National Baseball Hall of Fame.