Ukulele-Festival

Martin Walter is a well-known teacher for ukulele and guitar in Freiburg and the surrounding area. This is the very southwestern part of Germany. For some years he has passed his knowledge and his art on to many teachers of primary and secondary schools in Freiburg. So today, it is quite common to teach and play ukulele in school.

Besides that, Martin is teaching in his own studio. He is running a biennial ukulele festival. In and around Freiburg, he is a well-known artist and live performer in his own right.

Refreshing simple basic patterns

Calypso, shuffle and more… Everybody uses the basic strumming patterns on the uke, but there is a wide variety of perceptions of which is the right way to play these patterns. After cleaning up a little bit, you will find interesting techniques like slap, chuck, rolls and more to pimp up the basic patterns for a colourful and groovy play.

Required playing level: Basic chords

The time has come. Pink Floyd’s legendary song from 1975 finally finds it home on the uke. We will work on all three different parts of the song. The song fits the low-G-uke perfectly, but there should not be any problems with the high-G-uke. The guitar becomes a uke in the chords, the soli, partly bottleneck, turn out fine. The song itself shines with simple, yet brilliant chords. Glass or metal bottlenecks -the choice is yours - even empty Jim-Beam-bottles are possible.

Frank presents two traditional Hulas in his workshop. These pretty and catchy songs tell of Hawaii and the soul of the uke. Simple chords and traditional techniques complement each other. To make sure that everybody will be taking two complete songs home, there will be singing, too. There is a Hula dancing workshop taking place simultaneously, where the Hulas we will be playing are being danced to. Finally, musicians and dancers will meet on stage for an extraordinary performance of music and dance in the true Hawaiian Hula style.