Sarah Maisel and Craig Chee - Sarah talks about their new sound

Come Back Home (GNUF Tour Version)



Sarah and Craig put this video together when they got back home to America to share their memories of the folks at the Grand Northern Ukulele Festival (GNUF) held in Huddersfield, England in May. It is a joy... (I was very surprised and thrilled to see my own face pop up there with Sarah...)

They are a very special couple, as anyone who has met them or seen them perform together on stage will tell you. Off-stage they both have a genuine warmth, which embraces anyone they meet - that certain something that makes you feel as if just at that moment you are the most important person in the world to them... and their on-stage chemistry makes their performance something quite exceptional - every time.

When I first heard Sarah play, at UFGB two years ago, her style was jazz standards, but she and Craig have now worked on developing their own sound, as you can hear in the video and on their first full length album together, just released, "Scene 1: Take 1".

This is what Sarah told me...

"When Craig and I first started working together- we really just played our own styles, and backed each other up. I played low G and he played High G. Eventually we started to want more from our playing- especially if we did not have a bass player or guitarist with us. Two ukes, even with the high G and low G didn’t’ give us the depth of sound we were looking for.

For our CD “With Love”- Craig decided to play Baritone ‘Ukulele for a song or two. This gave us the depth we were looking for, but we still weren’t 100% happy with the Baritone sound. We had already begun working with GHS Strings (USA) on creating custom string sets. After working with the Baritone Uke, he asked them about creating a set for the uke that would be Baritone tuning, but re-entrant (meaning the top string is a high note). AND he wanted this set to fit a TENOR ‘Ukulele. The main reason for wanting the tenor uke scale was ease of travel- it is much easier to travel on planes with a tenor uke, than with the baritone. The Re-entrant tuning was important because he still wanted to play it like an ‘ukulele, utilizing that top string. Though this tuning is not new (Lyle Ritz and Benny Chong have both used it), for some reason it never gained popularity. After months of trial and error, we figured out the set and the uke became a new instrument again! Craig could not stop playing it and became re-inspired. We started doing harmonizing picking, along with our harmonizing vocals and we realized we had such a large sound for two people and two ukes.

It has been a fun and wonderful experience and we are very happy with the direction we are headed. When we perform together, we do switch instruments frequently. It’s actually very refreshing for us, as performers, to have a change of pace during the show. You would think it’s difficult to wrap your head around, but it really isn’t! All of the chord shapes are the same- but you’ll be thinking in a different key. MEANING- If I am playing a standard tuned uke in the key of C, Craig will be playing the Bari-Tenor tuned uke in the key of F. Once you get used to thinking of songs in numbers- like , the 1 chord, or the 4 chord, it is actually very easy to switch turnings."

Fascinating stuff! Thanks for that, Sarah!

And just in case you didn't know, Sarah and Craig are indeed a couple and will be marrying in Hawaii in September!

Watch this video on youtube

And - if you want to read more about Craig and Sarah, there's a great article and interview here on Rock at Night...