Ukulele Review – Julie Strietelmeier Orders a Custom Lichty Ukulele
When someone as way cool in the world of ukuleles as Julie Strietelmeier dials Jay up and says, I’ve got to have a custom Lichty, we get pretty excited. Julie is the gal behind the website Ukulele Review, which is yet another great site for ukulele fans. The mix of postings include instrument reviews, a heads-up on fun uke videos and much more. Definitely swing by and check it out.
Here is a bit about Julie, in her own words (from the site) … My name is Julie Strietelmeier and I’m obsessed with ukuleles. Let me back up a bit… I actually taught myself to play fingerstyle guitar years ago when I was a teenager. I always liked the idea of playing whole songs (melody and chords) all by myself because I didn’t have the opportunity to play with other people and I wasn’t a singer. I had several guitars through the years, but always had a thing for small travel guitars. I tried several of them but when it came right down to it, I just wasn’t very good at playing the guitar period. So after years of plunking around from time to time, my guitar took up permanent residence in its case. Very sad, I know…
Then in October of 2007, I somehow happened upon two videos of people playing songs on the ukulele. The first video that I saw was a YouTube video of Jake Shimabukuro playing a My Guitar Gently Weeps (Beatles) on a ukulele and the second video was Michael Wagner playing a tune called Spooky. I was completely blown away because in all my years of researching, buying and trying various travel guitars, I’d never even considered a ukulele. Heck, I never even had a clue that people played fingerstyle on these little instruments. A few days after seeing those videos, I ordered my first ukulele (a concert sized Koa Pono PKC-1E) and a few hours after unboxing it, I posted my first attempt at playing a tune.
A few weeks later and I was still obsessed with this instrument, so I decided to start-up a new website devoted to it. I’m no stranger to running a website. I run another popular site called The Gadgeteer, where I review consumer electronics, gadgets and gizmos. That site is over 10 years old now!
My plans for this site are to write reviews of instruments, accessories, CDs, DVDs and books. I know I have a lot to learn about this wonderful little instrument, but I hope that my opinions will be helpful. Wish me luck growing ukulelereview.com
A Custom Uke for Julie
The first step in the custom build process is choosing that perfect set of wood and Julie certainly has. Here it is:
Her Custom Tenor Ukulele Features: Brazilian rosewood back, sides and headplate, curly redwood soundboard, maple rosette, koa binding
It is well underway and here are some shop images as of March 26, 2011 …
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