In 2004, musician “Manitoba Hal” Brolund organized an “Ukulele Expo”, held in Portage la Prairie, that included workshops, concerts, and jams featuring Jim & Liz Beloff and Joel Eckhaus. A second Ukulele Expo was held in 2005 in Winnipeg, and featured Ralph Shaw and a young James Hill who was just beginning to be known across Canada. Despite the line-up, the Expo was a bit ahead of its time, and attendance was disappointing. Still, it garnered enough interest in local ukesters that The Ukulele Club of Winnipeg was established soon after.

Starting with just a handful of people, the UCW would meet casually in members’ living rooms to share their joy of the ukulele. Scott Sauder designed the first club logo. Word soon got around locally about this ‘little guitar’, resulting in the Club garnering attention in a local newspaper article and CBC radio. As a result, interest grew and more players meant the need for a venue to support the growing membership. By 2009, the Tuesday night jams at Casa Grande Restaurant became a regular feature on the Club’s calendar. Back then, though, a ‘great turnout’ would be a dozen strummers!

More jamming helped newer players become better and emboldened them to perform. Nine nervous strummers braved a church basement stage to perform three short songs for an appreciative audience – the first public performance of record for the UCW.

Then in early 2012, the Winnipeg Folk Festival offered a Beginning ukulele class taught by Kate Ferris. Twenty-five enthusiastic players signed up! At one point, three members of that first class decided they wanted to be able to play more than just once a week. They contacted the Kings Head Pub and arranged to meet every second Sunday afternoon, and “Strum and Suds” was born. Members of the Ukulele Club of Winnipeg were informed about the gathering, and eventually the two groups merged. New faces continued arriving, and the Club eventually outgrew the Kings Head and moved to the Viscount Gort.

Someone at the Kings Head jam mentioned that the Harlem Globetrotters would soon be in town and, on a lark, suggested that they should play “Sweet Georgia Brown” (the team’s theme song) at the Bell Centre. It was a song from the Vancouver Circle songbook they were already playing. Less than three weeks later and with little formal practice together, twelve intrepid strummers gathered to play Sweet Georgia Brown and a couple of other songs for an appreciative crowd before the game. The newly formed King Street Strummers were soon performing in the community at festivals, street fairs, and for senior homes. The Club also formed Prairie Aloha, a performance group led by Kate Ferris and Fred Casey, whose repertoire is primarily Hawaiian songs, exposing Manitoba audiences to the beautiful music of the islands.

At the same time, small informal jam groups formed by members also started popping up. New clubs even formed around the province in Carman, Brandon, Thompson, and Portage La Prairie. Club membership grew – there were new members who could already play, and coupled with the emerging skills of WFF students, soon there was a clamouring for a regular avenue to display those skills. This gave rise to open mic nights which are always well attended. They have been a great showcase for the wealth of talent in the Club, and also an accommodating way for new performers to show off what they have learned.

In 2018, as part of a natural growth curve and coinciding with its 10th anniversary, the Club hosted the Prairie Jamboree Ukulele Festival at the Viscount Gort Hotel. Spearheaded by Club president Tim Hogue and a great bunch of volunteers, the festival was a grand celebration of the ukulele not seen since Manitoba Hal’s first expo. The festival provided an opportunity to unveil the new logo designed by member Phil Natividad and the release of the club’s proprietary anniversary song book. But most of all, it featured such luminaries as Marcie Marxer and Cathy Fink, Ukester Brown, and Kevin Carroll who gave workshops and performed at a Gala Concert at the Crescentwood Fort Rouge United Church. The festival sold out and was a resounding success with both attendees and visiting instructor/performers. There were plans for a follow-up festival in 2020, but those were derailed by the Covid pandemic.

In spite of the pandemic, the Club managed to stay active and relevant by holding regular online jams and some great themed online workshops with the likes of Lil’ Rev, Kevin Carroll, Aaron Keim, and Gerald Ross. Local teachers were teaching online, too, drawing in new players, and helping attract and maintain members until the Club could meet in person again.

Like the rest of society after the pandemic, the Club has been in recovery, but what a recovery it has been! The bi-weekly strum has moved from the Viscount Gort to a new home at the Henderson Legion, and these Strums are highly anticipated, often drawing as many as seventy strummers Winnipeg and nearby communities. The Club even livestreams the strums on Facebook to give people who are unable to attend a chance to play along. Open mics continue to be held at the Legion every three months and are as popular as ever. In the post pandemic restart, the club also unveiled its new slogan, “Four Strings, One Community” reflecting the cohesiveness and unity of a group brought together by the mighty ukulele.