James Hill
The Ukulele Hooley team are thrilled to welcome James Hill to the 10th anniversary Ukulele Hooley festival.
A seasoned performer with an ever-growing fan base in North America, Asia and Europe, Hill has garnered wide acclaim for his songwriting skills and ground-breaking approach to the chronically-underestimated.
Over the course of his first three genre-defying albums, Hill re-wrote every rule that had previously kept the ukulele in the realm of novelty and obscurity. Then came the Canadian-Folk-Music-Award-winning True Love Don’t Weep (Borealis, 2009), his collaboration with cellist/singer Anne Janelle, an album that pushed the budding songwriter into new territory and topped folk radio charts across North America. Since the release of his acclaimed Man With a Love Song in 2011, Hill has become known as much for his songwriting as for his instrumental virtuosity.
Hill’s latest album, The Old Silo, finds him charting a course into deeper, rockier waters with producer Joel Plaskett at the helm. The music has an edginess and swagger unlike anything Hill has ever recorded: the thundering baritone ukulele riff in She’s Still Got It would be right at home on a Black Keys single and the grinding slide ukulele in Tie One On would make Jack White proud.
A humble, uncompromising artist who “gives the ukulele its dignity back without ever taking himself – or the instrument – too seriously” (Songlines), James Hill’s music cuts a deep, winding path through Folk, Roots Rock and Americana.
- “Possibly the best ukulele player in the world… Hill wowed and charmed the audience.” – Waikato Times
- “A serious virtuoso upon the instrument… truly amazing.” – Canadian Folk Music
- “A dazzling live performer with a genial, low key sense of humour.” – Edmonton Journal
- “The perfect evening of tunes, stories and musical virtuosity. ” – Wellington Dominion-Post
Find out more at www.jameshillmusic.com
Find James on Facebook & Twitter: jameshillmusiq
Join James for a Workshop
Lyricism and Line: How to Make the Ukulele Sing – Explore the lyrical side of the ukulele. In this intermediate level workshop students learn to play chord-melody arrangements of beautiful melodies. Discover subtleties of left-hand fingering and right-hand fingerpicking and how these can make (or break) the lyrical qualities of the music. A workshop full of musical delights and ukulele insights.
Venue: The Studio @ dlrLexicon; Workshop start time : 2pm; Duration: 90 minutes
