Ukulele gaining popularity with all ages

Observer photo by Stephanie Choate Isaac Goldman, 8, plays the ukulele in his Williston home last week.

Eight-year-old Williston musician Isaac Goldman describes the sound of his favorite instrument with one word: “happy.”

Isaac has been playing the ukulele — a diminutive instrument long associated with grass skirts and Hawaiian sunsets — for delighted audiences at local concerts and restaurants, including Monty’s Old Brick Tavern.

“It’s just fun,” Isaac said. “I like how it’s a lot higher, so it’s easier for me to sing with.”

Isaac plays everything from The Beatles’ “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” to Bob Dylan’s “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door” on the four-stringed instrument, which looks like a mini guitar.

“People are usually pretty amazed. They love it,” said Rebecca Goldman, Isaac’s mother. “It gives people a gift, because people get really happy to see him playing, so it’s exciting.”

Isaac, who also plays with local kid-based band Buddy Dubay and The Minor Keys, said he never gets nervous playing in front of people.

“I love doing it,” he said.

Isaac is also a budding songwriter. Last week, he wrote a song for the ukulele with a friend.

“I think rainy days are boring, tired of hearing my dad snoring,” part of the lyrics read. “But watching movies can be fun, hanging out with everyone.”

Isaac first started playing the ukulele while visiting his uncle in Hawaii several years ago. The family — all surfers — visits every year. Isaac said his uncle was learning to play, so they started learning together.

Rebecca Goldman said the ukulele has become a family instrument.

“It took on a life of its own when he started,” she said. “My husband plays the guitar, and so they play together every day.”

More Goldman family members may be up-and-coming ukulele players, too. Isaac often plays with his younger siblings, Claire, 7, and Henry, 2.

“He has a pretend uke, and he strums it and sings at the top of his lungs,” Goldman said of Henry.

A growing trend

The Goldmans aren’t the only Vermonters to become enthralled with the little instrument.

Bristol residents Jim and Jennifer Vyhnak started the Vermont Ukulele Society, a group that gets together twice a month to play, after discovering the instrument on a trip to Hawaii in 2007.

“It seems to be this presence that has come into our lives in a big wonderful way,” Jennifer Vyhnak said. “You can never really walk into a room with a ukulele without having everybody smile. It has a very positive association with it.”

Vyhnak said the ukulele is making a comeback, and she has heard of ukulele groups and players popping up across the nation.

Hawaiian player Jake Shimabukuro — one of Isaac’s favorite musicians — played at Higher Ground in South Burlington in July. The Goldmans went to the concert, and Isaac was able to meet Shimabukuro and play for him.

“He said, ‘I’m going to be carrying your bags someday,’” Isaac said.

Shimabikiro, currently on tour in Japan, wrote in an e-mail to the Observer that he enjoyed hearing Isaac play, and said Isaac is “extremely talented.”

Shimabukuro said he thinks the ukulele is “growing tremendously in popularity,” in part thanks to websites like YouTube that help promote the instrument.

A YouTube video of Shimabukuro has gotten close to 6 million views, and the nearly 14,000 comments include one calling him the Chuck Norris of ukulele.

“People have such low expectations when it comes to ukulele music,” Shimabukuro wrote. “It’s very hard to be a disappointment. That’s the beauty of the instrument.”

Shimabukuro, who started playing as a kid in Hawaii, said that to him, the ukulele sounds like “children laughing.”

“It’s warm, gentle, innocent, and full of joy,” he wrote.

He also said the ukulele is “a friendly instrument,” and people of all ages aren’t afraid to give it a try.

Vyhnak said the ukulele is fairly easy to learn.

“For a little bit of effort, you get a lot back,” she said.

Ukuleles can also be more accessible than other instruments. A quality ukulele can cost as little as $100.

Ukulele players seem to agree that it makes people happy.

“If everyone played the ukulele, the world would be a better place,” Shimabukuro wrote.