May 8, 2026: The Last Rose of Summer is in Book 2.
The Last Rose of Summer is a really beautiful song with a couple more characters headed for the grave. These Celtic tunes are filled with a lotta death, but maybe that's what make them fun. Thomas Moore wrote the poem and he knows a bit about metaphorical writing. It was set to an old traditional tune called Aisling an Óigfhear (which Wikipedia tells me means "Young Man's Dream). John Andrew Stevenson wrote the arrangement of the music to fit Moore's words and they of course have nothing to do with a young man's dream. They're more dead flower forward.
This is almost entirely in open chords so the TuffUke will flow out of your soul and into the hearts of your audience with only a couple of fussy moments. At Measure 11, you have our famous minor-shaped bar with your ring finger on the fourth string and your pinky finger on the first string. Again, it'll be coming up all the time in the music you play so come to terms with it. And of course the ending bar chord is about the millionth time I've ended a song like that. It just works. Ukulele and baritone players should be able to play this together without the need to look up too many chords.
Remember we're getting together on Sunday nights at 7 pm Mountain time on YouTube and you should join us. Info is here.
