At a recent Sage n Zaza show, I brazenly promised you a playlist.
Today I make good on that promise. In it you’ll find some of our recordings alongside some absolutely gorgeous versions of tunes that we covered in our set that night.
Click the button to listen, and continue reading for a bit from me about each tune.
Pity – Sage n Zaza
This is music that I wrote to accompany Sara Teasdale’s poem by the same name, composed around the year 1920. It’s a poem about the deep impact that love can make on you, even if the relationship doesn’t last.
Sara Teasdale’s songs always make me wanna cry a little. Or at least, pay a little more attention to that persistent ache of heartbreak.
I Want Someone to Love Me – Sol Hoopii
Sol Hoopii, Hawaiian steel guitar and ukulele legend, wrote many beautiful tunes, including this one. As Zaza’s musical hero, he shows up in our set more than once. 😉
The Voice in the Old Village Choir – George Ku and His Paradise Islanders
George Ku, steel guitar wizard of the 1930s, plays a gorgeous rendition of this plaintive tune here.
Maui Chimes – Jerry Bird and Marty Robbins
Maui Chimes was the first song that Ukulelezaza taught me when we first met at a ukulele festival in the summer of 2022.
I love this song and now it’s a favorite of mine.
Home – Ukulelezaza
Home is a lovely old jazz tune from 1931. You could say I’m fairly fond of Ukulelezaza’s magical arrangement here, and it’s the one that we use, except!In our recent live sets, I steal the glory in several ways: I play his arrangement on my bari uke, and sing the chorus as well.
Moonlight Dell – Sage hey that’s me
I wrote this! And I love how it sounds with Ukulelezaza backing me on the 1930s Washburn / Lyon and Healy tenor uke with bari tuning.
Stumble Hop Blues – Ukulelezaza and shiny chrome forest
If you ever wanted to imagine yourself into a lush forest of shiny chrome, this is an excellent way to do that.
There Will Come Soft Rains – Beautiful William <– (hey I’m in that band)
This is a song I wrote with my friend Meredith Wilder. <3
Sara Teasdale composed this poem after WW1 broke out, positing that we humans are the doers of our own undoing. See, it’s another iteration of that ache I mentioned earlier.
Also, I really loved that giant poofy scarf. I lost it at one point. (I think someone stole it from a place I once worked?!) Still a little sad about that.
Beautiful Ohio – George Ku & His Paradise Islanders
As a childhood resident of Ohio, I was astonished to learn only last summer that:
- a song called Beatiful Ohio exists
- that it could be and in fact WAS played in a Hawaiian style
- it was adopted as Ohio’s state song in 1969, long before I was a child experiencing my childhood IN Ohio
The music was wriiten in 1918, with additional very regionally proud lyrics added in 1989.
It is Hard to Say Goodbye – Sol Hoopii
Gorgeous.
(In the Unlikely Event of a Certain Encounter) – Sage n Zaza
A cowrite! Zaza wrote the music, and later I added the lyrics 😉
The One Rose – Jimmie Rogers and Lani McIntire’s Hawaiians
I’m including two versions of this tune, as promised.
Jimmie Rogers performed this in his signature country style in 1930. Ah, my heart! My love of country music has crystallized in a much different way in the past few years of living in Europe. There’s just a very VERY something special about it that I haven’t figured out how to articulate yet.
Lani McIntire composed the song and in this video, you get to see him perform it on a soundstage on a beautiful shiny archtop guitar. Ah, his voice! So smooth so gorgeous.
A YouTube commenter wondered aloud if Lani McIntire wrote the song for his deceased wife. I did not look into the veracity of this claim, but it stands that if the narrator of this song is singing for a lover parted from him by death rather than by a simple breakup, it becomes much, much more tragic and my heart feels even achier than before.
What a world what a world!
I’m so grateful to all these people for living their lives and making pretty music. And for all the people who helped record it and for the internet for making it possible for me to listen to it, and to share all this with you.
Thank you thank you thank you. Live laugh love keep playing your ukie, listen to nice songs and the sad ones, hug your lover, snuggle your pet, have a nice beverage tonight.
ttyl
xo
-s
I hope you’ve been listening along this whole time! But if not, here’s the playlist again:
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