A few years ago, White Lake musician Penny Rushing was encouraged by a friend to start a ukulele club. The club meets every Sunday 1-2 p.m. at Book Nook and Java Shop in downtown Montague. What started as an unexpected idea grew into something bigger, fostering the local music community and encouraging people to try something new.
“When we were talking about this, I was like ‘what do I do? Will people show up? What do I show them?’ I was so nervous to share with people what I had learned at the beginning,” Rushing said. “I put it out there and a couple of people showed up at the first meeting who had never even held a ukulele before. I showed them how to hold it, strum it and where to place their fingers. Then we had five people, then 12, then 15, and we had to find a new location because we were getting too big, which is how we ended up at the Book Nook. Now we usually have a minimum of 20 people, but we’ve had as many as 50 people attend.”
The group has continuously grown since it started and has provided a new passion to many new musicians who had never considered ukulele before.
“One of the first few people who started with us had never touched a ukulele before. I think he’s now on his eighth ukulele,” said Rushing. “I’ve created some ukulele monsters, in the best way. I call them my baby bears, like ‘Mama bear’s so proud of you guys.’”
Rushing shared that unlike her husband, who was raised playing instruments, she did not grow up musically. That made when she discovered her ukulele passion more special to her.
“For my 40th birthday, my husband took me for a drive to Lansing and told me to pick out whatever musical instrument I wanted,” Rushing said. “They had this huge wall of ukuleles and I made the poor sales guy play every single one of them so I could find the right one for me. I kept coming back to the same one and that’s the one I purchased, along with some sheet music. I didn’t read sheet music, so I didn’t understand what I was looking at. There wasn’t a lot online yet, so I was frustrated because I couldn’t figure it out. That was the case off and on again for seven years. YouTube was helpful, but these musicians were just jumping right in. They didn’t explain the cords or placements.
“My husband took a course online on how to play the flute and he suggested I sign up for an online ukulele class. I took it and something clicked. It was rough at first, but I knew what I was trying to do and understood it. I did my first open mic at Fetch Brewing Company four months later and I was hooked after that. Then we had the 2020 shutdown and that was all I was doing, practicing ukulele. We went to Sawyers Brewing Company after they opened and started doing music, and I caught their attention and they asked me to start playing weekly.”
In addition to enjoying playing and performing herself, Rushing has discovered she also has a passion for teaching others. She loves fostering a welcoming community that encourages curious newcomers to try something new for free.
“We have an annual celebration near the anniversary date of when we started in June,” said Rushing. “The reason behind that is going back to when I did open mics, and I just wanted to share what I could do and how far I’ve come. It’s exciting and I like to give our members a platform to showcase what they can do, and it can be inspirational to new members and ukulele players. When we have new people join, I try to go back to the basics of teaching them single down strums. Then we’ll play some songs together as a group, where we’re all playing music at the same time, but everybody’s playing at their level as we go along. That connects us and I think people are looking for that. This world is so divisive right now and we’re battling everything, and this is a great way for people to come together and share a commonality playing music.”
Rushing said one of the most special takeaways of the club is watching the growth of so many members over time.
“It’s so much fun to hear everybody strumming and singing along,” Rushing said. “It’s this feeling of ‘Wow, I can’t believe how far we’ve come.’ I never would’ve thought I would do anything like this. I haven’t played music my entire life. It took me seven years just to figure out how to play the ukulele. This was absolutely not on my radar of something I thought I would do, but I’m having the most fun ever. This is my happy place - ukulele and playing music, doing gigs, hosting the club.
“People are welcome to bring other instruments to play as well, we’re very open. We also bring extra ukuleles for newcomers who’ve never touched one before and maybe want to give it a try for free before investing in one. We’ve got people who started in February and they’re doing fantastic, and for those who are just starting to be able to talk to somebody who just started in February to see how far they’ve come. I think it creates more excitement. We’re not all in the same spot, and that gives somebody who’s just coming in some hope and reassurance. They don’t feel like they’re coming into something where they don’t belong. We want everyone to feel welcome.”
Since the start of the club, Rushing’s journey with music has grown into something bigger than she ever imagined.
“When I started the club, my friend told me she had been wanting to start a nonprofit around music,” said Rushing. “We’ve been working together and now the club is under the umbrella of what’s called the Servant Musician. We want it to be a place where people can come to be a part of any community. We’ve started a guitar club and we’ve also started a ukulele club at the senior center that meets on Tuesdays at 1 p.m. We’re hoping to grow and start more clubs. My friend has been filling out grants and trying to get more money to help support the musicians.”
