Joe, Tom, Bounce, Karen, Arlene, Cris, Tom, Nathan, Larry, WendySue, Jen, Ken, John, Chris and Rick played MAGICAL SONGS.

1. Magic Bus, the Who, 1968 (Tom) This was very difficult, though there may have been only two chords. No one knew what to play when they sang, "I want it. I want it....." There was a similar song done by the Strangeloves in 1965 and Bow Wow Wow in 1982 called I Want Candy.

2. Abracadabra, Steve Miller Band, 1982 (Arlene) I never liked this one, but it sounded fine when we did the verses. Our timing was off on the chorus.

3. This Magic Moment, Drifters, 1960 and Jay and the Americans, 1969 (Jen) It was a good effort. We all did the tacet parts well, stopping in the appropriate spots, thus adding tension and interest to the song. I had my kazoo out, all ready for the trumpet instrumental, but it came out wrong. Something similar happened at the senior citizens concert when I marred a fine version of the theme to All in the Family. At first I thought, "Why is everyone playing something else?" but soon surmised that I was the offender. I should retire my kazoo, perhaps taking it down to the basement, where I can sulk in private over my missteps and play along with records, out of earshot of the public.

4. Black Magic Woman, Santana, 1970 (John) We were going along all right, playing with the record, but everyone played and sang during the instrumental break and we were thrown off. We could probably simplify the long intro, shorten the instrumentals and do a good job on this otherwise straightforward song. I'm gonna work on that.

5. Do You Believe in Magic, Lovin' Spoonful, 1965 (John) This was another that we played along with the record, and again we over enthusiastically played and sang louder than it, so that we could no longer hear it. We plunged into another verse instead of taking an instrumental break.

I'm reminded of a time some years back when people came to my house with electric guitars, a bass and amplifiers. We started playing along with a rock CD, but soon got so much louder and faster than the recording that no one could hear it. We weren't following it at all. I realized this and gave up playing (the piano) but everyone else kept going full tilt. Someone could have stood in my living room, banging a metal garbage-can lid with a hammer, and the players would not have noticed. I found it amusing that while they were playing this crashingly-loud, guitar-centered rock and roll, the CD had changed, and I could make out through the noise that we were hearing the soundtrack to West Side Story sung in German.

There were some good songs that fit this theme that we did not play because they were too difficult or we didn't think of them: Magical Mystery Tour (Beatles), Bewitched Bothered and Bewildered (standard), Strange Magic (Electric Light Orchestra), Magic (Olivia Newton-John), Are You Sitting Comfortably (Moody Blues), Magic Carpet Ride (Steppenwolf), Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic (Police), and You Can Do Magic (America).

6. I Put A Spell On You, Creedence Clearwater Revival, 1968 (John) We watched an outrageous performance of this by Screaming Jay Hawkins. That didn't help us to play it. I think we may have done all right when we took it very slowly.

7. Puff the Magic Dragon, Peter, Paul and Mary, 1963 (Ken/Nathan) Except for the time we got messed up when some of us played the chorus and some went to the next verse, we did well.

8. Rude, Magic, 2013 (Nathan) Chris knew this reggae song and sang it. I never heard of it, but it didn't sound bad.

At this point we were out of magic songs and were fishing around for something to do. We tried out these songs:

• Rainbow Connection, Kermit the Frog, 1979 (Arlene). (Arlene jotted up her own chord sheet for simplicity but Dr. Uke has a really nice version posted --Ken.)

• Bring Me Sunshine (Karen) A British comedy duo, Morecambe and Wise, used this as their TV theme song in 1969. It's very catchy and was easy to learn. It turned out to be the unlikely hit of the evening. (The "The Jive Aces" ukulele group made a music video of this song. The chord sheet for their version is available here. --Ken)

After this, all order broke down. Karen and WendySue entertained each other with Ain't She Sweet. The north side of the room was engaged in deep conversation. On the south side, Ken, in a burst of inspiration, suggested the few of us down there do a Buddy Holly record. (It is almost always a good idea to play Buddy Holly.) He picked one I had never heard Raining in My Heart: Excellent (this chord sheet was created for our Buddy Holly Aug 2013 theme nights but we never played it because it didn't fit into our 10-song medley --Ken). There was a G augmented in it but it was surprisingly easy. We then went into Oh Boy! before running out of time.

Joe proposed the theme of INTERNATIONAL songs for next time, citing a Yiddish song I didn't know as an example. This would be easy if we were to pick songs by the Beatles, the Kinks, the Who and all the big English acts, but I don't think it's what Joe had in mind. Another easy thing would be to play Irish songs, but we've already done Irish nights in the past. What hit records were produced in Greenland, Uzbekistan or the Grand Duchy of Mecklenburg? This topic may require a little thought. Maybe if we broadly interpret it as songs done in another language (La Vie En Rose), or with some foreign words (Michelle), or the mention of foreign cities (Travelin' Man), people (Snoopy vs. the Red Baron) or landmarks (You Belong to Me), we can meet our quota of ten or a dozen songs to fill up an evening.

-- Dan.