Jake Shimabukuro-Christmas in Hawaii tour
Fox Tucson Theatre
Tucson, Arizona
11/27, 2021
By Mary Andrews
Hawaii’s Jake Shimabukuro brought his brilliant and powerhouse ukulele performance to Tucson once again. Shimabukuro manages to coax many wonderful sounds from this instrument. The music was rich and full aided by the superb acoustics of the Fox Theatre. This time he brought singer/songwriter, Justin Kawika Young, on tour to open the show and accompany him on part of his set.
The ukulele virtuoso released a new album earlier this month, Jake & Friends. He has some heavy-hitter friends including Jack Johnson, Jimmy Buffett, Willie Nelson, Lukas Nelson, Vince Gill, Amy Grant, Michael McDonald, Billy Strings, Warren Haynes, just to name a few. The album has been described as dazzling by the critics. Some of the songs from the album were performed. Unfortunately, none of his guests from the album were able to attend.
Young performed several of his songs during his 25-minute intro before he introduced Shimabukuro for his two-hour set. Young returned later in the show to sing and accompany the virtuoso.
Shimabukuro expressed how grateful he was to be performing live after the pandemic-related pause of live shows for well over a year. The show was advertised as a Christmas show, but it was a delightful blend of self-penned and cover songs with a nod to The Beatles, Stevie Wonder, and Queen. “Sonny Days Ahead” from the new album was a song that he wrote with Sonny Landreth.
Jake mentioned that they had performed in Phoenix the previous day. He toured the Musical Instrument Museum (MIM) early in the day. He was very honored because they had one of his ukuleles on display. They had just placed an ukulele on display that was a collaboration between Kamamka and Proworks. He described it as the most beautiful ukulele he has ever seen in his life. He was so honored because there are only two in the world. One is on display at the MIM. The second one was presented to Shimabukuro yesterday. He proceeded to show the instrument to the fans. He played “Grateful” using the ukulele with Young.
This show aptly demonstrated that there is no limit to what Shimabukuro can do with his ukulele and his creative ability to thrill fans around the world. He is a rock star.
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