See Jake at the World Premier March 14th – And Congrats to Dominic!

update: Jake Contest 2013 – Win a chance to meet Jake Shimabukuro!


Congratulations to Dominic Pieranunzio (aka the Dominator)!

 

After dozens of entries and 6 very impressive finalists, Jake chose Dominic as the winner of
CAAM’s Jake Shimabukuro Ukulele Contest
!

Dominic will play on-stage with Jake live at the

World Premier of the Jake Shimabukuro Documentary at the Castro Theater on March 14th!

Enjoy this insightful documentary into the rise of this ukulele phenom,
followed by mind-blowing performance with Jake and the Dominator!

 

  Thank you to all of our finalists once again, most of whom will be in attendance as well!


Annier Lee (Kaohsiung, Taiwan)
Brian Hernandez (Merced, California, USA)
Chris Cortes (Allen, Texas, USA)
Dominic Pieranunzio (Roseville, California, USA)
Gino Silvestre (Los Angeles, California, USA)
Monique Macasaet (San Francisco, California, USA)

Please join us the World Premier of the Jake Shimabukuro Documentary this Wednesday, March 14!


 

Here’s a little bit more about our winner, Dominic:

Dominic fell in love with the ukulele on a trip to Hawaii in 1997. It was also when he first heard Jake’s music. Dominic is self-taught and played lead guitar (aka Dominator) for most of his life.

Why do you want to play for Jake Shimabukuro?
Jake and his music have had such a positive impact on my life. It’s been a dream of mine to share the stage with Jake ever since I saw him perform “live” for the first time at Borders in Sacramento. At Borders I presented him with a copy of the tab I had just prepared from the video of “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” (the video in Central Park that he has become so famous for). Being able to spend some time with Jake and play music for him means so much to me.

Tell us something unique about yourself!
After coming back from Hawaii with my Pure Heart CDs in hand I started trying to find tablature for his music. A Google search for ukulele tablature for Jake’s music produced no results. In fact, at that time there was absolutely no ukulele tablature available on the Internet. That’s when I decided I was going to have to learn to play his songs myself. Over the next few years I kept practicing and started attempting to learn Jake’s music as well as other ukulele music I had become exposed to. I wanted to keep a record of my work and so I decided to create tabs to have as a reference. As I began creating the ukulele tabs I became more aware of other ukulele players that were eager to learn and anxious for tabs. That’s when I decided to create a free website called “Dominator Ukulele Tabs”. Over these last ten years I’ve had the opportunity to communicate with and meet many people from all over the world who share the “Aloha Spirit” of this precious little instrument we call the ukulele. Without Jake’s inspiration, none of this would have been possible!

See Dominic’s website: http://dominator.ukeland.com/

Congratulations again to Dominic!

The Jake Shimabukuro YouTube Contest Committee
at the Center for Asian American Media (CAAM)

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