The Unpredictable Unlikely Strummers

BY JIM D’VILLE | FROM THE SUMMER 2026 ISSUE OF UKULELE

In 2017, Cynthia Miller was teaching ukulele lessons at An Unlikely Story, a bookstore in Plainville, Massachusetts. The local farmers’ market thought it would be fun to have some ukulele entertainment, so Miller rounded up her students and “any other ukulele players I knew,” she says, and formed a group. What has taken place since that first gig is truly an unlikely story.

That group continues today as the Unlikely Strummers, a 30-member–strong cohort based in southeastern Massachusetts known for performing Miller’s complex ensemble arrangements that include instrumentals, harmony singing, song mashups, and outlandish musical stunts. In one such stunt, the group waddled an entire 5K race in inflatable pink flamingo outfits while playing and singing the entire time, raising $5,000 for the Ukulele Kids Club.

What pushed the members of the Unlikely Strummers to elevate their playing was an invitation to participate in the 2019 New England Battle of the Ukulele Bands in New Hampshire. “I told the band we can’t just get on stage in front of judges Tom Rush and Kimo Hussey and sing ‘Wagon Wheel’ in unison,” explains Miller. “That was when I thought we had to do something bigger and more musical.”

Their set opened on a darkened stage with an instrumental ensemble arrangement of “Sunrise Fanfare” from Richard Strauss’ Also Sprach Zarathustra (known widely for its use in Stanley Kubrick’s film 2001: A Space Odyssey), followed by a mashup of “The Water is Wide” by Cecil Sharpe and Billy Joel’s “River of Dreams.” They closed with the Blues Brothers’ “Gimme Some Lovin’,” featuring a “horn section” of kazookaleles (ukuleles with kazoos affixed to the heads).

“Over the years, we have grown into our name,” says Miller. “We like to be unlikely!”

But to paint the group as ukulele clowns would misrepresent them and diminish their musical work. The Unlikely Strummers rehearse for 90 minutes weekly, refining arrangements, fine-tuning vocal harmonies and solos, and practicing instrumentals. “We sometimes work for months on new arrangements,” says Miller. “‘Under Pressure,’ for example, was a four-month undertaking for a festival performance.”

Miller, who spent two decades as a concert flautist, is a graduate of the James Hill Ukulele Institute and was on his mentoring team for several years. She has also studied music at Berklee and at Windward Community College in Hawaii, and played with Peter Luongo’s critically acclaimed Legacy Ensemble for three years. While she is also a college professor of anthropology, she has been teaching ukulele for over a decade.

Last year I spent a month in the Boston area and was lucky enough to be an honorary member of the Unlikely Strummers. I attended several rehearsals and witnessed firsthand the time and effort director Miller and the band devote to their craft. I was onstage with the group in October at An Unlikely Story with Peter Asher (of Peter and Gordon fame) as they closed the show by performing “Lady Godiva” with the legendary musician. It brought the house down!

Not only do the Strummers wow audiences with their arrangements of classic tunes like the Who’s “Pinball Wizard,” and the Ventures’ “Walk, Don’t Run,” their work is also recognized and appreciated by professional musicians. In addition to twice sharing the stage with Peter Asher, they have opened for Jake Shimabukuro twice, and played with Irish supergroup Gadan. This year, the band is performing a four-concert series with the Warwick (Rhode Island) Symphony Orchestra with selections from the Great American
Songbook arranged for orchestra and ukuleles.

Many of the 100 or so gigs the Unlikely Strummers play each year support nonprofit and local community groups. The main beneficiary of the group’s fundraising efforts is the Ukulele Kids Club, for whom the group has raised over $40,000 in the past seven years. Some of the Strummers’ most unique fundraising enterprises are its “You’ve Been Uked” surprise serenades, sort of like musical candygrams. The group has astonished recipients in restaurants, offices, hardware stores, parking lots, grocery stores, schools, and even a backyard shed. The Strummers also partner with several area public schools to perform and mentor students in the schools’ ukulele programs.