Cliff Adams

After teaching himself to play a guitar he received as a junior high graduation gift in 1963, Cliff Adams went on to play guitar and electric bass with a variety of rock bands in the 1960s, including Andrew Staples and the Beau Brummels. Growing up in the San Francisco Bay Area gave him a west coast jazz combo approach to rock and roll. After retiring from public performance in 1969, he sold his equipment except for a 1967 Gibson SG Special. An occasional visit with old musician friends in Austin, Texas in the early ‘70s kept the fingers agile. By the 1980s, he was performing in a classic rock band again. He currently plays bass and second lead guitar with a retro instrumental surf band, The VibroCounts, and U-Bass with the Na Aikane ukulele group.

By day, Cliff is a graphic designer, but his career(s) have been as varied as his taste in Hawaiian shirts. He has been a partner in an advertising agency, driven race cars, written for Road & Track magazine, edited a monthly arts journal, been disk jockey and music director for a college radio station (and a midnight-to-six dj in Buda, Texas), repaired avionics for the Air Force, sold stuff at Radio Shack, taught a 3-unit honors course on Comic Books at California State University Sacramento, directed amateur films, coached soccer, T-ball and rookie league fastpitch softball (1999 & 2000 league champs!), and had a high school painting displayed at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.

While taking a long vacation in Hawaii in July 2007, Cliff bought a Kamaka Standard ukulele at a furniture store while in Hilo. He has added a pineapple soprano, a pearl white Dolphin, a KoAloha concert, a John Gill traveler tenor (signed by the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain), a solid mahogany dropped-D baritone, and his fretless solid mahogany U-Bass… and all this may change at any moment. He teaches ukulele to elementary school children and senior citizens.