The Ukulele Alphabet: Wolves by Josh Ritter

Letter R, Week 1
“Wolves” by Josh Ritter

I hate to admit this, as someone who has spent most of her adult life seeing live shows. But since the pandemic, my tolerance for going to concerts has dwindled into non-existence, with basically one exception: Josh Ritter.¹

In fact, the show that brought me back to live music was Josh’s May 4, 2023 performance at one of the most storied and perfect locations to see a show: Levon Helm’s barn in Woodstock, NY.

(More on that later… I promise that The Band is on its way!)

“Wolves” was the second song of the night at the Woodstock show, and it’s one of the songs I always hope will be on the setlist (and according to Setlist.fm, this is a good bet, since it’s Josh’s eighth-most-frequently-played song).

But that’s not entirely why this Josh Ritter song was chosen for The Ukulele Alphabet.

The other reason is because of our cat Lenny Potatoes.

See, Lenny has this incredible ability to grow the claws on his back feetsies to insane lengths. And quite often, in the middle of the night, we hear him click-click-clicking around the bedroom as he walks across the hardwood floor.

So out of all the moving, funny, thoughtful, wonderful lyrics that Josh Ritter has written in this lifetime, the line “wolves inside the bedsprings / clicking ‘cross the floor” is one that we’re quite fond of in this household.

We even make little “claws tapping on the floor” hand movements to each other during the line, because we’re that kind of cat family.

Listen to the original version of “Wolves”:

What’s the Ukulele Alphabet?

Read all about my 2025 ukulele performance project (and its rules) here.

I want to A-B-SEEEE some more!

Watch all the performances in the Ukulele Alphabet project.

1. Not Taylor Swift! I KNOW!!! ↩︎