There’s a brand-new musical club on Vashon, devoted to discovering the big pleasures to be found in a tiny stringed instrument.

The group — The Vashon Ukulele Society — will have its public debut at the Strawberry Festival parade on Saturday, with some of its members strutting down Vashon Highway playing tunes, including “Aloha Oe” and “When the Saints Come Marching In,” while others ride atop a Hawaiian-themed float.

Karen Eliasen, owner of Vashon Island Music, founded the ukulele group in March.

Eliasen’s store, nestled in a cozy space in the Thriftway shopping complex, is well stocked with a wide variety of musical instruments, but she said that ukuleles have always been her biggest sellers.

“A ukulele craze has swept the nation,” Eliasen said with a laugh during a phone interview. “And it’s a very well-deserved craze, because there is hardly anything more fun and easy to play.”

Eliasen recently hired Seattle musician Nova Devonie, a well-known accordionist, to teach ukulele lessons and host “strum-ins” at the store, and she said she has been delighted by the response.

“I couldn’t have hand-selected a more fun bunch of people,” she said.

She added that more than 20 Islanders, from teenagers to middle-aged folks, have signed up for the group, and that no experience was necessary to join in on the fun.

“A good percentage of the people have never played before,” she said.

One of Eliasen’s most enthusiastic recruits is Sharon Danielson, an irrepressible Islander who is already well known for her volunteer work in emergency preparedness groups and her participation in the equestrian community on Vashon.

Danielson joined the ukulele group in April, as part of a 62nd birthday present to herself.

“I got a ukulele for my birthday, but then Karen had a prettier one so I upgraded three days later,” she said. “So I was not only getting my first Social Security check, I was also getting my first ukulele. Now I just can’t put that dang little thing down.”

Danielson said she didn’t have any experience playing stringed instruments, but that didn’t stop her from becoming immersed in a full-blown passion for the ukulele.

“I’ve dragged a bunch of people into the ukulele world with me,” she said. “We practice on Saturday nights at my house — we’re the Saturday night ukesters. We laugh and we play and if we make mistakes it doesn’t matter, because we’re all just beginners.”

Danielson has also played a major role in preparing for the Ukulele Society’s debut march down Vashon Highway during Strawberry Festival.

She enlisted her husband, Dick Danielson, to loan the group his trailer so it could be turned into the group’s float.

“We’re making it a Hawaiian island unto itself, using freecycled stuff and things from Granny’s Attic,” she said. “It will be a rolling billboard for Karen.”

And if Danielson and Eliasen get their way, the Ukulele Society’s march in the Strawberry Festival parade will bring even more converts to the group.

“You can’t be in a bad mood when you’re playing the ukulele,” Eliasen said. “I keep a ukulele in the car — you miss the ferry and you don’t care.”