When asked to explain the music of Uncle Bonsai to someone not familiar with the folk-pop trio’s repertoire, band member Arni Adler is quick to answer.

“I’ve been thinking about this lately, and the word vignette keeps coming to mind,” Adler said. “I would describe the music as folk-pop. We draw more from pop vocabulary than folk, but the phonetic material is similar to theater songs. I say that we try to capture in our songs characters in situations that are emotional but have a sense of sad humor and melancholy.”

On May 2 concert-goers will have a chance to make their own decisions about the sound when Uncle Bonsai takes the stage at the Auburn Avenue Theater, courtesy of the Auburn Parks, Arts and Recreation Department.

The band formed in 1981 in Seattle when an ad for folk musicians drew together Adler, Ashley O’Keefe and Andrew Ratshin, three transplants from Bennington College in Vermont.

“We had all come out here independently,” Adler said. “And we answered an ad placed by Ashley. We didn’t really know each other from college, but there are only 600 students at Bennington, so we were all kind of moving in the same orbit and knew of each other.”

The band first performed together outside of the Bumbershoot Festival, busking for enough cash to earn a ticket to the festival.

Soon, however, the band began refining its blend of satirical folk-pop music, along the way building a strong following and releasing several recordings.

“We toured and made records throughout the eighties and played with a variety of interesting people,” Adler said.

The band performed with up-and-coming folk artists, such as Suzanne Vega and Tracy Chapman as well as such alternative music acts as The Violent Femmes, 10,000 Maniacs, Robyn Hitchcock and They Might Be Giants.

After flirting briefly with record deals with major labels such as A&M and Island records, the band decided to call it quits in 1989.

“We’d just kind of had it,” Adler said. “There were too many struggles with being an unusual band, not even really a band but a folk trio. Nobody knew quite what to do with us, and that started creating internal strife, and we just decided there might be something more out there.”

Although the band reunited several times for one-off shows during the 1990s and early-2000s, all three members stayed busy raising kids and tending to their lives outside music, Adler said.

Soon, however, the urge to perform on a regular basis overwhelmed them.

“Andrew called out of the blue, and we were just sitting on a mountain of repertoire,” she said. “So we got together and started writing songs.”

Initially, the band continued with O’Keefe as the third member, despite her relocation out of state.

“It really became difficult to get together more than a few times a year, with Ashley in Iowa with a couple of kids,” Adler said. “After struggling with that frustration, we decided in the past year to make a go with someone else.”

The band invited Patrice O’Neill, a singer with another of Ratshin’s bands, the Mel Cooleys, to take O’Keefe’s place.

Soon the trio began ramping up their show schedule and writing new songs.

“The songwriting has evolved,” Adler said. “In the 1980s we had some big novelty hits.”

The band gained some notoriety with their single “Penis Envy” which garnered negative attention from the Federal Communications Commission after receiving airplay on college radio and the Dr. Demento show.

“We’re not doing things quite like that, but there is still a lot of humor in our music,” Adler said. “Lately we’ve been obsessed with things that are happening with our families, like the passing of family pets.”

As for the shows, Adler said that the audiences at the band’s recent gigs have been a mishmash of old fans and new.

“We get a lot of fans from the eighties,” she said. “But we have a pretty wide range in the audience. A lot of people are bringing their kids now. One of my favorite quotes is by a 17 or 18 year old who said ‘Wow man, I listened to you guys when I was in utero.’”

On stage, Adler said, fans can expect a fun and proficient set.

“What you can expect from a show is a lot of acrobatic vocals and harmonies. You should expect great harmony singing and lots of words. We’re really word people, we’re focused on words. We come from the tradition of theater, where rhyme is really important and alliteration. We sing carefully constructed sets of music, but what we say in between is never planned. So the whole quality has an almost improvised atmosphere.”

Uncle Bonsai will play the Auburn Avenue Theater at 7:30 p.m. May 2. Tickets for the show are $17, $15 for students and seniors. The show is recommended for audiences 18 and older. Tickets can be purchased at www.brownpapertickets.com/event/58390.

More information can be found at www.auburnwa.gov/Community/arts_entertainment/auburnave.asp or by visiting the band’s Web site at www.unclebonsail.com.