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I'm really tempted to try a low g string on my tenor uke because a) I'll likely perform by myself when showing off to people and b) it's acoustic/electric so I feel as if the extra range could be seriously beneficial. Anyone have any experience with this? I'm trying to decide between wound and unwound. According to amazon reviews, wound tend to need replacement far more often than the other nylon strings, whereas other nylon low g users have complained about the Aquila Red randomly snapping if not very slowly and carefully installed. That makes me nervous. What do you all think? Especially as I regard my uke as a little guitar and not a typicial hawaiian soprano, think it's worth experimenting with low g strings? Sideote: learning recognizable songs such as House of the Rising Sun and Hotel California is entirely too much fun. It's pretty easy to learn an entire song and people love hearing recognizable tunes coming from such a tiny, "weird looking" instrument! I just have to work on my singing... KingSlime fucked around with this message at 17:47 on Jul 25, 2014 |
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Jul 25, 2014 17:44
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Checking in to nth the uke love in here... My Ohana concert ukulele has held up wonderfully to some extensive traveling and I've actually made some cash busking which feels so cool because it wasnt that long ago I despaired about trying to sing at the same time as strumming a two chord song... Too funny. It has sustained a ding on the body of the instrument (i think from the combat strap on my pack or something). Was wondering if you guys thought I should smear a little clear nail polish or superglue to effectively "seal" it. Looks as though it chipped the varnish and now I can the the wood. I honestly am not fussed from an aesthetic standpoint... This instrument goes all over the country with me but of course thats why I am interested in protecting from any significant damage.
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Jul 27, 2014 03:30
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KingSlime posted:I'm really tempted to try a low g string on my tenor uke because a) I'll likely perform by myself when showing off to people and b) it's acoustic/electric so I feel as if the extra range could be seriously beneficial. I only have some experience, but I thought I'd reply, since nobody else has, yet. I replaced the strings on my Pono tenor and Makala concert recently, with high G on the tenor and low G on the concert. Even though my concert is a cheapo, I play it much more than my tenor now and has me wondering if I should just get a low G on my next tenor. It's all about personal preference. One of the YouTube personalities I follow also prefers low G, and I've been trying to pick up on his style a bit. You can make great music either way. I can't really comment on acoustic/electric benefiting either way. I used Worth Clears (fluorocarbon) on both, so I can't comment much on wound strings, but I imagine an unwound low G on a tenor could be pretty thick. A wound string will probably fit better in a nut meant for a high G, but it might need adjustment anyway. Again, I think it's personal preference and you probably should worry more about sound and how it plays than replacing it. My tenor came with a wound C and I didn't like it.
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Jul 31, 2014 23:43
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Haven't posted in here in forever, but just want to chime in and talk about how I got a set of 25 ukes for my elementary music classroom and now I get to tune (and re-tune and then re-tune several more times) 25 brand new instruments. Hooray.
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Aug 12, 2014 17:34
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You could let the students tune the ukes: "Lesson 1: tune your ukulele"
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Aug 12, 2014 17:44
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I thought about it, but I don't really want to spend the first several classes doing that (since its not all that we'll do) plus I only teach up to 4th grade.
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Aug 12, 2014 18:22
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furushotakeru posted:You might like the D'addario Titanium strings, assuming you don't mind fluorocarbon strings. I tried these strings and they make the Outdoor Uke sound much better, thanks for the recommendation!
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Aug 12, 2014 18:27
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Faltion posted:I tried these strings and they make the Outdoor Uke sound much better, thanks for the recommendation! Glad to hear it. I think I like the D'addario J71 strings best so far, but I have used so many kinds of strings in the last few months that I think it is time to circle around and try the ones that the local uke store recommends one more time, just to make sure. The great thing about trying lots of different strings for your uke is that a set only costs like $5-7 
furushotakeru fucked around with this message at 22:47 on Aug 12, 2014 |
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Aug 12, 2014 22:45
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edit: wrong thread. me idiot.
Cobweb Heart fucked around with this message at 01:12 on Aug 13, 2014 |
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Aug 13, 2014 00:02
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I do need to get better strings for my Outdoor Uke (not that the current are terrible). It's a bit of a clunky thing, but it's indestructible so I'm carrying it around a lot actually. The only reason I'm not taking it to South America with me is because it's easier/cheaper to just pick up a local uke-type thing when I get down there. But for local trips in the US I've been dragging it around. They were doing preorders for their tenor, but had some kinda hangup with their moldmaker or whatever, so refunded all backers for now until they get a clearer way-forward. Hope they sort it out, since the tenor version seems to fix some of the issues they had with their soprano, mainly the single-construction nut/bridge that made adjustment tough, and the clunky square neck. Though yet again I think the original friction pegs are great (and non-ferrous) and complainers are just unused to old-school pegs. In any case, as an example of the fun stuff that comes up when you carry a uke around all day, all this from just yesterday: - Went to meet an ex-girlfriend in the park to practice uke. I gave her my old Tangi sopranino that was my "take to the pubs" beater from before the Outdoor, and had many dents and dings. So we practiced chord changes on our respective ukes, good time. She has tiny hands so likes the sopranino; I might advise her to get either an Ohana sopranino for her next one, or one of those Kala Pocket Ukes that most adults can barely finger. - I next went to a backyard party for a State Dept. buddy who's deploying. Turns out another friend brought a guitar, so we ended up doing duets for a good 30m+ later that evening, with me strumming part of the time, and doing mandolin-esque high fills at other points. I think someone shot video of that, will try to find where it's posted. - Was walking home through Adams Morgan after that, and two drunk young guys came running up and wanted to borrow the uke. I loaned it to them, and they immediately kicked off playing a pretty solid reggaeton riff while freestyling lyrics over it about ukulele, surprising strangers by knowing how to play, etc. It was pretty cute, though I got a bit annoyed when the player drunkenly opined "man, you gotta get a better uke, this one's kinda hard to play. The problem is people don't take uke seriously enough and think it's a toy or something". So I try to explain it's a solid plastic one to take to the beach, and that I own nicer ones but don't just hand them to strangers on the sidewalk. The Outdoor is a little clunky, but I'll put up with that for the price, and since I can just throw it on the lawn, hand it to a small child, hang it off a coathook by its peghead, etc without ever worrying about it. 
TapTheForwardAssist fucked around with this message at 01:27 on Aug 18, 2014 |
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Aug 18, 2014 01:24
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Practicing/strengthening my fingers for bar chords and the joint in my finger hits the E string at a point that's almost impossible to get a clear sound from. It always comes out dull no matter how hard I hold it. Do I just need to keep practicing? It's been frustrating. Anyone have this problem in the past?
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Aug 18, 2014 14:52
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cheese eats mouse posted:Practicing/strengthening my fingers for bar chords and the joint in my finger hits the E string at a point that's almost impossible to get a clear sound from. It always comes out dull no matter how hard I hold it. Do I just need to keep practicing? It's been frustrating. Anyone have this problem in the past? Yeah, I had that problem with D and I still have it with E sometimes. For D: code:With E: code:code:If I don't treat it like a bar chord: code:
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Aug 18, 2014 17:45
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I'm at the Berkshire Uke and Brew Festival that The Magic Fluke company is putting on. I just impulse purchased a firefly banjolele to add to the collection. Time to relearn how to clawhammer.
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Aug 24, 2014 18:46
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As a banjo and ukulele owner my next instrument has to be a banjolele.
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Aug 25, 2014 21:07
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cheese eats mouse posted:As a banjo and ukulele owner my next instrument has to be a banjolele. Not a resonator ukulele to switch it up? Also sounds great with clawhammer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D5V4mtZ-0qg Did Aaron Keim pretty much singlehandedly online-popularize clawhammer uke some six years back? 
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Aug 25, 2014 22:07
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He is responsible for its recent popularity online, per a lot of the old clawhammer players BHO there was apparently a good deal of technique borrowing and exchange between uke and banjo players since way back in the old days. I thought it was pretty neat to hear about clawhammer banjo player who incorporated some of the uke strums and fans into their banjo playing.
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Aug 25, 2014 22:46
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TapTheForwardAssist posted:Not a resonator ukulele to switch it up? Also sounds great with clawhammer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D5V4mtZ-0qg Of course these exist haha. Just looked up prices for those and wow. I got my uke for $75 and my banjo free soooo.... cheese eats mouse fucked around with this message at 14:48 on Aug 26, 2014 |
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Aug 26, 2014 14:37
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laertes22 posted:He is responsible for its recent popularity online, per a lot of the old clawhammer players BHO there was apparently a good deal of technique borrowing and exchange between uke and banjo players since way back in the old days. I thought it was pretty neat to hear about clawhammer banjo player who incorporated some of the uke strums and fans into their banjo playing. See also Lil' Rev and James Hill on youtube for more clawhammery goodness. They're the ones who got me into it as well as Aaron.
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Sep 4, 2014 02:14
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So I just bought a ukulele a couple of weeks ago, and I'm having one particular problem I can't figure out. I can't bloody strum the thing without the g string buzzing half the time, regardless whether it's open or not. I know it must be something to do with how I'm hitting it on the down strum, but that's as far as I can figure. Thumb, index finger, whatever, it's the same problem. Anyone got a recommendation for a guide to actually strumming this thing right?
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Sep 10, 2014 09:11
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TetsuoTW posted:So I just bought a ukulele a couple of weeks ago, and I'm having one particular problem I can't figure out. I can't bloody strum the thing without the g string buzzing half the time, regardless whether it's open or not. I know it must be something to do with how I'm hitting it on the down strum, but that's as far as I can figure. Thumb, index finger, whatever, it's the same problem. Anyone got a recommendation for a guide to actually strumming this thing right? Have you checked to make sure that the string is seated properly up by the tuning pegs (the nut)?
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Sep 10, 2014 17:57
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TetsuoTW posted:So I just bought a ukulele a couple of weeks ago, and I'm having one particular problem I can't figure out. I can't bloody strum the thing without the g string buzzing half the time, regardless whether it's open or not. I know it must be something to do with how I'm hitting it on the down strum, but that's as far as I can figure. Thumb, index finger, whatever, it's the same problem. Anyone got a recommendation for a guide to actually strumming this thing right? Do you have a high-G or a low-G? That is, is your G the lowest-pitched string on your uku, or is it higher than your C? Knowing that will help. Also, does it just buzz when you strum, or does it also buzz when plucked? Try plucking it different ways (more horizontaly, more verticaly) and note what that does to the buzz. My gut guess is that you have either a high fret somewhere on that end, or that your G string is a little low. The latter particularly is an easy fix.
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Sep 10, 2014 17:57
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I checked the seating today, no luck. It's a high G, and it's fine when plucked (obviously except when I do it blatantly wrong), which makes me think I'm probably hitting it too hard or at an off angle when strumming. I'll play around and see if I can figure out anything else useful tomorrow. Oh, and it's a PukanaLa PU-13C concert ukulele, if that helps. e: Just saw your advice on this kind of thing back on page 4 - I'll try the measuring thing tomorrow too then. sub supau fucked around with this message at 18:34 on Sep 10, 2014 |
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Sep 10, 2014 18:22
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TetsuoTW posted:e: Just saw your advice on this kind of thing back on page 4 - I'll try the measuring thing tomorrow too then. Yeah, this thread's been going for 7 years now. I started it iirc around Malaga in Spain, kept it rolling through two different Afghanistan tours, and while living in Quebec, Austin, and DC. I think the above was my first post in this thread since moving to Bogotá. It's trippy how much my life has changed since starting this thread, but I'm still happy to kick it and talk ukulele with goons worldwide.
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Sep 10, 2014 18:49
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Uke is the best. After getting pretty competent at singing along with simple chord-heavy songs, I picked up my friend's guitar for fun (he always leaves it here). A few random play sessions later, and I can cleanly strum through a couple of chord progressions on guitar! My friend gets really thick strings too since he likes a deep sound, so I'm pretty pleased. Why does it seem infinitely much easier now than when I tried years ago? I can only credit my uke playing! Seriously, I could never play a clean barre chord in an acoustic guitar before. Now I'm strumming and picking through basic songs and am getting better pretty quicky. As a drummer of six years, this opens up a whole new world! Coupled with drilling musictheory.net lessons over a summer, I can finally play all the instruments, including piano. Okay, not all of them, and I'd need some time to work chords/movements out, but I can pick up pretty much anything that might be used in a band and know how to make the sounds I want it to make. The best part is other musicians always told me drummers don't know anything and real music is harder. To be honest though, it's been pretty smooth sailing and actually am finding music to be easy. I'm sure my drumming experience contributed a lot but man my bandmates were so full of poo poo. Aside from tricky technical stuff like solos, playing music that sounds good is really not a difficult thing to do and music theory/chords are no harder than most high school math. For real, uke is the best. KingSlime fucked around with this message at 19:27 on Sep 10, 2014 |
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Sep 10, 2014 19:22
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Hi, another brand new ukulele owner checking into the thread! My husband bought me one a few weeks ago to cheer me up (I have a bad knee injury and had to give up dancing). It's a Tardis blue Hilo Soprano, and I adore it. I've never played an instrument except recorder in grade school, but I feel like I'm grasping it fairly well. I have two questions that I can't seem to find the answer to: 1. I saw a video (but forgot to save the link) where the guy says when you switch chords, you should do one open strum in between. I haven't seen it anywhere else. Like switching from say C7 to F you would strum C, then strum open, then do your F strum. Is that a tip just for beginners or is that the unspoken way it's just done and I missed something? 2. My other big question is about music written with tabs and chords. Do you play both or pick only one method? Do you mix them and if you do, how? I can't find any good answer to this either, maybe I'm phrasing my question wrong when I search. (I love the hell out of fingerpicking and plan on getting a banjolele soon.) I sort of feel like there is a lot of stuff you're just supposed magically intuit, and I'm one of those learners that need the obvious spelled out for me.
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Sep 13, 2014 19:37
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jaded_daisy posted:1. I saw a video (but forgot to save the link) where the guy says when you switch chords, you should do one open strum in between. I haven't seen it anywhere else. Like switching from say C7 to F you would strum C, then strum open, then do your F strum. Is that a tip just for beginners or is that the unspoken way it's just done and I missed something? jaded_daisy posted:2. My other big question is about music written with tabs and chords. Do you play both or pick only one method? Do you mix them and if you do, how? I can't find any good answer to this either, maybe I'm phrasing my question wrong when I search. (I love the hell out of fingerpicking and plan on getting a banjolele soon.) jaded_daisy posted:I sort of feel like there is a lot of stuff you're just supposed magically intuit, and I'm one of those learners that need the obvious spelled out for me.
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Sep 13, 2014 20:20
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Just wanted to bring the thread back into the mix now that we're hitting gift-giving season. For those not wanting a whole lot of explanation but just simple answers, here's a brief uke-gift guide: - What brand of uke to get?: In the cheap range ($50-100), you really can't go wrong with the most basic models from Kala/Makala and Lanikai, if you're looking a little pricier ($100-200) take a look at Ohana which has a nice variety of solid wood instruments. If you need to go cheaper still, in the $35-50 range there's Makala and Mahalo, though I'd avoid most of the other cheapies in this range as having unknown/unreliable QC. And honestly the cheapest Makalas and Lanikais are barely above these anyway, so an extra $10 might be well-spent. If you're buying from a non-expert company (Amazon, Guitar Center, etc) avoid the other cheap brands like Fender, (modern) Martin, etc. Luna are okay if you really want great visuals, covered in tribal tattoos and all that, but not amazing players though not terrible. If you're buying off-the-shelf at a physical store, Lanikai is pretty commonly carried at big-box stores, I'd go that. - Where to buy: Overall I really suggest you buy from a place that specializes (at least partially) in ukes. The main thing you're trying to avoid is buying from someone who just cracks open a case of ukes fresh from China and chucks one in a shipping box for you. By buying from a uke specialist, you're paying an extra $5-10 to be sure an actual person who plays uke has picked it up, checked it for common flaws, done a few quick adjustments, etc. I don't work for any uke shop, it's just experience of this thread has been that that extra level of QC makes a difference. So far as uke specialists, the much-loved Music Guy Mic, famous for really making proper QC/settup integral for serious uke dealers, died last year of illness, but http://www.theukulelesite.com is run by one of his protegees. The player/teacher Curt Sheller has a pretty good list of reputable dealers that glancing through I largely agree with, so I won't repeat it too much here: http://www.curtsheller.com/ukulele/dealers/usa.php - What size to get: Ukes generally come in soprano, concert, tenor, and baritone. The first three of these are tuned/played identically, just the larger body gives a smoother/less-bright sound and more room for your hands. If it's for a kid or small person go soprano, if it's a large person go tenor, anywhere in the middle concert-size is usually the safe bet. Baritone is mostly for people in the "I kinda want to learn guitar" category, and a good option particularly for smaller women who find guitar hard on their hands, since the baritone largely is played/fingered very much like a guitar. I overall wouldn't get baritone for someone who just "wants to learn ukulele" since it's its own beast. - What to include with it: If you buy a uke from a decent dealer, you really don't need much in the way of accessories. A case or soft gig-bag is always good, often comes with purchase. If you buy from a big-box dealer, never hurts to upgrade the strings first thing, for about $5 on eBay you can get strings that are better than the default ones that come with cheaper ukes. Things like electronic tuners, chordbooks, etc are being rapidly superseded by smartphones and the like, so unless someone lacks a smartphone I'd just help them download a tuner app and chordbook app, and suggest they learn off of the many websites and YouTube tutorials for the instrument.
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Dec 3, 2014 22:38
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I came across this earlier today, and thought it was pretty cute (except for the fact that it is not performed on a uke  ).I'm getting a ukulele for Christmas
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Dec 3, 2014 23:34
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It's a good time to thank you, TTFA, for all the joy over the years. Ukulele really enriched my life and I'm very thankful for you and this thread. Thank you.
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Dec 3, 2014 23:42
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furushotakeru posted:I came across this earlier today, and thought it was pretty cute (except for the fact that it is not performed on a uke
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Dec 5, 2014 06:53
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i like nice words
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onecooldana posted:It's a good time to thank you, TTFA, for all the joy over the years. Ukulele really enriched my life and I'm very thankful for you and this thread. Thank you. I'd like to echo this as well. TTFA makes great threads and keep a them well supported.
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Dec 6, 2014 01:13
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Couldn't get to sleep last night. My wife woke up this morning to find me sprawled in front of the living room heat register in my skivvies next to my uke, a half-empty bottle of Flying Dog's raging bitch, and a copy of SHARKNADO 2. She didn't even bat an eye and just woke me with a cup of coffee and an orange. And it is definitely time for new strings. Might as well pick up a set of Aquila for my daughter's dolphin while I'm at it.
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Dec 30, 2014 14:05
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Guys did you know that ukuleles are popular now? http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/01/though-it-be-little-the-rise-of-the-ukulele/384453/
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Jan 25, 2015 19:30
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I'm kicking around the idea of picking up an eleuke so I can practice with headphones on. The MP3 line in is nice too, for video lessons/practice tracks, etc. Does anyone here have one, and how do you like it? I figure for $200-300 it won't be incredible sounding, but I have a nice uke if I want to sound good, this is just going to be for noodling around when I need or want it to be quieter. Does the 9V battery powering the headphone jack last a while or are you having to swap it out constantly? Anyone have a better suggestion for a solid body uke with an internal preamp/headphone jack? Thanks!
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Jan 28, 2015 18:49
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furushotakeru posted:I'm kicking around the idea of picking up an eleuke so I can practice with headphones on. The MP3 line in is nice too, for video lessons/practice tracks, etc. Does anyone here have one, and how do you like it? I figure for $200-300 it won't be incredible sounding, but I have a nice uke if I want to sound good, this is just going to be for noodling around when I need or want it to be quieter. Does the 9V battery powering the headphone jack last a while or are you having to swap it out constantly? Anyone have a better suggestion for a solid body uke with an internal preamp/headphone jack? Thanks! Though Bugsgear/Eleuke dominates the market, note that since solid e-ukes are pretty easy to build, there are a number of full-custom makers producing these in the high-$200s, so if you don't mind paying slightly more there are some pretty cool options out there. I haven't read the reviews on the following ones, so these aren't endorsements, but are a few options worth scoping out: - No price given, but Tinguitar has some neat minimalist models: http://tinguitar.com/gallery/solid-electric-long-neck-soprano-ukulele/  - Teton Guitars starts at $299 for a solid concert, and has the mp3 feature if that appeals to you: http://www.tetonguitars.com/steu102-series-solid-body-ukulele/  -Unukulele I'm unfamiliar with, but seems to have a lot of cool features for $295, offered in all four sizes. Just at my initial glance, the worksmanship seems a little cruder, but still worth reading up on. Note that instead of having the typical ukulele transducer built into the saddle (to pick up the vibrations directly, since unlike on an electric guitar, lacking metal strings the uke strings have no magnetic field to be read by a normal e-guitar pickup), it has some novel kind of transducer placed below the strings like on an electric guitar. Interesting. http://unkulele.com/products/les-paul-style-solid-body-electric-ukulele 
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Jan 28, 2015 19:31
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I have an eleuke and I really like it. It's well constructed and a breeze to play. The electronics work fine too. It's exactly as advertised.
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Jan 28, 2015 21:24
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Thanks. I'll mull it over some more. And yeah that last one looks like a toy for some reason. I think it's because it looks like untreated pine.
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Jan 28, 2015 23:24
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Ended up picking up a Teton uke. Eleukes are supposed to be great, but I couldn't find anyone that was actually selling them. Their own website lists about a dozen online retailers - ten of them are dead links and the other two don't have any eleukes in stock. The Teton has the features I'm looking for (tenor size, solid body, headphone jack, and MP3 line in) and looks sharp. I'll post again once it gets here and I've had a chance to play it.
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Feb 2, 2015 05:53
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furushotakeru posted:Ended up picking up a Teton uke. Eleukes are supposed to be great, but I couldn't find anyone that was actually selling them. Their own website lists about a dozen online retailers - ten of them are dead links and the other two don't have any eleukes in stock. The Teton has the features I'm looking for (tenor size, solid body, headphone jack, and MP3 line in) and looks sharp. I'll post again once it gets here and I've had a chance to play it. Sounds awesome! Looking forward to hearing your opinions. Do you already have some effects pedals (distortion, flanger, etc) you can jack into it? So far as what happened with Eleuke, this thread on UU explains it a little bit. Roughly it appears that Teton was a distributer for Eleuke and owned some of the tech used in the design, and ended up just deciding to produce a similar instrument internally: http://forum.ukuleleunderground.com/showthread.php?83441-Move-over-Eleuke-It-is-Teton-Time!
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Feb 2, 2015 18:46
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TapTheForwardAssist posted:Sounds awesome! Looking forward to hearing your opinions. Do you already have some effects pedals (distortion, flanger, etc) you can jack into it? I don't own an amp or any pedals, nor do I have any plans to purchase any as of right now. Just looking for something to practice quietly on at home. I have a nice Kanile'a for when I want to be heard
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Feb 2, 2015 19:49
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