All to often, the ukulele is dismissed as a toy instrument – not capable of real musicianship. So I was delighted to find out the Victoria College of Music (VCM) will be offering exams in the ukulele up to grade 5 from this summer. I tapped the man writing and arranging the ukulele exams, Colin […]

Wayne Federman – Electric Ukulele Medley (Tab) Wayne Federman, for those of you not in the know, is a stand-up comedian and comedy actor. He was in Curb Your Enthusiasm, 40 Year Old Virgin, the uke-featuring 50 First Dates and a whole pot load of other stuff you can find out about on his website. […]

Jake Shimabukuro is touring the US at the moment. Uke Hunt’s roving reporters Shawn and Lonna B filed this review from Chicago. Jake Shimabukuro Old Town School of Folk Music Chicago, IL 4/26/08 Early show Set List Let’s Dance Dragon Me and Shirley T In My Life Sakura, Sakura Going to California Blue Roses Falling […]

Every time I’ve turned on the TV the last few weeks it seems like this ad featuring Broadcast 2000 has been on (you can listen to the full song here). I didn’t really have much choice but to tab out its ukulele riff. The time signature for this piece is a little strange. The first […]

Lots of precipitation this week; two songs about rain and one about snow. And, of course, plenty of other great stuff including Roy Smeck, Ledward Kaapana and Shorty Long.

GUGUG – Blitzkrieg Bop (Chords) I’ve had this one written up and been intending to post it since the Ukulele Video of the Year (I think it was my favourite, still can’t decide), but I finally got a kick up the arse when it was featured on Boing Boing yesterday. The chords to the song […]

Watching Mike DaSilva’s video, is very inspiring. Unfortunately, after a rather spectacular woodwork lesson at school where my clumsiness left a number of class mates significantly short on limbs, I have an ASBO barring me from moving within 6 feet of tools. The solution offered to people like me is ukulele kits which require nothing […]

I’m embarking on a new mini-project on the blog. I’m going to list the definitive ukulele songs – the one’s most associated with the uke – and the definitive versions of those songs. If you’ve got any ideas about what should be included, leave a comment. There’s a really great little feature of Mike DaSilva […]

The Devil and the Deep Blue Sea (Chords) As far as I’m concerned, Mark Occhionero‘s arrangement of The Devil and the Deep Blue Sea is the definitive ukulele version. You’d have to be crazy to want me to do a version. Which might explain why Heather requested just that. My version of the chords is […]

With all the stuff on the net about the ukulele, there’s very little about how to play scales on the ukulele. It’s a bit strange as scales are the building blocks of music in general and chords in particular. I wrote an ebook about how ukulele chords are made up, so I won’t go into […]