Bowie played a huge part in my musical development. Back in my school days, the first band I was ever in was basically a Ziggy-and-before Bowie tribute band. I learnt a whole bunch of fancy chords from Life on Mars. And there are many, many chords in it (just one chord short of the record-holding So Long and Thanks for All the Fish).

The song is a real masterclass in using chords. So many of the chord changes involve changing just one or two notes (something I’ve done my best to preserve for the uke version). That’s particularly true of my favourite section of the tune: the pre-chorus. It creates a huge build up of tension by having rising chromatic notes (on the C-string then the E-string) against a fixed background.

For the chords in the pre-chorus (one other) I’ve suggested chords that only use three strings to make things a bit easier. I do that by bringing my thumb around the neck and use it to mute the g-string (an X above a string on the chord diagram means it’s muted).

Links

Buy it on iTunes
DavidBowie.com
More Bowie tabs and chords

Full Playlist

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Ukuleles
– Madonna’s ukulele sold for $300,000 at an auction for Haiti. They could have saved themselves $299,700 and bought it on Amazon.
– Zombie Ukulele.

Learning
– A selection of classical ukulele tab books for solo and ensemble ukulele. You can buy them in physical form or get the PDF version on a pay-what-you-want basis.
– Apple has released a free iOS app Music Memos. It’s a nice app for making a quick recording of any musical ideas you have. As well as being able to do some basic editing, add notes and the option to automatically add (slightly cheesy) bass and drums, it’ll attempt to work out the chords you’re playing. In my experience it does a reasonable job with major and minor ukulele chords but it does have a bit of trouble with 7 chords.

New Releases
– Matt Griffo – My Brother’s Friend Jerome.
– Danielle Ate the Sandwich wrote, recorded and produced an album in 24 hours.
– Tiki Cowboys – Island Dreams.

Videos
– Helen Arney extends Tom Lehrer’s chemical element song with the new elements.
– Full show of some great musicians playing timples, ukuleles, cavaquinhos and other uke-adjacent instruments (via @HermanVDC).
– I Rettiloni.
– Squeeze do a bit of lyric changing to heckle David Cameron on The Andrew Marr Show. He must be getting used to ukulele heckling by now.

When I got my first ukulele, I was completely clueless. This was in those dark, long forgotten days before the internet had been discovered. I didn’t even realise that the strings weren’t supposed to go thickest to thinnest and restrung it.

But you can save yourself from the social disgrace I experienced. I’ve put together a free mini-ebook covering the basics that every first time uke owner needs to know. Here’s what it contains:

Five Things to Know
Five Chords to Learn
Five Patterns to Strum
Five Songs to Play
Five Websites to Visit
Five Things to Get Free
Five Things to Buy
Five Videos to Watch
Five YouTube Channels to Subscribe to

You can download it free by clicking here:

So You Just Got Your First Ukulele (PDF)

And get playing by following the beginner ukulele lessons.

If you’re not new to ukulele but know someone who is feel free to pass it along. It has a Creative Commons license so distribute it as you wish.

Merry Christmas, Chanukah Sameach, Happy Holidays, Io Saturnalia and Happy Holidays! (If you’re into that kind of thing.)

If you’re after some Christmas music and you’re as Spotify user here’s my Christmas Ukulele playlist. Or if you’re sick of Christmas music my playlist of ukulele selections from 2014.

Don’t forget my chord theory ebook How to Play Ukulele Chords is being taken down at the end of the year. You can buy it here until then for the reduced price of $7 (down from $17).

That’s it from me for this year (other than the ebook for new ukers). I’ll be back at the end of January 2016 (year of the unnecessarily difficult F7 chord).

If you can’t bear to be without a steady stream of uke, I’ll be posting bits and pieces on Tumblr, UkeToob and on Twitter.

Full Playlist

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Full Playlist

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Wilfried Welti has just released a new free tab ebook Erste Ubungsstucke fur Solo Ukulele and was kind enough to let me share it. The arrangements are very simple and suitable for people just starting out with solo ukulele.

It goes along with his solo ukulele crash course for people new to solo ukulele (it’s currently in German only but he’s working on an English version and Google does a reasonable job in the meantime).

Links

Ukulele-Arts.com
Wilfried’s other ukulele ebooks

I did the chords for this Bernard and Smith tune way back in 2008 so it’s long overdue a run through a tabbed version.

I’ve gone with a chord arrangement for most of the tune. That means I’m just holding down chords and strumming. Then emphasising the melody while letting the other strums hang back.

The other main technique is picking the C-string with my thumb and flicking my index finger up across the E- and A-strings. I do that right at the start of the verse (second half of bar 4) and in the, “In the meadow…” section (bars 14-19).

The only bit of pure fingerpicking comes in the descending line in bar 20.

Links

Buy the Bing Crosby version.
Christmas ukulele tab ebooks

Even though it features no animal noises whatsoever*, A Christmas Fucking Miracle is one of my favourite Christmas songs.

For this tab of the intro I’m picking all the strings at the same time. That way all the notes are played simultaneously just like a piano (as opposed to strumming where they sound at very slightly different times). It seems like a subtle difference but it really helps match the sound of the original.

Links

Buy it on iTunes
RunTheJewels.net
More Christmas tabs

* Unexpected connection: That Colbert bit was directed by Christmas ukulele album maker Ballard C Boyd