Ukulele Window Shopping

Blackbird have just released the Blackbird Clara ukulele made from plant fibre. One of the few ukuleles made from renewable materials.

Some spectacularly colourful ukulele gig bags and cases from Musical Miscellany.

Never seen one of these before: KoAloha Solid Body Tenor prototype.

Fender have finally got on the ukes-that-look-like-Fender-guitars bandwagon with the Fender ’52 ukulele.

Kala are continuing to add to their Ukadelic range including:
Swirls, cheesy beach night and cool decorated skulls and steampunk.

Lanikai LKS-TEU complete with USB connection and Gibson-style fret markers.

Swagerty Kook-A-La-Lee.

1930s The Egyptian Ukulele by Regal.

Mr Bones banjolele.

Eleuke Vox Ukulele.

Pictures
Ivan Petrovitch
Margaret Thompson (as seen on Boardwalk Empire)

Friday Links

heART for PEACE: auction of decorated ukuleles to benefit victims of the typhoon in the Philippines.

New Releases

Can’t Stop, Shan’t Stop – Mr.B The Gentleman Rhymer.
Heretics by Rusty Cage.
An Evening With Neil Gaiman & Amanda Palmer (Live)
Lost Forever by Craig Robertson.
Easy Christmas Song ebook.
Ma Petite’s – Winter Comes, Winter Goes

Pictures

Dog, beard, ukulele.
Ukulele haul.
Grand Cat Show, 1883.
Decorated ukuleles.

Kickstarting

woodhook ukulele hanger.

Videos

George Formby’s Rolls-Royce Silver Wraith (Thanks to Ron Hale).
– Former Australian PM, Julia Gillard’s rant at ‘sexist’ Tony turned into a song.

I Am The Doctor (Doctor Who) (Tab)

Murray Gold – I Am The Doctor (Tab)

Following on from Charlie McDonnell’s Big Bang 2 with the tune from Doctor Who it was based on: Murray Gold’s I Am The Doctor. The theme for Matt Smith’s Doctor.

I also jammed a reference to the main Doctor Who Theme in at the end.

7/8 Time

The main theme is in rather tricky 7/8 time. When counting it I went with “1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3, 4”. But once I’d got the hang of playing it I dropped the count and just went with the swing of it.

Trickiest Bit

The high, screechy violin bit in bars 5-8. You can simplify this a couple of ways. You can drop the note on the A-string 8th fret at the end of the bar and just stick with the 10th fret. Or you could play a simpler version without the screeches. Either repeat the first four bars or play bars 17-20.

Links

Buy the original on iTunes
More Trock tabs and chords.
More theme tune tabs and chords.

Ukulele Trock Songs

Full Playlist

Read the rest of this entry »

Christmas Tabs and Chords

Christmas is coming, the goose is getting fat and tuning its ukulele. As am I. If you’d like to join us here’s all the Christmas stuff on the site.

Christmas eBooks

I’ve done two ebooks of Christmas songs arranged very simply for the uke. Each song is done in two ways. One solo version combining the chords and tune. And one that’s just the melody. You can read more about them here:

Christmas Ukulele 1
Christmas Ukulele 2: The Second Coming
Christmas Ukulele III: Return of the Maji

They’re each just $7 but get them all at once and you can get all three for the price of two

Buy them here

Chords

12 Days of Christmas
A Christmas Duel – The Hives and Cyndi Lauper
All I Want for Christmas Is You – Mariah Carey
Christmas for Cowboys – John Denver/Ballard C Boyd
Christmas in July – Jonathan Coulton and John Roderick
Cold Outside – Julia Nunes & Wade Johnson
Fairytale of New York – The Pogues
Fuck Christmas – Eric Idle
Give the Jew Girl Toys – Sarah Silverman
It’s Cliched to be Cynical At Christmas – Half Man Half Biscuit
iPod X-mas – Hello Saferide
Let It Snow
Lumberjack Christmas/Christmases Past – Sufjan Stevens
Merry Christmas (I Don’t Want To Fight) – The Ramones
Merry Xmas Everybody – Slade
No Christmas – Zee Avi
Present Face – Garfunkel and Oates
Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree
Run, Run Rudolph – Chuck Berry
Santa Baby
Silver Bells – She & Him
Space Christmas – Allo Darlin
The Christmas Song – Weezer
The Christmas Song Song – Rocky and Balls
White Christmas
Winter Wonderland
Year End Letter – Garfunkel and Oates
You’re a Mean One Mr Grinch

Tabs

Away in a Manger
Carol of the Bells
Christmastime Is Here – Charlie Brown
German Christmas Carols
Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas (Instrumental)
Jingle Bell Rock
Jingle Bells
Mele Kalikimaka
Merry Christmas Mr Lawrence
O Christmas Tree (Single Note Version)
Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer
Silent Night (Harmonics Version)
Silent Night (Single Note Version)
Sleigh Ride – U900 / The Ventures
We Three Kings
White Christmas

Charlie McDonnell – Big Bang 2 (Chords)

Charlie McDonnell/Chameleon Circuit – Big Bang 2 (Chords)

It’s the 50th Anniversary of Doctor Who next week so this week a couple of Who tunes to get you ready. First up is Charlie McDonnell’s solo uke version of Big Bang 2 by his trock band Chameleon Circuit. The song is based on Murray Gold’s I Am The Doctor from the show. More about that song on Thursday.

Suggested Strumming

Intro: Do this once for each chord:

d – d – d – x u
– u – u d u d –

Here’s how that sounds slowed way down:


IntroStrum

Verse: One down strum for each chord in the first half (the single strum bits vary between the verses). Then this twice for each chord:

d – d u – u d –

Chorus: Here’s where it gets tricky. Each line is this:

BigBang2Strum

Here’s how that sounds slowed down:


Chorus Strum

Middle: You can use the verse strum again: d – d u – u d –

Twiddly Bits

Here’s the little riff at the beginning. Best not to let it worry you that it’s in 7/8 time.

BigBang2Intro

Links

Buy the Chameleon Circuit version on iTunes
CharlieMcDonnell.com
DoctorWho.tv
More Charlie McDonnell chords

Mike and Ruthy, Blind Pilot: UkeTube

Full Playlist

Read the rest of this entry »

Friday Links

T-shirt update: You only have a few days left if you want to buy a Uke Hunt t-shirt. The standard black t-shirt has sold over 100 so that will definitely be made. As will the women’s black t-shirt which has just past its goal. Unfortunately the white t-shirts weren’t popular enough so those won’t be made.

New Releases

– Ohana have released a new ukulele based on the original look of the ukulele as made by the Madieran bunch. It’s called the Ohana SK-28. aNueNue had the same idea with their 1879 series. The aNueNue version looks more faithful to the original. But it’s also around double the price.
The Ukes in America DVD.
Post Mortem of a Monster by Zahra.

Pictures

Ukulele Skull.
The Hat Boys (c.1920).
Spanko strummin’…
Using the uke to pick up chicks.
A postcard from the Netherlands UPDATE: Thanks to karl for pointing out it’s the Ukulogisch Museum in Belgium. You can watch Bosco and Honey visiting in here.

NPR listen to the sounds of New York in 1930 with a fascinating recording of a strummer in Coney Island at the bottom.

The daughter of Mario Maccaferri discusses why he moved from making reeds to making plastic ukuleles.

Tune-Yards – FIYA

Tune-Yards – FIYA (Tab)

I started a new hobby blog today about African guitar music. There’s not a whole lot of crossover between ukuleles and African music but the one obvious link is Tune-Yards. Merrill Garbus cropped up on a couple of tracks on the recent Red Hot + Fela album including the standout track Lady with ?uestlove, Angelique Kidjo and others.

So today I’ve written up one of her African-influenced tracks FIYA.

The tab shows the riffs used in each section of the song (not the whole tabs).

The Tuning

The tuning on this one is weird. I think it’s baritone tuning (on a tenor ukulele) with a high-d string. But that high-d is tuned half a step to Db. So it’s dbGBE.

Standard Tuning Version

In case you don’t fancy making the effort for that tuning here’s a version in standard tuning that more or less works out:

Tune-Yards – FIYA (Standard Tuning)

Here’s how that intro sounds:


Intro Riff

The bridge:


Bridge Riff

And the chorus:


Chorus Riff

Links

Buy it on iTunes
tune-yards.com
Tune-Yards: Africa in Your Earbuds
Hatari tab
Powa tab

Ukulele Picking Patterns in 3/4 Time

In the comments of the fingerpicking patterns post post Gretchen requested picking patterns for 3/4. Which was an excellent idea.

If you’re not familiar with it, there’s a guide to fingerpicking notation here. And there’s a beginner’s guide to fingerpicking here.

What is 3/4 Time?

Most pop songs are in 4/4 time. So you’d count along with them “1, 2, 3, 4” Joey Ramone style. But there are many songs in 3/4 time i.e. you count “1, 2, 3” along with the song.

Some well known songs in 3/4 time: Happy Birthday, Hallelujah, The Times they are a-Changing.

Thumb and Two Finger Patterns

Three patterns using the thumb and two finger method of picking.

PIMP Pattern

A very straight forward pattern with the thumb on the C-string.

Ex1

PIMIPI Pattern

Similar to the last pattern but now you’re going up and down the strings (and up a bit again).

Ex2

Unison Pattern

Here you’re playing the E and A-strings at the same time. There’s a bass note then the rest of chord. It’s something you hear a lot in 3/4 time.

Ex3

One Finger Per String Method

Now for three patterns using the One Finger Per String Picking Method.

PIMA Pattern

Going straight up the strings. But the first two notes are eighth notes and the second two quarter notes.

Ex4

Unison Pattern

Similar to the third pattern except this time playing the g-string alone. This example is a bit Beirut-y.

Ex5

IMP Pattern

Another example with strings being played in unison. But this time the g and E-strings being played at the same time.

Ex6

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