This lovely tune from the Keston Cobblers’ Club got a great reaction when I featured it on the UkeTube. And Matt from the band was kind enough to share the chords and lyrics so I thought I’d write them up.
Suggested Strumming
For the most part it’s just down strums with a ‘d u d u’ just before the chord changes.
So in the first part the G would be:
d – d – d – d –
d – d – d u d u
And the C and E:
d – d – d u d u
The exception is the C in lines three and four where you just need two down strums.
Back in the olden days I had a fingerpicking mini-course available for people who signed up for my mailing list. It’s been unavailable for quite a while and a few people have been asking about it. So here’s the first part of it and the rest of it will be available once I work out what I want to do with it.
In order to tab fingerpicking, we need to introduce some new notation. The fingers of the picking hand are referred to as:
T = Thumb
I = Index Finger
M = Middle Finger
A = Ring Finger
The finger names come from pulgar, indice, medius, annular.
Each of these fingers is allocated to an individual string:
Thumb – g-string
Index Finger – C string
Middle Finger – E string
Ring Finger – A string
Like this:
As you can see, I use my little finger as an anchor. This stabilizes the hand. However, there is a trade off. Letting you hand hover over the strings will give your fingers greater flexibility and make it easier to switch between picking and strumming.
Once you’ve got comfortable with that position, try this simple exercise.
Here, we’re picking through the each string in order while holding down a C chord. When picking a note, your fingertip should be very slightly underneath the string. You pluck it by bringing your finger up and towards your head (or up and away from you head for your thumb).
Make sure you let all the notes ring into each other so that, by the time you’ve picked all the notes, a full chord is ringing.
You can see a video (mpg) of me doing this (first slowly then sped up) here:
Once you get the hang of this, you can try changing chords while playing it. Like this:
Example 2
This can feel like trying to rub your stomach and pat your head at the same time. But a little bit of practice and it start to come more naturally.
It’s must-read stuff for everyone, but particularly relevant for ukulele groups. It’s dispiriting to watch a group of ukers all playing the same chords in the same inversions with the same strum at the same volume for the whole song. If you’re just playing for shits and giggles, no problem. But if you’re playing in front of people, you need to put some thought into the arrangement.
This Too Shall Pass would be an excellent tune for a ukulele group to play. The chords are dead simple, it’s one big singalong, there are some twiddly bits for the show offs, plenty of dynamic changes in the arrangement and plenty of room for ideas.
Suggested Strumming
When you are strumming you can use
d – d – d u d u
But the most important part of the strumming pattern is when you stop strumming. Make sure you’re not playing during the plinky bits and the, “Let it go…”
Twiddly Bits
The most obvious dip in the dynamics is this little bit that comes in the verse.
I like to play it further up the neck for extra plinkiness (let me know in the comments if you need these technical terms explained).
These notes are also used in the middle section but each two note pair lasts for twice as many beats.
And here’s the little xylophone bit that crops up in the verse:
It’s a little tricky to fit all those G notes in – even using two strings – so you can drop a few notes to make it easier.
There are tons of ideas for extra bits of filigree for you to add as the arrangement builds towards the end in the vastly superior but unembeddable marching band version. You can use any notes you feel like in the C major scale or, simpler still, pick notes from the chord that’s playing at the time.
A great way to keep strumming and add some colour is to use octaves like this:
The site has been throwing a bit of a diva fit this evening. At the time of writing, it’s sort of back on line. But don’t be too surprised if things look weird, aren’t working or the whole site disappears.
I’m going to get some sleep and pray the interfairies take pity on me.
A big thanks to all the people who let me know they were having problems.
Richard Ayoade makes some great videos but the one he made for Vlad the Impaler is a whole new level of astounding. Not least because of Noel Fielding’s moustache.
The bass riff, of course, doesn’t work on ukulele at all. But why should that stop us?
Nothing made me laugh more this week than this video by Barbara Holm. I watch a lot of ukulele videos and, with the best will in the world, some of them are really bad. This parody is spot on (there’s always a danger declaring something to be a hilarious parody when you’re not entirely sure it’s a parody at all).
Up this week is Samantha Shelton (who has some veryheavyweightfriends), The Bad Mitten Orchestre, Marie Darling playing with both arms in plaster and plenty more.
I’m in a bad mood at the moment so this might change when I’m back to my usual ‘rainbows and fairy-wings’ self but the Monday Exposures won’t be every week any more. They’re always the least commented on and least read posts.
Blueberry are another guitar company leaping onto the ukulele bandwagon. Their Bluekulele is a bit filigree-heavy for my taste but it’s already commanding a good price and plenty of bidders.
Anyone ever tried a Pickard ukulele? They’re commanding a high price on eBay UK but I don’t remember having seen anyone play one (or even talk about them).
I think this would be a great song for ukulele orchestras. It’s got a really interesting arrangement: simple chords, a bunch of little riffs to play, plenty of space in the arrangement and some nice dynamics (I might rant on this next week). It’s in the key of C. And it sounds great sung chorally.
There are three little riffs in the song a one bar riff, a two bar riff and an eight bar riff.
The first riff from the keyboard:
The first guitar riff:
The second guitar riff is worth playing with pick and some damping (letting the underside of your hand rest gently on the strings just in front of the bridge).
Mid-East caused quite a splash at NAMM 2010 with a range of ukuleles based on traditional instruments including a hippie’s wet dream – a sitar that’s small enough to carry in a backpack. So I caught up with Jay McDonald from Mid-East to discuss chikaris and sympathetic strings; and to get some extensive use out of superscript.
What made you decide to start making such unusual ukuleles?
Mid-East has been making ethnic instruments from around the world since 1973. I wanted a “crossover” instrument which was a more mainstream western instrument such as a guitar or ukulele but yet would let us capitalize on our world instrument expertise. I felt at least four of our existing instruments lent themselves to be made into 4-string ukuleles. Three of the four had to be re-designed to make them smaller but the Russian folk instrument, called a balalaika, already had the same string scale length as a tenor ukulele so it was a natural fit by adding one more string.
The Lute-kulele™ is based on a 16th century Renaissance lute. I felt it was important to maintain the bowl back, the bent-back peg box, the carved rosette and the wooden pegs.
The Baroq-ulele™ is based on the roundback guitar-lutes made popular in Germany in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s. When I first saw the results of my design come into fruition at our overseas workshop, I just wanted to hug it and I’ve seen it have this same effect on many people. This is the most feature- rich instrument in our entire product line in that it is offered in 3 sizes (soprano, concert and tenor), 3 woods, and two tuners options. We are exploring a third tuner option with Pegheads(tm).
The fourth one, getting a lot of buzz (pun intended) is the sitar-based ukulele we call the Sitar-kulele™. Mid-East has been the largest provider of sitars in the USA for many years. We had a toy mini-sitar in the product line so I took that idea and made it into a real sitar using a different maker.
What challenges did you face designing and developing these instruments?
This Lute-kulele™ was a challenge in that Renaissance lutes normally have between 11 and 15 strings. I wanted to keep the peg box in proportion so I added two double strings to make it a 6-string ukulele but since they are double-strings, the instrument is still played like a normal 4-string uke. The nylon frets, typical on a Renaissance lute were a challenge too. Tied at the top of the neck, this is never and issue with a wide-neck lute but for the Lute-kulele™ these knots preclude fast thumb-over techniques. It is best suited for fingerpicking in the John King-style of music.
The Sitar-kulele™ has been the biggest challenge. It was a struggle to get the sitar makers to center the strings down the neck (sitars are offset). Regular sitars have very high action so the height of the arched frets can permit a wide degree of inconsistency. I wanted to achieve standard low action for the ukulele version, so leveling the arched frets was also something new for the sitar makers. I tried a nylon-string version but the sitar buzz that everyone knows and loves doesn’t work unless the strings are of steel or brass.
The instruments look great. Did you have to make compromises to the sound or the playability to get that? Which was your priority?
I wanted to keep the integrity of the original instruments as much as possible yet make these all truly playable instruments. These were not designed to be novelties or décor items.
Without a soundhole the small Sitar-kulele™ is really very quiet, so a pickup was added as standard. A strap is recommended for the Baroq-uleles™ with their round backs. Otherwise they tend to want to roll out. I could have flattened the back to prevent this but the instrument would lose its huggable personality for sure.
The Sitar-kulele looks very unconventional. What are the string and fret arrangements on it?
A typical sitar has 7 main strings with two of these called chikari strings that ride on posts along the edge of the neck. There wasn’t enough real estate to keep both these and the sympathetic strings on a ukulele-sized version. I converted the chikari tuning pegs into sympathetic string pegs enabling 6 sympathetic strings instead of only four. The sympathetic strings run underneath the frets and can be tuned chromatically or to a particular key. The frets are spaced like any standard ukulele except I eliminated the 9th and 13th frets in keeping more with the heritage of a true sitar. This also enabled one more sympathetic peg to be added where the ninth fret was removed. The instrument can be played normally as long as your tuning or key doesn’t require the notes omitted by the two absent frets. I would encourage alternative tunings on this ukulele. It’s a Sitar-kulele™ so keep in the spirit of “sitarness”.
Have you got plans for any more ukuleles in the future?
Absolutely! We are already planning a larger version (tenor or baritone) of the Sitar-kulele™. The Baroq-ulele™ has been such a hit we’re exploring a baritone version and we’re looking into other woods. Our very first ukulele, the Cumbus-ukulele (pronounced Joom’-bush) has been in our product line for several years and I will be visiting Turkey next month to make some changes to the fingerboard. We also have plans for 3 new ukuleles based other old-world instruments that we’re real excited about. I don’t want to say too much right now but Ukulele Hunt will be the first to learn about them later this year.
