Seeso

I Shot the Sheriff (Bob Marley)
Santeria (Sublime)
I Got A Name (Jim Croce)
Waterfalls (TLC)
Fire & Rain (James Taylor)
What A Wonderful World
Rubber Ducky (I’m wearin’ my Oakland A’s cap too!!)

Daniel McF

Daniel is someone I found on You Tube some time ago. He’s a nutter and a talent. Love his songwriting.

Dive On In (Just a little naughty)“If you were my woman and I was your man. I would be all over you just like Godzilla on Japan”(You gotta love that Metranome solo)
God
Sweet Life
Christmas Beau

Lyle Ritz & Bill Tapia

Go Back to the Little Grass Shack (Partial)

Victoria Vox

Ukulele Lady (Partial)

Lil’ Rev

One Meatball (Portland Uke Fest 2006)
St. Louis Blues
Ukulele Polka
Angelina Baker
Boots and Saddle Anacortes 2007
Wild About It
Finjeta
Harmonica Anacortes 2007

Final Countdown midi

To play this riff, it’s important you follow the example of Europe and spend ten times longer getting big hair than practicing.

Buy The Final Countdown

Love Machine Midi

It’s a bit disheartening that the most innovative, eclectic and enjoyable music around at them moment is made by a pop band put together on a reality TV show. Even the Arctic Monkeys had to face the fact that this song was better than anything they could come up with and cover it.

Buy Chemistry

Have Love, Will Travel midi

This song was originally written by Richard Berry who also came up with Louie, Louie. It has been covered many times by the likes of The Blues Brothers, Bruce Springsteen and, most recently, The Black Keys.

I’ve cheated a note in this tab so that it will fit on the uke in the original key of C.

Buy Have Love, Will Travel

Blister In The Sun midi

I’m away from the computer this week, so I thought I’d launch into the next series of posts in the top guitar riffs for ukulele. These aren’t the riffs that work best on the uke but those that are most recognisable, fun and catchy. You probably wouldn’t want to use these to play the full song, but to throw in Taimane style to keep the audience on their toes. For this round of guitar riffs I thought I’d throw in a few less expected ones. I’m even going all out and including a few riffs from the decade that not-being-dreadful forgot, the 80’s.

Blister in the Sun by the Violent Femmes is insanely catchy and has been picked up for use in film (Grosse Point Blank) and TV (Two Guys, a Girl and a Pizza Place>. The riff is chord based which makes it well suited to the uke and – unlike most of the rest of the riffs in the series – suitable to play all the way through relatively unchanged on the uke. So, I’ve tabbed it in the original key of G.

The chords for the chorus are:

Em – C – Em – C – D

Suggested by Edegoly

Buy Violent Femmes

Jessica midi

On Monday, I’ll be kicking off numbers 20 to 11 in my series of guitar riffs for the ukulele. I’d tabbed this out for inclusion but decided it wasn’t really a riff. It is, however, fun to play while wearing too much denim and a perm.

British readers might recognise this as the theme tune to the most morally bankrupt show on TV, Top Gear.

Download Jessica on Amazon

Pretty soon, your clueless relatives will be searching the intertubes trying to come up with something to buy you for Christmas. To help them out, I’m going to be doing a series of posts of suggestions of gifts for ukulele players. If you want to avoid getting socks that play jingle bells, leave a comment letting everyone know what you’re hoping to find under the tree (uke-wise obviously). Or if there’s something you have that any uke player would love to get, tell us about it.

 Update: Christmas gifts for ukulele players.

Greg Hawkes

When I was in just out of high school I would hear “The Cars” on the radio. I really liked their unique sound. I found a member of “The Cars” playing the ukulele on “Midnight Ukulele Disco” and I really love it. Here’s Greg Hawkes. Enjoy.

Songs from “The Cars”
Moving In Stereo w/Tim Mann
Drive w/Tim Mann
Tonight She Comes

Greg Hawkes Classics
Pennies From Heaven
Greg Hawkes version of old time tune…
Blue Jay Way (G. Harrison)

Kharmachanic

Cover songs with Kharmachanic personality!

Heart Full of Soul (Yardbirds)
Backstabbers (O’Jays)
Beginnings (Chicago)
Temptation Eyes (Grassroots)
Let Your Love Flow (Bellamy Brothers)
50 Ways to Leave Your Lover (Paul Simon)

Brook Adams

(New videos)
Abbey Road Medley
The Ballad of Larry Craig Idaho Thrillbillies (with Mike DaSilva)

In Other News…

I’m going to be away next week (nowhere exotic). Thanks to modern technology, there will still be posts cropping up but I won’t be replying to emails or comments until I’m back.

See you soon.

Design a logo for the New York Uke Fest.

The ukulele is so easy to learn a chimp could do it.

Bill Tapia’s 100th Birthday Show kicks off a little early.

Ukulele Tonya at the Southern Californian Ukulele Festival.

Howlin’ Hobbit on the ukulele’s trouble-making past.

The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain on This Morning.

Del Ray’s new album with Britain’s most photographed shed on the cover (at Rye Harbour).

GUGUG on Q Magazine Blog.

Any chance of a self tuning robot ukulele any time soon?

If you’re reading this as soon as I post it, head over to Radio Ulster and listen to Stuart Bailie’s ‘Nothing Compares 2 Uke’. Or you can use listen again if you’re not so quick out of the blocks.

I thought I’d celebrate my 200th post by putting up a song that will make you lose any respect you might have had for me. This is my favourite song at the moment (with Sexy! No, No, No a close second), I can’t get enough of it.

For those not in the UK, Leona Lewis won last years X-Factor (like American Idol but with water fights). She’s always being compared with Whitney or Mariah, but this song is far better than anything they’ve ever done.

UPDATE: Craig Robertson has recorded a cover of Bleeding Love and it’s fantastic. Here it is:

Craig Robertson – Bleeding Love

Buy Bleeding Love