A couple of weeks ago I tabbed out a version of this song for two ukuleles and I couldn’t resist the challenge of doing it on one.

I combined the two parts in the simplest way I could think of: by only playing the background riff when there were no melody notes. There are two tricky parts to getting this: keeping the groove and distinguishing the melody notes from the riff. There are parts where the melody cuts across the riff in awkward ways (such as in bars 7 and 8 ) and I need some practice before I could fall naturally back into the riff. I also found the phrasing in bar 20 a little unnatural. Counting the beats (1 & 2 & 3 & 4 &) and playing on the ‘1 &’ and the ‘4 &’ helped me sort it out.

I separated the melody from the riff by dampening the strings a little on the riff notes (i.e. resting the flabby bit at the bottom of my right hand against the strings very lightly) and giving the melody notes an extra bit of welly.

WS64 has done a great version of this tune. He incorporates more chord notes than I did. I particularly like his strummed sections. I like them so much I’m going to steal the idea.

The best of the week’s uke performances over the fold – including an earth-shattering performance by Tessie O’Shea and Jake coming over all Spinal Tap.

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Ukulelenurkka will be celebrating International Ukulele Day (August 23rd) in Helsinki with two days worth of top-notch gigs. Appearances from Ukulelezaza, Pete Howlett, Shelley Rickey and Scheidenbach.

After I mentioned the Tay Zonday’s viral hit video Chocolate Rain in connection with this performance, WS64 produced a fantastic ukulele version of the song. Tay Zonday and WS64 – Chocolate Rain (mp3)

A couple of atmospheric photos of Amanda Palmer and one of her many surprise ukulele performances.

Learn how to tie your ukulele strings extra firmly from the knot experts.

Mix Me A Molotov has a live mp3 of UOoGB performing Anarchy in the UK. Ukulele mp3s galore at Ochblog.

The Independent can’t resist a terrible ukulele pun either and reveals that Pete Doherty has, apparently, bought a uke.

Tedtoons of the Nashville Ukulele Society has two hilarious uke ecards: kitty ukulele and frog ukulele.

More painted ukes.

New ukulele LiveJournal group.

A ukulele playing Des O’Connor. Not that Des O’Connor.

Fluke played atop a camel.

Desperate rappers turn to Tiny Tim.

Of all the ten commandments, the one I find most difficult to live by is, “Thy shalt not covet thy neighbour’s uke.” I’ve often found myself browsing eBay or YouTube, ogling the ukes of others and contemplating harvesting the organs of my uglier children to raise the cash to buy one. But my moral compass got the better of me. So how do you get a better sounding ukulele without shelling out for one?

1. Holding the ukulele

I’ve seen it suggested that you should hold the uke by smushing it into your chest; that is entirely the wrong way to go about it. Being so small, it’s easy to smother all the tone out of a ukulele. You want to be touching the ukulele as little as possible. You need to allow the front and back of the uke to vibrate as much as possible to wring all the tone and volume out of it as possible.

Watch how the masters like Jake Shimabukuro and Roy Smeck hold it. They have the uke angled away from the body and their forearm resting very gently on the corner of the uke. The area of the uke they are touching is very small and mostly limited to the corners.

2. Use good strings

The quality of strings you use can have a huge effect on the sound of the ukulele. Buying top of the range strings is far more affordable than buying a top of the range uke and can yield almost as much of an improvement in tone. Aquila and Worth strings are generally considered the best ukulele strings around. But I still love my pink KoAloha strings. Find more about ukulele strings here.

3. Find the sweet spot

The place where you strum the uke can have a big impact on how it sounds. If you strum close to the bridge (where the strings are tied on), then you’ll get a very thin, reedy sound. Each uke has it’s own sweet spot but it’s usually somewhere around the point where the neck meets the body.

4. Don’t use a guitar pick.

The number one mistake guitar players make when transferring to uke is hacking away at the uke strings with a thumping great rhino’s toenail. Guitar plectrums are far too hard for nylon uke strings (you can just about get away with it on steel strings) and as a consequence they make a harsh sound. If you have to use a pick, use the dedicated ukulele felt picks.

5. Look after your uke.

Ukes react very badly to humidity. If you’ve got a cheap instrument you may not want to fork out for a humidifier but don’t leave your uke on a sunny windowsill or near a heater. The latest edition of UkeCast (episode 222 – the number of a third of the beast) has a list of tips for looking after your uke (I did not know that suncream can damage ukuleles).

So you might not be able to make a Mahalo sound like a vintage Martin ukulele (that was just an excuse for a very tenuous pun) but you can certainly improve the sound it makes.

Do you have have any other tone tips?

The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain‘s latest album, Precious Little, contains a version of this song (made famous by Nancy Sinatra’s version on the Kill Bill Soundtrack) but they’re not the first to do it on the uke. Former Miss France, Mareva Galanter did a ukulele version on her Ukuyeye album (which combined two of my musical loves that I never thought I’d see together) she also has the only flash website so cool it doesn’t make me run away and look at a blank sheet of paper for half an hour.

Ukulele Boogaloo has the chords and tab for the intro but the way they’ve written up the intro strikes me as crazy. It makes more sense to play it this way:

At the start of the intro bar your index finger across the third fret and leave it there until bar 4. Let as many notes as possible ring into each other – to recreate the sound of the original. The notes in brackets are ‘ghost notes’ i.e. played more softly than the others. These aren’t fully part of the tune but help to support it – it’s your choice whether to play them or not.

Buy Kill Bill Soundtrack US UK

(that must be the first time I’ve anything cheaper in the UK than in the US)

I can’t get enough of the Decemberists’ approach to lyrics. They are full of strange and threatening characters. It’s a mystery to me why murder ballads are dying out – we’re supposed to be living a culture awash with violence. Chimbley Sweep is a little more light-hearted (but with a creepy undertow) – it could be a Mary Poppins song were it not for the blatant euphemisms – but has the usual characters and anachronistic language (‘chimbley sweep’ comes from Martin Chuzzlewit). It also happens to be an excellent strum-along ukulele song.

The original version of this song was recorded by a guitar with a capo on the first fret (as you can see in this video) which puts it almost into uke territory. If you want to play along with the record, you have to tune your uke down half a step to B-tuning (F# B Eb G#) but the chords are named as the familiar C-tuning shapes. Other than that, the chords are the first few you learn.

But I couldn’t help but make things a little tricker on myself. I prefer the sound of this chord progression played when your uke is tuned to C# (or capoed at the 1st fret). The chord shapes are a little more tricky. Try it both ways and see which you prefer.

The Decemberists – Chimbley Sweep (Chords in C# tuning)

Buy Her Majesty US UK

Learn another Decemberists song on Mike’s Ukulele Page.

Read (Decemberist guitarist) Chris Funk’s agony uncle page answering queries such as, “what gift befits a newborn monarch whose father’s untimely death (by your own hand) allowed the succession of such a young heir?” And watch him bravely defend the honour of indie music against Stephen Colbert in a guitar solo challenge.

The 60th Edinburgh Festival Fringe kicked off at the weekend and – amongst the many desperate self-publicists wandering around in lurid, skin tight clothing – are a few ukulele acts.

The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain

Sugar Plum Fairy (mp3)
My Baby Does (mp3) via UOGB

The biggest names in the uke world appearing at the festival will be the UOGB who will be appearing at the Assembly for three nights (this Thursday to Saturday) as part of the tour supporting their new album Precious Little.

Stuckey and Murray

Comedy duo who call their music ‘Cognitive Rock’ or ‘Cock’. If that video wasn’t enough to convince you of their cerebral charms, check out the Ukulele Song and download a couple of mp3s on SoundClick.

Appearing at the Underbelly all month.

Liz Bentley

Comedy songs and poetry taking a light-hearted look at bulimia, multiple sclerosis, expressing green breast-milk, public indecency and life as a therapist and a therapee. Her website says she’s willing to smash up a ukulele if enough people want her too. Now that’s just sick and twisted.

Appearing at Just The Tonic all month.

I recently acquired a Fluke and ill-educated people have been confusing it with a balalaika ever since. I’ve given up trying to explain it to them and have learnt to play two Russian sounding tunes on it. The first bit of this video is the tune from Gogol Bordello’s Not A Crime – from a traditional tune called Tromba de Zingari. The second part is a solo version of the Tetris theme.

I’ve tried to retain as much as I could from the duet version – which has made it tricky to play as it shoots around the neck. The trickiest section is bars 5 and 6. Originally I had it tabbed as:

I made it slightly easier for the tab. You can make it easier still by playing it like this:

Which I should have done because I was struggling with this section in the video.

One more hint: in the first bar make sure you fret the A with your third finger so you can play the next few notes more easily.

This work by Ukulele Hunt is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.

So, so, so many top notch ukulele videos this week.

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Uke Hunt has a MySpace. Friend me up and join the Uke Hunt endorsed Ukulele Nation.

Lyle Ritz and Roy Sakuma chat on NPR (via Ukulelia).

The C-FleaPO & R2-Flea2 Flea ukulele doesn’t exist. But Darth Vader plays uke.

Howlin’ Hobbit is dishing out bi-weekly uke tips.

An ukulele has finally made an appearance in Flight of the Conchords during the song Goodbye Leggy Blonde.

Short lived cartoon character Crazy Ike and His Uke.

A short clip of Aldrine Guerrero in the studio on DoctorTrey and a podcast with him here.

Old Blue Bus has Hawaiian tracks and WFMU’s Beware the Blog has an interview with Tiny Tim (thanks to KDUS).

Another art uke.

Naked ukulele in New York.

Be careful how you type ukulelehunt.com.

The chords for 100 Hawaiian songs.