Tracklist
Vinícius Vivas – Spain
Paula Fuga – Rain On Sunday
Sufjan Stevens & Angelo De Augustine – Reach Out
Mathias Cévé – Vivaldi's Summer
Garam JEON – Für Elise
Lou Barlow – PAWS
Art Levine – Do Nothing Till You Hear from Me
Conrad Cayman – Oh, Lady be Good
williwaw – leaning o'er parapets of cloud
Uke Hunt turned 14 in May (I would have mentioned it then but time has become a flat circle and I still think it’s March). According to WebMD a 14 year olds will experience, “mood swings.. and may be embarrassed by you.”
Here’s a round-up of my favourite tabs and the goings-on of the last year.
May 2020
– Sad news of the deaths of two ukulele legends: Ian Whitcomb and Willie K
In tabs: Little Richard – Tutti Frutti, Gary Jules – Mad World, John Prine – Fish and Whistle/In Spite of Ourselves and Money Heist/La Casa de Papel Theme.
Patreon tab: Chris Isaak – Wicked Game
June 2020
– The Big Chord Quiz
– Formby was wrong, you do need a license for your ukulele.
In tabs: I finally got around to doing Tiptoe Through the Tulips. Plus CCR/Wilson Pickett – Proud Mary/Midnight Hour, Dua Lipa – Don’t Start Now, John Denver – Take Me Home, Country Roads and some riffs from TikTok.
Patreon tab: Daft Punk – Get Lucky
July 2020
In tabs: Hank Wiliams – I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry, Bill Withers – Ain’t No Sunshine (Tab) and from the Last of Us 2: the theme song, Beyond Desolation and a bunch of riffs.
Patreon tab: Julie London – Cry Me a River
August 2020
– Following up on the five free tab collections earlier in the year with four more free tab ebooks: The Beatles on Uke, US TV Themes, Game Themes and Songs from the 60s. And, with my final Steven Universe/Adventure Time tabs: the Rebecca Sugar collection.
In tabs: Taylor Swift and Bon Iver – exile, Community Theme and The Proclaimers – Sunshine on Leith.
Patreon tab: Queen – Love of My Life
September 2020
In tabs: Tracy Chapman – Fast Car, Eagles – Desperado, Bruno Mars – When I Was Your Man, Amazing Grace and Pixies – Where Is My Mind?
Patreon tab: Robert Johnson – Love in Vain
October 2020
In tabs: The Beach Boys – God Only Knows, Black Sabbath – Paranoid, Frankie Valli – Can’t Take My Eyes Off You and
Patreon tab: Neil Young – Harvest Moon
November 2020
– Long lost tapes of Joni Mitchell playing the ukuelele showed up and I celebrated by tabbing A Case of You.
In tabs: Ray Charles – Georgia On My Mind (Tab), Damien Rice – The Blower’s Daughter and Goo Goo Dolls – Iris.
Patreon tab: Guns N’ Roses – November Rain
December 2020
– I ran down my favourites of 2020.
In tabs: John Lennon – Happy Xmas (War is Over), John Denver – Christmas for Cowboys and Oasis – Don’t Look Back in Anger.
Patreon tab: Dusty Springfield – Son of a Preacher Man
January 2021
In tabs: Rey’s Theme from Star Wars, Toploader – Dancing in the Moonlight and, for obvious reasons, Vampire Weekend – 2021
Patreon tab: Eurythmics – Sweet Dreams
February 2021
one year of Patreon. It’s made a huge difference to me and that’s been reflected in the number of tabs going up. Patrons have also provided loads of suggestions of songs (which hadn’t occurred to me, I didn’t know or was too chicken to taken on) that I’m really pleased I tabbed. So a huge thanks to everyone that’s supported me at any point along the way. I don’t think either I or the site would have survived the pandemic without you.In tabs: The Supremes – Where Did Our Love Go, Inspector Gadget Theme, Agnes Obel – Riverside and Loudon Wainwright – The Swimming Song
Patreon tab: Extreme – More Than Words
March 2021
In tabs: The whole of Wagner’s Ring Cycle, Sex Pistols – God Save the Queen, The Cure – Boys Don’t Cry and Frightened Rabbit – I Wish I Was Sober
Patreon tab: George Gershwin – Rhapsody in Blue
April 2021
– A ukulele song made it to #1 for the first time since Train’s Hey, Soul Sister in the shape of Polo G and Einer Bankz’s RAPSTAR.
– I shared what I’ve learned so far while trying to improve my sound.
In tabs: Avril Lavigne – Sk8er Boi, Phoebe Bridgers – I Know the End , Simon and Garfunkel – April Come She Will, Queen – Bicycle Race and Weezer – Undone – The Sweater Song
Patreon tab: The Stranglers – Golden Brown
Louis Armstrong/Sam Cooke – What a Wonderful World/Wonderful World (Tab)
A pairing of two almost identically titled songs: Sam Cooke’s Wonderful World and Louis Armstrong’s What a Wonderful World. One because of a Patreon request and the other in tribute to Maple the guitar dog.
The arrangement starts with the beautiful melody of What a Wonderful World. Nothing too difficult here. Be sure to make the melody notes stand out against the backing note. And prepare for bar 13 by barreing across the strings for the notes on the E-string, 1st fret in bar 12.
Things speed up for Wonderful World but the chords get simpler. I must have heard this song hundreds of times, but I didn’t have any recollection of the bridge section. It’s certainly more forgettable than the earworm of the verse and chorus.
Links
Buy the Louis Armstrong MP3
Buy the Sam Cooke MP3
Uke Hunt Patreon
Beyonce – Halo (Tab)
I’ve been negligent not doing a Beyonce song before this. But with some pushing from Patreon I’ve rectified the situation.
My favourite part to play is the intro. It fits so nicely on the uke I decided to use it as the outro too. Things stay fairly straightforward to play in the verse. All that is played with one finger per string picking.
But in the bridge and chorus Beyonce stretches her vocal range which means a trip up the neck. The arrangement goes as high as the 14th fret where it’s tough to play cleanly. You’ll also need to pick more forcefully so to keep the volume of the note at the same level as notes lower on the neck.
The picking in the rest of the song is more haphazard. For the quick notes, I’m using alternate picking to keep up.
Links
Joe Biden has nominated Jake Shimabukuro for the National Council on the Arts.
Fender have released a ukulele with Dhani Harrison.
On Video
– Documentary on the Survivor Girl Ukulele Band.
– The George Formby Society celebrate their Diamond Anniversary.
– Helen Arney teaches you how to use a toilet.
New Releases
– The UOGB’s Ben Rouse has released a solo record: Classical Ukulele.
– Ciat Conlin’s The Moon and The Sea.
Patreon
A massive thanks to all Uke Hunt’s Patreon backers for keeping the site up and running. And double thanks go to these unmatched patrons of the arts:
– Arthur Foley
– Colleen Petticrew
– Dan
– David Burt
– Elizabeth Beardsley
– Fiona Keane
– Katherine Penney
– Kie77
– Leia-lee Doran
– Lisa Johnson
– Mr Daniel Barclay
– Nick Parsons
– Olga deSanctis
– Pat Weikle
– Paulina Banach-Mazur
– Pauline LeBlanc
– Thorsten Neff
If you sign up at the Concert level or higher you’ll get access to all the past Patreon-only tabs including May’s tab Alicia Key’s If I Ain’t Got You June’s Jose Gonzalez’s Heartbeats.
It’s the halfway point of the year and it’s already a golden year for the ukulele. There’s even been a ukulele song at number 1 for the first time since Hey, Soul Sister. Here’s a round-up of my favourites of the year so far.
In other video news, I’m switching to doing UkeTube once a month. At least for the summer months now that people are legally permitted to spend more time having fun and less time making ukulele videos.
Tracklist
Tyrone and Lesley – No Words
Jenifer Cabrera – Negro Gato
Polo G and Einer Bankz – RAPSTAR
SeattleUke – Jerry’s Breakdown
The Backyard Revival – Boiling Point
Ari Chi – Next Fall
Ryo Natoyama – Absolute Zero
Julián Rodríguez – Por una cabeza
dodie – Hate Myself
Vivian Kim – Mozart Symphony No.40
Ryan Adams – Stars Go Blue/Semisonic – Closing Time (Tabs)
Following up Bob Dylan with another “Blue” song: When the Stars Go Blue by Ryan Adams (one of the many sensitive singer-songwriters I listened to who turned out to be a full-time shithead). Although it was a bigger hit when Bono and The Corrs covered it.
I’ve paired that with Semisonic’s only hit Closing Time as they have almost identical choruses.
Links
Buy When the Stars Go Blue
Buy Closing Time
More 90s tabs and chords
Uke Hunt Patreon
Bob Dylan – Tangled Up in Blue (Tab)
There are at least five options when it comes to the best Bob Dylan album. And I’ve cycled through all of them. But currently it’s Blood on the Tracks. So here’s an arrangement of the opening track.
This tab is very straightforward. It’s mostly strummed with a few notes picked out here and there. The only big challenge is the stretch up to the 7th fret in bars 11 and 13. If you’re struggling with that, you can just play the note at the 5th fret and no one will notice.
The arrangement plays through the verse twice and ends with a solo. The solo is very loosely based on the harmonic part at the end of the original but is mostly just me bashing out whatever I feel like.
Links
Mouse Rat – 5,000 Candles in the Wind (Bye, Bye Lil Sebastian)(Tabs)
I hope you brought a change of clothes because your eyes are about to piss tears thanks to Andy Dwyer’s heartbreaking tribute to Li’l Sebastian.
The trickiest part of playing this is fighting through the tears. There are also some quick bits of picking and a rogue bar of 2/4 on “horsiest friend” near the end.
If you want to play along with the original, put a capo on the second fret.
