This is a guest post by Daniel from Aloha Akademie. It original appeared on his blog in German but he was kind enough to adapt an English version for us. Malcolm Young´s unmistakable groove and what you can learn from his style for your playing To all of you who haven´t heard of Malcom Young, […]

A good chord progression is all about building tension and releasing it. Which makes the mysterious and unsettled suspended chords, sus2 and sus4, so effective in a progression. This post should demystify them a little. Giving you ideas for when to use them, how to play them and why they work so well. Using Sus4 […]

Muted strums are a useful tool to have in your repertoire. They can add percussion and syncopation to an otherwise boring strum. You perform them by resting a finger or fingers from your fretting hand on the strings. You need to hold them down enough so the strings don’t ring open but not strong enough […]

Chuck Berry’s intro to Johnny B Goode has to be the most famous piece of guitar playing in the universe. Not only did he influence an entire generation of rock and roll guitarists, you can hear elements of his playing in all the great rock guitarists since. The lick combines major and minor elements to […]

As a companion to the “Songs with Chords You Know” post I thought I’d put together a list of posts for people just getting started learning fingerpicking, tabs and solo playing. Tutorials for Tabs and Fingerpicking I’ve written a nine part guide on how to read tab. But you don’t have to read them all […]

There’s a neat little trick at the end of the solo in Steve Miller’s The Joker. While the backing guitar plays a C chord, the lead guitar slides into an F chord. The two chords blend together to make a much more interesting sound than they do individually. Stacked chords like these are known as […]

If you want to write a hit song at the moment you need an intro with at least two of these features and preferably all three: 1. A minor key 2. Lots of echo 3. This rhythm: To illustrate the point I threw together into a medley including Sia’s Cheap Thrills, Shawn Mendes’s Treat You […]

One of the pleasant aspects of the ukulele is the nice symmetry between the four strings and your four fingers. But there are very few times in life an extra finger wouldn’t come in handy and for the non-polydactyl amongst us a capo does a pretty good job. And they’re so easy only a moron […]

I’ve been using Guitar Pro for almost 10 years. I think all my tabs on Uke Hunt have been made with it. I highly recommend it if you’re getting into making uke tabs. Out of the box, it is set up for guitar so I thought I’d pass on what I’ve learnt about using Guitar […]

There are no shortage of fancy techniques you can learn that will improve your ukulele playing: campanella picking, split strokes and roll strums. But there are two quick wins that don’t require hours of practicing. They just need you to be more conscious of how you’re playing and to take control of it. Dynamics Dynamics […]