I do sometimes have it brought home to me that not everyone hangs on every single word I say. Hard to believe, I know. So here are a few things that are popular, good or over-looked that might have slipped by you. The Most Popular Tabs and Chords Well, it’s all fairly obvious stuff. Exactly […]

Jemsite has been doing a series called 10 Things I Wish I’d Known About Guitars (Before I Bought One) and I know a good idea when I steal one. The concept: if you could hop into your DeLorean, whack it up to 88 mph and visit yourself when you were buying your first instrument, what […]

I’ve had to come up with my own method of writing up strums both for the blog and for the How To Play Ukulele Strums ebook I’m working on. I’ve tried to keep it as simple as possible, and here’s what I’ve come up with: d : indicates a down strum. u : indicates an […]

The E chord – the bete noire of all ukulele players. Trying to cram all your fingers into a tiny space on the fretboard. Impossible. So here are ten possible ways to play the E chord. Try them out and see if you like any of them (I don’t). 1) The Way the Books Tell […]

You can get a sneak peak of Amy Crehore’s next show Dream Girls and Ukes on her Flickr and find out more here. “”The ukulele is already a magical instrument, but there’s something about his playing and being that is other-worldly.” Yo-Yo Ma discusses working with Jake Shimabukuro. Roger Greenawalt will spend 12 hours performing […]

Listening to the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain’s CD, inspired me to do a little post on harmonizing on the ukulele. When you’re soloing on the uke, playing just one note can sound a bit wimpy. A great way to beef it up is to harmonize the notes. For an example, I’ll use the simplest […]

Ultimate Ukulele is a new ukulele tab and chord site from Uke Hunt friend Joe. Tunes already up include Coldplay’s Life In Technicolour, The Killers’ Mr. Brightside and Pacman. It looks like I might have overestimated people’s ingenuity when it comes to finding things. If you see a message on any posts telling you something […]

I get quite a few emails asking me about strumming, so I thought I’d put together a ‘How to Strum a Ukulele’ post. This is how I strum – any resemblance to good technique is pure coincidental. UPDATE: For a more comprehensive coverage of the subject check out my ebook on ukulele strumming. And there’s […]

Harmonics are a big part of Hawaiian lap steel playing where they’re referred to as ‘chimes’ because of their bright ping sound (hence tunes such as Maui Chimes). Unfortunately, because of the short scale length, they’re much harder to produce on the ukulele. Natural Harmonics You produce a harmonic by touching the string only very […]

Compared to tabs, reading standard notation is a complete pain in the arse. For some reason, there are a few ukulele books that use only standard notation (such as the Jumpin’ Jim books and some of the Ukulele Masters series). I thought I’d knock together a short post in the hope of making all those […]