One of the joys of Christmas is that Shane MacGowan is on the radio and TV as often as he should be the whole year round. Since the BBC has decided that the words ‘faggot’ and ‘slut’ are perfectly fine and it looks like being Christmas number one, here’s Fairytale of New York.

I tried a bunch of different ways to play the intro and narrowed it down to two. This one:

And this one:

I prefer the second one because of all the open strings.

I had a tendency to get a little lost in the chords during the penny-whistle parts, so I had to start counting. For the first one, after ‘…dreams come true’ and the repeat of the intro:

D,2,3. D,2,3. D,2,3. A,2,3. D,2,3. G,2,3. A,2,3. D,2,3.

The second (after the first chorus) is even trickier to follow:

D,2,3. A,2,3. Bm,2,3. G,2,3. D,2,3. D,2,3. D,2,3. A,2,3.

D,2,3. Bm,2,3. D,2,3. G,2,3. D,2,3. D,2,3. A,2,3. D,2,3.

Links

Christmas Tab ebooks

Like Mr Garrison, I’m very eager spread the love to all during the holiday season. So here are the chords for Sarah Silverman’s protest against Santa’s blatantly anti-semitic present giving policies.

I’ve written the song up in D-tuning as it makes the chords much easier to play. You can play the chords in C-tuning but they’re slightly more difficult:

Alternatively, you could play the same chord shapes as the D-tuning. This will make the tune a whole step lower.

Helen Love’s cover of The Ramones’ Merry Christmas (I Don’t Want To Fight) is the sound of Christmas as far as I’m concerned. You can download it at Filthy Little Angels. You’ll have to hunt for it on there but it’s well worth it.

For the most part, the chords are dead simple. I’ve put a C5 chord in because it’s more punk, but you can play a normal C chord there and it will sound fine.

The only tricky bit for beginners is the Fm. You can minimise the amount of finger changing between these chords by playing them this way:

Here, you’re keeping you second finger on the G-string and sliding it down to the first fret. It’s a little awkward but easier than completely changing your fingers around.

In the introduction to the original, the chords slide up from B to C a few times. The easiest way to recreate this on the uke is to play the C5 shape, move both fingers down a fret, play the chord and then slide your fingers up.

Christmas With U (mp3)
Christmas for Cowboys (mp3) via his website.

At this time of year a lot of us will be working up a few Christmas songs to entertain family and friends. Ballard C Boyd is no different. Each year he puts together a CD for family and friends and also puts it up on the net. I mention it because this year’s CD, Christmas With You, is bloody fantastic.

The standout tracks are Christmas for Cowboys (made famous by John Denver) and, an original song, Christmas With U. There’s also a secret track mashing-up Steve Harley’s The Joker and Weezer’s Undone (The Sweater Song).

You can download the whole thing here and the previous two years’ tracks here.

Beirut – Flying Club Cup

Beirut – Sunday Smile (mp3) via their website

Beirut are hugely popular with hipsters and college kids. Whichever record exec focus-grouped the idea and found out that brass band waltzes and ukuleles were what the youngsters wanted deserves a raise.

You can check out the songs at flyingclubcup.com where the all the songs are performed in various locations (in an abandoned house, on the river bank, on the street) to great advantage.

Beirut are responsible for turning loads of people on to the ukulele and my Beirut posts are some of the most popular on the blog. So if you buy this for your uke playing loved one, be sure to give them the url of this blog too.

Craig Robertson – That Dress

Higher Heels (mp3)
Leopard (mp3) via his website.

Whoever said, “They don’t write ’em like the used to,” obviously hasn’t heard Craig Robertson. His songs have a classic, timeless feel to them and could have been written yesterday or ninety years ago. They’re full of dark and sinister ne’er-do-wells.

If you’re not drinking whiskey and smoking when you start listening to this album, you will be by the end of it.

Craig has a huge pile of mp3s available for free download. You can find cover versions here and demos of his originals here.

Buy Now

Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain – Precious Little

Theme from Shaft (clip)
How Can You Mend a Broken Heart (clip)
God Gave Rock and Roll To You (clip) via their website.

The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain seem to be popular with just about everyone. They’re a viral YouTube smash; writer Howard Jacobson called them, “the best musical entertainment in the country”; George Harrison wanted to jam with them; they’ve appeared on kids TV a number of times and Brian Eno said that they, “may well turn out to be one of the turning points of 21st Century Art.” I think that’s a fair demographic reach.

Personally, I could happily go without the covers of Nirvana and the like that seem to have made them popular. I find them much more impressive when they’re being musical rather than ironic.

Buy Now.

More Christmas gifts for ukulele players

This is one of my all time favourite Christmas songs. A huge number of people have done this song but my favourites are Coldplay’s (in the video) and Patsy Monteleone’s version on MUD.

The chords in my version are loosely based on Patsy’s version – and, gosh, there are a lot of chords in it.

Some of the chord changes in this song are gorgeous. The change between C and Am7 is a fairly common one. You could play Am7 with all open strings but this one is much more effective. The chord is just the Gm shape moved up two frets (with the open G string giving the 7th note). It just goes to show what a huge difference the chord inversion you use can make.

The other stand-out chord changes come from very small changes in chords like the Em – Em maj7 – G progression. There’s only a difference between each chord of one fret of one note but it’s very effective.

When you’re giving someone a gift, you do want it to be that little bit more special. Ukuleles with an added design give that extra ‘wow factor’. You could commission yourself a painted uke. Or, if you’re a bit more strapped for cash and time, buy off-the-shelf.

Fluke Ukuleles

Flukes seem to be almost universally popular. Even more so when there’s a half naked dolly-bird holding one aloft.

Inspiration for Fluke designs ranges from Hollywood to Dollywood (with their cowboy fluke). Flukes sell for between $200 and $300. You’ll pay a bit of a premium for the design and also if you want a rosewood fretboard (rather than the standard plastic).

Find Fluke ukuleles.

Black Bear Christmas Bell

At the other end of the price spectrum is the beauty.

Duane Heilman of fantastical ukuleles. This one’s more down-to-earth and based on the old Lyon and Healy bell ukulele designs.

The auction eBay auction for this one has finished now but it didn’t sell so it may return. If you’ve got a loved one worth $2,000 to you, keep your eyes peeled.

See Black Bear ukuleles

Pahu Kani

Another heftily priced ukulele. I have no idea how these sound but ooooh pretty, pretty, pretty. And, at the end of the day, isn’t it what’s on the outside that really counts?

More Christmas gifts for ukulele players

If you can’t stand the sound of your loved one strumming incessantly, it might seem a little counter-intuitive to buy them an electric ukulele. Were it not for one word: headphones.

Ovation Applause

With their round backs and distinctive sound-holes, Ovation Applause tenor ukuleles are heavily based on their guitar big brother. In my opinion, they have a slightly dated look – there’s a definite whiff of Bon Jovi unplugged about them. But recently, Kaki King came along and rescued the Applause image.

Buy for: the hair-rocker in your life.

Find Applause ukuleles

Bugsgear Eleuke

Bugsgear’s Eleuke has a much more modern look. They come in a sparkling blue or a more understated natural wood.

They now have one you can plug headphones straight into, so no excuse for waking up family members with midnight strummings.

Find Bugsgear EleUkes

Kala Archtop

The Kala Archtop Tenor has a more classic look with jazzy f-holes and an archtop.

Buy for: midnight jazzers, those who find the term ‘f-hole’ endlessly amusing.

Find Kala ukuleles

What’s your electric uke recommendation?

More Christmas gifts for ukulele players

Aldrine Guerrero and his team are in the process of setting up a new site Ukulele Underground. Until it’s up and running, join up to the forum.

Speaking of Aldrine, his track Bandito Tyler is one of Dominator’s new tabs.

Wilfried Welti’s Christmas ukulele tab book (with explanations in German). More German ukulele tab on Ukulele lernen.

More tab news: Buke has entered the wonderful world of GCEA.

Beirut will be on tonight’s Later with Jools Holland. Head over the fold to see an interview with Zach Condon.

The winner of the Bushman Ukulele Contest?

foggy ruins of time has a rather fantastic mp3 from The Darlings. There’s also a cover of The Sugababes’ Push The Button on their MySpace that’s not to be missed. (I was so impressed I’ve bought their EP as a Christmas present to myself).

Wolves, Hawks and Kites have an mp3 from and review of The Burning Hell (very Stephin Merritt).

Carboard ukulele.

Uke players organise a piss-up in a brewery.
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Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer (mp3)

As promised yesterday, here’s a solo version of Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.

It’s a fairly simple arrangement. For the most part, the melody is fingerpicked and chords are strummed in between the melody notes. Apart from a couple of notes at the fifth fret, it’s all first position stuff. Easy.

For more of my solo arrangements of Christmas songs check out How To Play Christmas Ukulele.

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