Ukulele Hunt

Tag: 70s

  • Dolly Parton – I Will Always Love You (Tabs)

    Dolly Parton – I Will Always Love You (Tab)Download

    I Will Always Love You is one of those songs where a cover version has completely obliterated the original. But Dolly’s version is still my favourite. Specifically, the 70s countrified version rather than the syrupy 80s version. So I used that one as the basis for this arrangement. Although some of the phrasing might be closer to the Whitney Houston version.

    The intro is the trickiest part of the arrangement with a couple of bends and a bar of 2/4 to navigate.

    The arrangement uses a lot of arpeggios. So you really need to emphasise the melody notes so it doesn’t just become a mush. But you can rely on most people being familiar with the melody, so they’ll do some of the work for you.

    You do need to prepare a bit for the high vocal trills in bars 15 and 19. There are open strings either side of those to give you a bit more time to move.

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  • David Bowie – Space Oddity (Tabs)

    David Bowie – Space Oddity (Tab)Download

    I’ve used some artificial harmonics in the intro because they’re the spaciest sound you can get on a ukulele. But you can play this section without them and it won’t be a problem. Or you could come up with your own intro.

    The first verse is the simplest part of the song. Then comes the “Lift Off” section. Pretty much any rising figure will work here. You can go as simple as grabbing a note and sliding up the neck. I took the opportunity to have a bit of fun with effects.

    The second verse is more much of a challenge. There are a lot of moves up and down the neck and a few finger-twisting bits. On the upside, it has the strange change from F major to F minor that mirrors the shift in the song from triumph to tragedy.

    After some quick chord changes, the solo starts up. I’ve stayed fairly close to the original here. Just adapting bits for uke. But I couldn’t resist throwing in a Day Tripper reference on the A chord (bar 44) as the original comes so close to it.

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  • Bob Dylan – Tangled Up in Blue (Tabs)

    Bob Dylan – Tangled Up in Blue (Tab)Download

    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.

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  • Cat Stevens – Morning Has Broken (Tabs)

    Yusuf/Cat Stevens – Morning Has Broken (Tab)Download

    For this arrangement I worked from the Cat Stevens version. But a few bits of the version I sang in primary school might have slipped in.

    The two main sections of this song are wildly different in terms of difficulty. The verses are very straightforward. It’s a gentle melody with easy chords and a few supporting notes.

    The section where he’s hammering away on the piano is much trickier. As well as the fast picking, the chord changes are more challenging. In the original, he speeds up considerably in these parts. I haven’t sped up anywhere near as much. And you could slow the tempo even further without spoiling the sound.

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  • Queen – Bicycle Race (Tabs)

    Queen – Bicycle Race (Tab)Download

    Putting it together made me realise it’s structured similar to Rhapsody in Blue (and that other rhapsody). It’s made of a few very catchy but unrelated sections that rub together and sometimes outright interrupt each other.

    The song starts in that fashion with the lyrical, “I want to…” line being interrupted by them yelling bicycle. You can bring out that contrast by playing the lyrical section smoothly and the shouty section brashly and more staccato.

    It then switches from major to minor for the hard-edged verse. I like to give the strings a bit of a snap for this section.

    The middle section, which returns to a major key and a more gentle style cuts, the second chorus shor and shifts to12/8 time. Make sure you’re warmed up before attempting the big stretch up to the 11th and 12th frets.

    The next chorus starts off two frets higher (making it a bit more difficult to play) before dropping back down to the original key in bar 31. Strumming the strings above the nut does a good job of imitating the bells at the end of this section.

    The solo is the trickiest part to play. The original has two guitars playing answer and response phrases. Moving both to one ukulele means some big, quick moves up and down the neck. It’s tricky. I certainly make a hash of it.

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  • The Cure – Boys Don’t Cry (Tabs)

    The Cure – Boys Don’t Cry (Tab)Download

    I went into this one expecting it to be tricky. But it all fell quite nicely once I transposed it into C. The riff works very well and is an absolute classic (even if I can’t shake the feeling it’s a bit 90s daytime TV theme).

    For my version, I worked from the ’79 version which I didn’t realise until after is subtly different from the 80s video version. The biggest difference is in the bridge section. The video version has harmonised vocals and ascends on the “more”s at the end. While the single version is a single vocal line and descends at the end.

    The chord move F-Em-Dm at the end of the riff is very quick. You can make it easier by keeping your middle finger free on the F chord. Leaving open to play the Em. n:

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  • Sex Pistols – God Save the Queen (Tabs)

    Sex Pistols – God Save the Queen (Tab)Download

    I’m still to entirely sure this one works but it is fun to play. There’s very little melody in the song. So this arrangement is heavily chord-based. But you can style it out, especially if the listener knows the song and is singing along in their head.

    The verses and choruses are talk-sung. So there I play the chords in the rhythm of the vocals. The bridge has just two notes: F (A-string, 8th fret) and E (A-string, 7th fret). They’re both in the chords they’re sung over, so there’s little to do here either. The outro has a long descending melody. All but one are the root notes of the chords they’re sung over. So the only addition to the chords is an A note (g-string, 2nd fret) over the B minor chord.

    The only tricky bit is the solo. But if you hurl yourself into it and make sure the bends are out of tune it’ll work out fine.

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  • Loudon Wainwright/Vetiver – The Swimming Song (Tab)

    Loudon Wainwright – The Swimming Song (Tab)Download

    A song from one of my favourite singer-songwriters (and occasional uker). With a hat-tip to Vetiver’s cover.

    The song is a lot of fun to play. The arrangement is mostly bashing out the chords with a few hammer-ons and single notes thrown in. There are only two sections in the song and they’re virtually identical.

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  • Toploader – Dancing in the Moonlight (Tab)

    Toploader – Dancing in the Moonlight (Tab)Download

    When Toploader’s cover of Dancing in the Moonlight (originally by King Harvest) turned out to be the most liked request on Patreon this month, I was unsure about taking it on. It was played to death when it came out and I inevitably ended up loathing up. But I had a lot of fun playing it. And it’s as much of an ear-worm as it ever was.

    My version is heavily based on Toploader’s. But it does take a few elements from the King Harvest version in the solo. And it steers very clear of Liza Minelli’s nutso take.

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  • John Denver – Christmas for Cowboys (Tabs)

    John Denver – Christmas for Cowboys (Tab)Download

    Probably my favourite Christmas song without swears in. And a fitting song for a Christmas where so many people are separated from their loved ones.

    The first time I heard this song was a ukulele cover by Ballard C Boyd (who is now a director and producer for Colbert).

    The arrangement is dead simple so you can focus on playing it with feeling.

    Don’t pay any attention to my fingering. I jacked up the tip of my index finger doing the lazy man’s load. So I’m fingering some things in a weird way.

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