A little tribute to John Prine who passed away last month.
Both these pieces use Cotten picking (named after Elizabeth Cotten) where the thumb alternates between the g- and C-strings and the index and middle fingers play the melody on the E- and A-strings respectively.
It’s a bit of a finger-twister and it’s pretty fast. So it’s well worth slowing right down when you’re learning it.
On hearing of the sad news of the death of Little Richard I had to bash out this classic. Refined and precise, it is not. But hopefully it’s got some of the spirit of the original and is closer to Little Richard than it is to Pat Boone.
It’s just three chords all the way through (G, C and D) with some picking of the melody. If you want to add a Little Richard “Woooooo!” in at any point you just add a A-string, 5th fret to the top of the G chord.
In these divided times it’s comforting to know that Kanye lovers and Kanye haters can unite in hating Kanye.
Like James Brown and Duke Ellington, one of Kanye’s under-appreciated skills is finding talented collaborators and pushing them to make their best work. For the first piece in this little medley, he worked with arranger Rosie Danvers. Who until that point had mostly worked with British artists and recently worked on Dave’s showstopping performance at the BRITS.
Kanye had a whole raft of collaborators on Violent Crimes (including an unexpected writing credit for the drummer form Pond). But the standout collaborator here is 070 Shake who was signed to Kanye’s label from nowhere and was immediately phenomenal on this album.
The two songs tackle the subject of loss of innocence in two different ways. Lyrically and musically. All of the Lights uses basic chords and a simple, emotional melody. Violent Crimes uses a maze of complex jazz chords. But I think they work together very nicely.
Violent Crimes on Amazon
All of the Lights (Interlude) on Amazon
More rap tabs
Uke Hunt Patreon
Starting up the Uke Hunt Patreon has really lit a fire under me to do some tabs. So much so, this is an extra week of tabs to ease the backlog a little. Starting with a request from Patron Daniel who wanted a Lizzobanger.
This arrangement uses a few elements from the SNL version of the tune featuring Celisse Henderson wailing on the guitar. I almost fell out of my chair when I saw her. Celisse is a uker and a Uke Hunt favourite from way back.
Firstly, the arrangement starts off with a lick adapted from Celisse’s intro. And, secondly, the bridge is also follows the SNL version. Other than that, it sticks pretty closely to the original.
Don’t Let Us Get Sick is one of the most beautiful songs ever written. It’s incredibly raw and emotionally direct. And given extra poignancy by the fact that Zevon would be diagnosed with cancer two years after writing. I can barely make it through without breaking down in tears.
I’ve kept the arrangement very simple to match the original. The picking is thumb and two finger but I don’t use the g-string at any point so the thumb is always on the C-string.
I do hope you and your loved-ones are keeping happy and healthy.
I used to only know this tune as, “that chicken song from the cartoons,” until I found out it had an actual name. Chicken Reel was written in 1910 by Joseph Daly but was adopted and adapted into the bluegrass catalogue.
And I’ve gone with a very bluegrass inspired version played fast and loose. I use thumb and two finger picking all the way through. Plus, I make liberal use of campanella which means I long parts of the A section are played just on open strings. Leaving your fretting-hand to play Candy Crush, fill out your taxes or tear an apple in half.
The C section is based on a part many bluegrass players include that I love. It really doubles down on the chicken theme by including a clucking sound.
After bouncing off BoJack a couple of times, I finally started watching it in earnest after I was told to watch this fantastic bit with K Flay’s Blood in the Cut riff. After that it rapidly became one of my favourite shows of all time.
As well as being hilarious and insightful, it also uses some great music. Both in terms of licensed music and original music from Jesse Novak (who I’ve covered before with his People Person’s Paper People jingle from The Office). So I had to put together a medley of my favourite songs from the show (that RBW pretended to like proving himself to be a Hollywoob phoney).
For most of the medley I’m either using strums (with a few picked notes mingled in) or thumb and two finger picking.
The song that works best on ukulele is the outstanding I Will Always Think of You. Which is such a dead-on pastiche I had to double check it wasn’t a long lost Cole Porter song.
The trickiest to pull off is Back in the 90s. That includes some quick Cotton picking i.e. the thumb alternates between the g- and C-strings with the index and middle fingers playing the melody on the E- and A-strings respectively.
The full tracklist:
A Horse with No Name (America)/Special Feeling/Avant Gardener (Courtney Barnett)/I Just Met My Perfect Match/Generic 90s Grunge Song/Mr Peanutbutter’s House/Blood in the Cut (K.Flay)/I Will Always Think of You/Back in the 90s/Stars (Nina Simone)/Boxer vs. Raptor
Buy the BoJack Horseman soundtrack
More TV theme
Uke Hunt on Patreon
Following up on Brave Sir Robin with another medieval pastiche. This time from the TV show The Witcher. I haven’t got around to watching the show yet, but Toss a Coin to Your Witcher has been impossible to avoid.
The original is in Am so it transfers neatly to the ukulele in the original key. There’s nothing massively difficult in the tune. But the hardest parts are the jumps up the neck. Particularly the one in bar 16. So I’ve arranged it with open strings in the previous two notes so you move up the neck early in preparation.
I don’t think any ukulele player has had a bigger year than Billie Eilish. She’s been all over the shop and her debut album WHEN WE ALL FALL ASLEEP, WHERE DO WE GO? and 2017 EP don’t smile at me have both been selling by the bucket-hat load. I’ve already done a few tracks from the album, so today I’m doing one from the EP.
I’m using one finger per string picking all the way through this arrangement. There are many chnks in the song which can make it difficult to get your fingers back in position. I’d recommend not doing a standard chnk and instead muting the strings with your fretting hand and bringing each finger down on the string it’s plucking. That should leave them in the right position for picking.
The tab is pretty long thanks to the second verse and second chorus being slightly different to the first. Both are a little trickier second time around. I don’t think anyone would notice if you just played them the same both times.