Uke Note

Sometimes it's just easier to scan a quick photo to share. This might not mean much if you weren't at our uke group meeting today, but it might be fun to decipher anyway.

a quick uke note to answer a few questions

Ukulele - the magazine

A work friend brought this in today! She found it on the magazine rack of Wegmans (a favorite supermarket chain in these parts). Seems it's just been around for a year and starting in 2014 it will be going quarterly ... and if you sign up quick you can get it for $14.95 for the year.

Check out the website, Ukulele Mag, the back issues are there for perusing!

Uking Digitally

Having been involved in music in one form or another most of my life, I was really excited when tablets came into widespread usage and I finally had a really mobile and low profile way to handle sheet music! As a piano player (or any other musician) it can get cumbersome to lug around huge books and binders filled with music. Below are my picks for music notation apps. There are quite a few of them out there, and it could be that these don't fit your needs, but it's a good place to start!

MobileSheets

I've used this app for about as long as it's been on the market. This app is great for organizing pdf and image files. You can make notations, put together set lists, connect your bluetooth pedal and best of all, the developer and community of users are very supportive. If you're an iOS user, you're out of luck with this one since it's Android only. I'm sure there's something similar for iOS.

A great way to organize all those uke club books in pdf that you collect!

Songbook

When I started to play ukulele and found that beside pdfs there was this file type called "chordpro" (or sometimes .pro or .chopro) I started to look for an app that would allow displaying, transposing, creating and editing of these text files. Songbook does this so well! You can also create set lists, add alternative chord fingerings, transpose on the fly and engage automatic scrolling. If you have a Dropbox account you can also sync your tunes across devices - also cool. Songbook is available for Android, iOS and Windows.

GuitarTapp

I probably use this one less often than the others above, but it's a great app for online searching for a specific tune or by band name. You can also save files in chordpro format and transpose. Don't let the "guitar" in the name worry you ... there's an option to show uke chords too! Available for Android, iOS and Windows.

Girl From Ipanema

Get your bossa nova on! A friend of mine who just started playing wants to learn this one and I found it on Richard G's uke site, which is a great resource so check it out when you can. Lots of fun jazzy chords in this one.

Girl From Ipanema

Let It Be

Another popular tune with a pretty standard chord progression (this version is easy... and yeah I know I might have left out a few chords).

Let It Be

You Are My Sunshine

What better than a jaunty tune of unrequited love! Great to sing with gramma or grandkids!

You Are My Sunshine

Hound Dog

Play it fast or play it slow - you can have a lot of fun with the 12 bar blues. Here's a tune familiar to most that uses that age old chord progression. We've tried making up our own blues tunes at work - a perfect place for singin' the blues!

Although there are variations, the basic 12 bar blues is the following progression (I'll use this "|" between bars/measures). The Roman numerals indicate with chord of the key you're playing without designating the exact name of the chord. That way it can be used for any key.

I I I I | I I I I | I I I I | I I I I
I I I I | IV IV IV IV| IV IV IV IV | I I I I
I I I I | V7 V7 V7 V7 | IV IV IV IV | I I I I

So in the key of C, you'd be playing:

C | C | C | C |
C | F | F | C |
C | G7 | F | C |

And in the key of G:

G | G | G | G |
G | C | C| G |
G | D7 | C | G |

Beginner Info

This is a page I put together of some beginner info: Uke Notes for Beginners

This page seems so naked! So here's a pic of my uke to dress it up:

My Mainland Uke. Concert size, red cedar - love it.

Ode To Joy

We've been having fun with this one! My very easy arrangement of Beethoven's Ode to Joy. Get a couple ukes strumming, another picking the melody and another picking the chords!

Happy Birthday

Every uker (or anyone who plays an instrument) should get this one down... it's always someone's birthday!