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Pauline Leland
`Olu`olu
USA
783 Posts |
 Posted - 11/02/2002 : 7:41:49 PM
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Aloha,
I'm looking for some suggestions of music to learn on the uke. Lyrics sheets with chords I got or can get. (BTW, there is a cool uke site with an animated version of lyrics sheets with chords and midi for Beatles, http://4rmj.com/rick/beatlesite/index.html ) I'm not terribly interested in novelty songs from the '20's.
I have a book by Heeday Kimura, How to Play Ukulele Solos by "Ear", Hawaiian Style, which is a little closer to what I'm interested in, like very easy guitar fingerstyle. His music notation style drives me nuts, but that's something separate. I'd like more.
He did a book that gives the vocal melody in notation and uke chords in about any key you need to suit your voice. Nope. I want more than chords, and I can look up transposing, don't need a book for that. Maybe I'm supposed to be doing it by ear at that point?
What I'd like is something on the order of the slack key books for guitar, but for uke. I've even taken other music written for guitar that didn't use the bottom two strings too much and printed it out as 4-string tab, but I'm not very skilled at making this sound good. Anyway, that trick won't work for all the Taro Patch tunes I have; too much is missing. When strings 5 & 6 vanish, so does the signature sound.
I'd like to get some instrumental music, fairly easy to play, by a better, far better, arranger than I am. I keep reading the phrase "slack key uke". It gives me hope.
Any suggestions?
Mahalo,
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Pauline |
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kihoalukid
Lokahi
USA
289 Posts |
Posted - 11/02/2002 : 11:04:43 PM
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| i know what you mean,good luck trying to find hawaiian uke song tab that goes beyond the simple chord diagram. i dont really care much for the tin pan alley stuff, heck those resonator ukes are about as nahenahe as fingernails on a blackboard to me heehee.i picked up jumpin jims herb ohta ukulele masters songbook, it has about 15 songs, (3-4 hawaiian songs). the good thing about it is it comes with a cd of the solo performances. unfortunatley the book just shows chord diagrams (and these may or may not be the chord voicings used by herb, it states this in the forward).i sure wish they would have just gone the extra mile and tabbed it out-sheesh. it has standard music notation, but shoots i no read da kine.its not really hard to pick out the melody stuff (i have a device thats slows down the music), and then of course you have to play around with different chord voicings (that ukulele chord finder website helps a lot). there is an ukulele song tabbed out in daniel hos slack key book called haiku, it sounds more japanese than hawaiian but its a really nice piece, maybe someday ill get around to trying it. |
Lee |
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Pauline Leland
`Olu`olu
USA
783 Posts |
Posted - 11/02/2002 : 11:41:57 PM
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The Herb Ohta book with the standard notation... Does it look rather complex, like the notation for "Haiku" with some stacked notes and all? (I have the Daniel Ho book.) How many measures long are the pieces?
I was thinking it could be keyed into some programs that will generate tab from std. notation. But then, why didn't they publish the tab themselves? Still, I'm curious, if you don't mind taking a look at the book.
"Haiku" looks a little fast for me, even tho the really fast parts are hammer-on/pull-offs. Huh, I haven't even tried that technique on the uke. |
Pauline |
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kihoalukid
Lokahi
USA
289 Posts |
Posted - 11/03/2002 : 2:02:11 PM
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the music notation in the ohta book looks very simple compared to ho's, it even depicts the chords as one note (?). dont see any stacked notes.songs vary from about 15-36 bars.if your ever around dusty strings they have some of the jumpin jim songbooks,you could check them out. i mail ordered mine as at that time they only had the lyle ritz books, theyre the same format.
if i was in a position to take some lessons, i might check out pekelo, i went to a basic workshop of his (just observed) at the folk life festival , he played a pretty involved version of yellow bird i recall. |
Lee |
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Pauline Leland
`Olu`olu
USA
783 Posts |
Posted - 11/03/2002 : 2:09:32 PM
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| Thanks for checking and the tip about pekelo. |
Pauline |
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Admin
Pupule
USA
4551 Posts |
Posted - 11/04/2002 : 12:25:33 AM
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Pauline,
It's sounds like you're simply looking for a book to expand your `ukulele repertoire? Unfortunately, I don't have much advice to offer.
One book I have is How to Play the Hawaiian Ukulele: 10 Easy Lessons which is published by the University of Hawai`i. I don't think it's what you're looking for though. Again, it shows you some chords and gives standard musical notation for the melody. No tablature. It contains a hodge podge of songs: - Aloha Oe
- Bow Belinda
- C-A-T Popoki Make a Cat
- Come Play With Me
- Crazy G
- French Folk Song
- Gaily the Troubadour
- Happiness
- Hawaiian Rainbows
- Hot Cross Buns
- I Wish I was Single Again
- Jazz
- Kau Kau Song, the Island Way
- Lightly Row
- Never On Sunday
- Oh, Susanna!
- On Top of Old Smokey
- Paniolo Country
- Polly Wolly Doodle
- Pretty Paruparo
- Red River Valley
- Rock-a-My Soul
- Row, Row, Row Your Boat
- Running
- Sing Together
- The Sloop "John B"
- Tinga Layo
- Walking
- When the Saints Go Marching In
- Yellow Bird
I mentioned in another post that I really enjoyed Byron Yasui's music theory workshop at the `Ukulele Expo 2002. He is working on an instructional book, but I need to find out when it is coming out. It probably won't have tabs and songs per se, but it will cover music theory as it applies to the four strings of the `uke and maybe playing melodic solo `uke? I'll try to find out more, but I look forward to buying one when it's out. Byron really explained music theory and playing `uke very logically.
Sorry, it seems that I've typed a whole lot of text without answering your question. |
Andy |
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Pauline Leland
`Olu`olu
USA
783 Posts |
Posted - 11/04/2002 : 12:58:12 AM
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Andy,
Thanks for looking.  I should finish Heeday's book; there's more to do in there; he even covers tremolo. Mainly, I think it's pick out the melody and hit a strum or five at opportune spots. That's not too bad, really, as a start, and certainly fits the way I play by ear. By the time I nail that, maybe Byron Yasui's book will be out and I'll be ready to look at it. It's just that I always want to leapfrog ahead.
Mahalo, |
Pauline |
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ukejackson
Akahai
USA
93 Posts |
Posted - 11/04/2002 : 09:52:16 AM
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Pauline, you want Jerry Moore's "the ukulele secret". it requires serious practice. but it will teach you how to create chord solos and melody picking for ANY song you want. http://www.ukebook.com
toll free phone 1-877-905-4543
email ukebook @ yahoo.com
please tell him uke jackson sent you. |
Uke Jackson, from farmers markets to festival mainstages, from crossroads cafes to cosmopolitan cabarets |
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Pauline Leland
`Olu`olu
USA
783 Posts |
Posted - 11/04/2002 : 11:25:04 AM
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UJ,
Thanks! I opened the site and will be giving it a serious look.
Last night I stumbled across "Memory" from Cats, couldn't get it out of my mind, found it fits nicely on a low G tenor if you start on C, but I'd like to play more than 3 chords with it. Will the book help? I want to do something sort of fingerstylish because my singing is even worse than my playing. |
Pauline |
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ukejackson
Akahai
USA
93 Posts |
Posted - 11/04/2002 : 11:27:29 AM
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| i believe this book will help. it's not a magic pill or anything. like all approaches to music, you gain knowledge based on what you put into it. |
Uke Jackson, from farmers markets to festival mainstages, from crossroads cafes to cosmopolitan cabarets |
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Pauline Leland
`Olu`olu
USA
783 Posts |
Posted - 11/15/2002 : 01:52:54 AM
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Hi Uke Jackson,
That was a good suggestion.
The book arrived, Jerry Moore's The Ukulele Secret subtitled "Hot to Create Melodies and Chord Solos", a few days ago, and I've been slowly working at it. It's valuable just for all the charts in it - where to find the notes on the fretboard up and down the neck, common chord progressions, common chord progressions transposed, and much more. Everything is presented in terms of standard tuning with high G.
After showing all the chord information he goes into how to create the melody and chord solos with a step by step plan for doing this. I'm just at the beginning of this section. I've just glanced ahead, but he holds you by the hand to create chord charts for the melody and chords you want to use, how to pick the chords. He has blank chord chart pages to photocopy. Eventually, he shows how to do all this by ear. He also has info on finger picking and strumming, stuff you've already discovered playing slack key, and a few uke strumming methods. There's more, too. It's a great book, and I highly recommend it.
What's missing? Notation and tab. His way of presenting music is like Heeday Kimura's with a chord chart, that grid of strings and frets, where tab would be more succinct and easier to read. On the other hand, the idea of which chord is happening at any point of a song is very clear. I don't think in terms of chords, so this is probably good to teach me a different mindset.
He makes no attempt to note the rhythm, so you should know the songs he is teaching already. They are common enough. There is also a CD of all the songs in the book. He assumes you've played a bit, so there is no how-to-hold the uke information and no songs to introduce new chords except a bit on playing some chords up the neck.
I ordered by phone and talked to Jerry Moore himself. He mentioned that he only had about 10 more copies left, that was about 11/4, and that either Mel Bay or the other big guitar publisher whose name I can't remember would be taking over. I'm not sure whether he was pleased with that or not.
The book itself is nicely printed, the cover is just a little heavier paper than the inside pages, the binding is the plastic comb style where the teeth all curve in a circle. It allows the pages to open fully and lay flat. It's also a little flimsy and may break. It's not a slick publication, but it's highly legible and 108 pages just packed with information.
Again, I recommend it based on what I've seen so far. And again, thanks Uke Jackson for recommending it to me. I have the feeling that once I've been thru this book for the uke, it will be easy to carry the information over to the guitar, after I learn the Taro Patch chords. I'm hoping!
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marzullo
`Olu`olu
USA
923 Posts |
Posted - 11/15/2002 : 12:05:22 PM
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hi pauline,
here's some advice that i hope you'll consider. make part of your self-imposed lessons learning from listening and trying to copy what you hear.
a great album to start with is iz's "facing future". he played the ukulele beautifully but not in a very complex manner (as compared to say, troy fernandez of the ka'au crater boys). play the CD on something that's easy to stop and reposition while you have the uke in hand (i use a CD walkman with headphones), play a bit, figure out what key he's in, and keep playing with it.
for example, his "panini pua kea" is in the key of C. that nice pattern he sets up is done by playing a C, and then playing an F without letting up on the C. that is, the chords alternate between 0003 and 2013. he'll go to a G7 and then back to a C.
"white sandy beach" is in the key of F. that little picking pattern he plays is easy to learn - it's basically a simple slack-key like run with a walking bass, but don't worry about that at first. first, concentrate on playing the high notes of that picking pattern. once you have that, try filling in one of the lower notes. keep in mind the chords of the key of F: F, Bb, C7. (a hint: he also uses a Bb minor, which is more unusual in the key of F).
a big part of playing the ukulele (as compared to the way most people play guitar) is right hand technique. it took me a long time to figure this out since i came to the ukulele from bluegrass and slackkey guitar. for example, listen to "kuhio bay" on the facing future album. iz combined picking with strumming with, i think, the fleshy part of his index finger, basically stroking the top three strings.
i find right hand techinque harder to learn from just listening. heeday tries to cover it, but i've never found a book that covers it well enough to be useful. to learn this, you may need to watch someone play and ask them questions. so, don't be shy to ask someone if you see them doing something you'd like to learn.
aloha no,
keith
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Keith |
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Pauline Leland
`Olu`olu
USA
783 Posts |
Posted - 11/15/2002 : 2:04:47 PM
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Hi Keith,
Thanks for the tip. Did Iz generally use standard tuning then on his ukes? I thought I'd read he did a lot of slacking on them, which would make it much harder for me to play along. I think you are saying he was decipherable on most tracks. Auntie Maria may be getting another visit.
And your comment on right hand technique is an aha! I guess for uke there are a variety of strumming patterns and techniques. Steven Espaniola said he was working on a teaching video, I think it was for teaching, and video sounds like the perfect medium for ukulele teaching from what you say. I think the right hand rules on guitar as well, I'm thinking of slack key and classical and subtleties of tone, volume, and rhythm, but not playing patterns. I have this thing about lefties playing righty just because there are more instruments to choose from, but that's another issue.
Mahalo, |
Pauline |
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marzullo
`Olu`olu
USA
923 Posts |
Posted - 11/15/2002 : 2:19:13 PM
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pauline,
i've not encountered an iz song in which he slacked. he did play with the top string tuned to low G (traditionally, it's tuned an octave up, and so the top string isn't the lowest in pitch. on iz's uke, it was). i play with the same setup, but the uke player for petty booka uses the standard tuning to get some awesome patterns, again by careful strumming techniques.
yes, a video sounds perfect! a friend of mine is producing a keoki kahumoku video on picking patterns, maybe i can get him to do one on uke strums as well.
aloha,
keith
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Keith |
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ukejackson
Akahai
USA
93 Posts |
Posted - 11/15/2002 : 2:21:52 PM
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| pauline, bob brozman's ukulele video is very good for uke right hand tech stuff. available from elderly, fleamarketmusic, ezfolk, etc. |
Uke Jackson, from farmers markets to festival mainstages, from crossroads cafes to cosmopolitan cabarets |
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Curtis Takahashi
Akahai
USA
62 Posts |
Posted - 11/15/2002 : 4:49:36 PM
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Pauline,
If you can get hold of them, there is the "How to Play 'Ukulele like Ohta-San" video series. They are quite clear (even if the instruction is in Japanese, but chords are spoken in English so there's no problem). The shots of right and simultaneous left hand technique are the best I've seen in a video. You might want to give them a try. Additionally, there is the Peter moon "How to..." video. Interesting, but definately for the intermediate student.
Good Luck!
Curtis |
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