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marzullo
`Olu`olu
USA
923 Posts |
 Posted - 04/30/2004 : 2:23:17 PM
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From http://www.melbay.com/product.asp?productid=20704 :
quote:
This book is intended for ukulele players who had some experience with their instruments, but would like to increase their musical ability, as well as for guitarists who like to improve their accompaniment skills on the treble strings of the guitar. There exist many excellent introductory ukulele methods, as well as extensive chord dictionaries. Instead, this book is intended for those players who wish to be able to sight read from a fake book, figure out the chords to a song without a chart, create accompaniments to their own songs, create chord solos, extend their chord vocabulary, or further their understanding of harmony.
i've known the author, robbert, for many years - we used to work together when i was out at cornell a decade ago. back then he was a jazz guitarist, but after getting married and becoming a parent, he got hooked on the ukulele. so, his background is jazz chords and chord substitution. he plays a mean ukulele, both strumming and picking, and rarely using a standard chord.
mel bay's description is pretty spot on. Note that this isn't a book for beginners. you should be comfortable with your basic chords and have some idea of the chord structure of songs. if you can transpose a simple 3-chord song, like "hawaiian war chant", from F to C on the fly, then you're ready for this book.
this book does several things: it teaches you chord shapes, which sets you up for movable chords. it teaches you to think about chords in terms of the notes that comprise them and where those notes are under your fingers. for example, a Bb is a 3211, but this book will encourage you think of this shape as 1-3-5-8 - that is, Bb-D-F-Bb. knowing this, and knowing that you get to the minor chord by flatting the third, you know that Bbm is 3111. you'll learn a fair amount of music theory - why, for example, a Dm7 is a good chord to substitute for an F.
i also recommend this book guitar slack key players who are looking to enrich their songs with different chords. since working through this book, i've started using, sparingly, some more jazzy chords in my slack key. for example, in a pa`ani for "ka uluwehi o ke kai", i followed one of robbert's chord substituion suggestions and start with a Gmaj7 (x00434 in taro patch) - it is a wonderfully dreamy way to start out the pa`ani.
note that if you're not already an expert in the material (i know that there are several of ya' in our `ohana) then you should brace yourself for some tough sledding. Each page or two can be thought of as a "lesson", and you will find yourself going back and working through each lesson multiple times. as robbert says in the introduction:
quote:
Nothing improves you skills like playing hundreds of charts over and over again, and believe it or not, it's a lot of fun.
i highly recommend this book for your ukulele library.
aloha, keith
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Understanding Ukulele Chords
