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23 messages

When ukuleles go bad

26 May 17 - 09:14 AM (#3857244)
Subject: BS: When ukuleles go bad
From: Donuel

There are many new variations of uke techniques.
Heres one by the Brits
There are Americans going with Asian chopsticks https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RylxBtEM0sI
and Asians going ultra western. My variant is a different kind of bass to tenor uke.
I'd like to teach the world to uke in relative harmony

If you find some uke gold on you tube please paste here
I love Europa https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3VmU9NjCPA


and for bluegrass a guy named Hill plays with a cllo that is not miked


26 May 17 - 10:05 AM (#3857250)
Subject: RE: BS: When ukuleles go bad
From: leeneia

Hi, Donuel. Thanks for the links. I've heard the first tune before, but the video with the chopsticks is all new for me.


26 May 17 - 05:46 PM (#3857309)
Subject: RE: BS: When ukuleles go bad
From: Jack Campin

I like what Brenna McCrimmon does with it, for traditional Turkish and Balkan songs - fits perfectly though nobody had ever done it before.


26 May 17 - 06:35 PM (#3857313)
Subject: RE: BS: When ukuleles go bad
From: gillymor

The great fingerstyle guitarist (and swing band rhythym guitarist) , Ton Van Bergejik performs the old Bix and Trumbauer standard
Singing the Blues on uke.
How come this thread isn't up top, Don?


26 May 17 - 06:53 PM (#3857314)
Subject: RE: BS: When ukuleles go bad
From: gillymor

correction- "Bergeijk". I think it was spelled "Bergeyk" on his Kicking Mule albums.


26 May 17 - 07:04 PM (#3857318)
Subject: RE: BS: When ukuleles go bad
From: Big Al Whittle

one really cool dude is James Clem of Portland , Oregon.


http://www.jamesclem.com/

James sometimes comes to Europe.


26 May 17 - 08:29 PM (#3857325)
Subject: RE: BS: When ukuleles go bad
From: Donuel

Jack are you the guy who plays the Oud? Brenna is charming

Clem is treasured master.

gilly , Traditional gem by Ton Van

There are the videos of 6 guys playing one uke and some sensational players out there.

Electric Koto music would kind of ruin the point of the nearly inaudible delicacies of the Koto.
Uke can be that way so I am not yet seduced by going electric.
Perhaps the only shared point of contact I have with this group is the acoustic factor. Making magic without smoke, hydraulics and mirrors is perhaps what I am aiming for.

The uke is so small and prosaic it surprising at times and comical for some reason.


27 May 17 - 06:20 AM (#3857362)
Subject: RE: BS: When ukuleles go bad
From: Joe Offer

I bought a ukulele recently. I had the impression that ukuleles were so easy to play, that they almost played themselves. Alas, that has not happened.
Do I need to talk to my ukulele differently, or what?
-Hopeless in California-


27 May 17 - 07:21 AM (#3857365)
Subject: RE: BS: When ukuleles go bad
From: Will Fly

Here's one for you, Donuel (and Joe) - demonstrating that the simplest instruments can also be complex in their own ways.

Kate's Starlings


27 May 17 - 08:57 AM (#3857378)
Subject: RE: BS: When ukuleles go bad
From: Big Al Whittle

i am coming to the conclusion that one needs to make friends with the uke - rather than obey dictats by former players. you have to look for your own voice.

although - i suspect, its a matter of personality. its like some people like to play bridge using the bidding conventions.


27 May 17 - 09:40 AM (#3857383)
Subject: RE: BS: When ukuleles go bad
From: punkfolkrocker

My uke has been gathering dust in a corner behind 2 of my least played guitars for getting on 15 years..

Anyone reckon the wood and tone would be maturing by now..???

Should i dig it out and give it a strum,
or leave it undisturbed while the patina continues to age and encrust slowly like fine stinky cheese...??? 🤔


27 May 17 - 09:58 AM (#3857389)
Subject: RE: BS: When ukuleles go bad
From: Will Fly

I play mine very loudly through a large amp - Eddie Cochran mainly. That usually makes the wedding guests sit up...


27 May 17 - 11:01 AM (#3857392)
Subject: RE: BS: When ukuleles go bad
From: Donuel

Will, your link is MAGIC. The Hirschfeld line art on LSD and the uke finger picking is what I was looking for in the void. The electronic feeds going backwards and forwards and turning into ambient resonance is familiar since the Beatles.
You have been a big help with your own website.

Joe not ever having played a fretted instrument it took me a year to finger or chord without lots of noise or buzz. It will take me another year or more to learn 3 finger picking.


Make friends with your uke? Hell I never would have mentioned it but I sleep with it and practice in front of a TV and reproduce ideas from films and such on the tube. I started with what I already knew from violin and cello.

Joe once you get a bit of proficiency more improvements come in tiny quantum leaps. I can't always reproduce the improvement the next day but I know its there. Adding vibrato and note bending and ornaments is the mustard and mayonnaise and lettuce of a uke sandwich.

If you practice rhythm uke strumming with 7 or more chord changes remember I assume it will take a great guitarist less time to learn. For a neophyte it will take twice that;^)


***
I practice play by ear but with my eyes closed to force more muscle memory. I still peek though.

The bad news is that there are no cheating shortcuts worth keeping.


27 May 17 - 11:49 AM (#3857400)
Subject: RE: BS: When ukuleles go bad
From: Will Fly

Glad you liked it, Donuel!


28 May 17 - 02:20 AM (#3857494)
Subject: RE: BS: When ukuleles go bad
From: Big Al Whittle

i bought my first uke in modern times the christmas befote last. i had one as a kid from the age of six or seven - but i never played it ti after i could play guitar when i was 14, or so.

my renewed interest began encountering a lovely brunswick tenor in the local music shop. with electrics added it was about £100. my christmas present to myself that year.

since then i have acquired a baritone and a soprano - off the net for about thirty quid apiece, i suppose i would like to inject a bit of George Formby style flair into my right hand.

is there anyone's dvd anyone could recommend. breaking it down for me?
youtube seems full - but its a bit wearisome trudging through them. i'd love to have it sorted.


28 May 17 - 01:06 PM (#3857585)
Subject: RE: BS: When ukuleles go bad
From: Merritt

When I saw the thread subject line I immediately reimagined as When good ukuleles go bad.

I like the sound of the uke, but after several tries have given up. Chords are easy enough just can't abide the yoinginess of the strings. Been playing Portuguese cavaquinho - rumored to be the great granddaddy of the uke - for the last 8 or so years and find the serious steel string tension more satisfying. It's actually a great little instrument for slide. Just my 2 cents.


28 May 17 - 04:00 PM (#3857614)
Subject: RE: BS: When ukuleles go bad
From: keberoxu

Yoinginess. I love it.


28 May 17 - 06:59 PM (#3857630)
Subject: RE: BS: When ukuleles go bad
From: Donuel

Merritt - exactly! That's why I use two metal Martin strings on bottom and nylon on top.

Cava quin ho sounds dirty. I'll google it.


29 May 17 - 07:39 PM (#3857758)
Subject: RE: BS: When ukuleles go bad
From: Big Al Whittle

since last writing, i've bought a book


http://www.georgeformby.co.uk/shop_pages/ukulele_jq.html

and a dvd


http://www.georgeformby.co.uk/shop_pages/jj_dvd.html

both from the george formby society. i'll tell you how i get on.
incidentally why is this below the line?


    I was wondering that myself, Al. But every time I try to second-guess Donuel, he tells me I'm wrong...and worse. But this has certainly developed into a music thread, so it's above the line now.
    -Joe Offer-


30 May 17 - 05:08 PM (#3857946)
Subject: RE: When ukuleles go bad
From: keberoxu

Aw, yeah. Even bad ukeleles can go home again.


30 May 17 - 05:11 PM (#3857948)
Subject: RE: When ukuleles go bad
From: keberoxu

Which reminds me.

There is a Rupert Brooke poem set in
the Hawaiian Islands, which I question if Brooke ever visited.

"Warm perfumes like a breath from vine and tree
Drift down the darkness. Plangent, hidden from eyes,
Somewhere an ukelele thrills and cries
And stabs with pain the night's brown savagery."

Maybe he was thinking of steel guitars ?!

That's Brooke's spelling, by the way -- AN ukelele.
The poem is "Wai Kiki."
Set to music by Charles Tomlinson Griffes.


30 May 17 - 07:29 PM (#3857967)
Subject: RE: When ukuleles go bad
From: Jack Campin

Yes, Brooke did visit Hawaii and knew what he was talking about.

http://breathlessinorewa.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/47-rupert-brooke-and-taatamata.html

English literature's best known ukulele player was Malcolm Lowry. He was probably pretty good when he wasn't too drunk.


31 May 17 - 04:07 AM (#3858023)
Subject: RE: When ukuleles go bad
From: Big Al Whittle

If I should play 'When I'm cleaning Windows'
Think only this of me
There is some corner of a foreign field
That is, for that moment, Lancashire.

Turned out nice again...!