59 – Finger Nail Tremolo

In this post: Play tremolo with your finger nail

Note: If you are new to the ukulele, I suggest you read the posts in the order in which they are numbered.

One of the things I like about the uke is that you can play it without flat picks or finger picks. Some people do use picks, but you don’t have to. Those who like to play tremolo a lot can make some sort of case for the use of picks, but I’m going to try to make the case for playing tremolo without a pick.

You don’t hear tremolo that much on the uke, but you do hear it a lot on tenor banjo and mandolin. The idea behind tremolo is that many stringed instruments – uke, banjo, and mandolin in particular – don’t have a long sustain. That is, a note once played dies out quickly. Playing tremolo, which is a rapid down-up strumming of the same note, keeps the note alive for an extended period of time because you are striking the note repeatedly rather than just once.

I had seen a demonstration of using your finger nail in place of a pick for playing tremolo, but have had some difficulty in actually doing it. I’m happy to say that I finally have it working for me, at least in a preliminary sort of way, and can say that the method does work, but that it may take some time to get the hang of. Here’s how it works.

First, put your thumb and index finger together as though you were holding a pick (i.e., crossed). Do not squeeze or pinch. Just touch the two tips in crosswise fashion. (You don’t actually need the thumb, but it is nice to have as a steadying influence.)

Next stroke the string downward with your finger nail – start with the first string – very lightly. Do not move your finger very far. Move just enough the pick the string.

Now stroke upwards, just picking the string with you finger tip. Again, do this very lightly and move the finger just enough to do the job.

Your strumming motion should be with the wrist, never the arm. The finger/hand relationship should remain constant. Do not try to just flick the string with you finger without turning your wrist.

Start strumming slowly. I really mean slowly. Don’t even think of doing this rapidly until you are comfortable with the motion.

Don’t try to make a lot of noise. Just strum softly and easily. Do not tighten your finger, hand or wrist. Just do it easy. Keep the thumb in contact with the finger, but just barely.

If you’re like me, you will have to come back to this on numerous occasions before everything clicks. Once it does click, you will be all set to play notes rapidly on all strings and with a strong sound. You will also discover that this method of strumming can be used with different rhythms, taking it well beyond the basic tremolo.

Later,
-- Al

58 – Just For Fun

In this post: The Box-A-Lele Company

Note: If you are new to the ukulele, I suggest you read the posts in the order in which they are numbered.




With schools cutting back on the arts, it may be that the only way your kids can get some music in school is to have a lunch box that doubles as a ukulele. If so, The Box-A-Lele Company in San Francisco has just the thing for you. It really IS a lunch box that doubles as a ukulele. It's called a LunchBox-A-LeLe. They also have CigarBox-A-LeLes, WoodBox-A-LeLes and TinBox-A-LeLes. They have a big range of very cool designs. In fact, they will even make a cigar box uke for you using your own cigar box. If you want to buy or just plain smile, check out their web site.

How well do they play? Check out the sample tracks on the web site. Don't expect them to sound like classic Martins. They do, however, sound like ukes, and if you you take it all in the spirit in which it's intended, you should have a lot of fun with them.

Later,
-- Al

57 – Big Bend Gal In C

In this post: A simple tune in C

Note: If you are new to the ukulele, I suggest you read the posts in the order in which they are numbered.

If you’ve been practicing the C scale on your uke you are probably getting tired of it and looking for something more interesting. Here’s a simple, traditional song that will give you some good practice reading notation and translating the notes to your uke. I’ve omitted the tab this time but I did place the open string number in key places just as a reference.




If you’re playing the baritone, the notation below will be easier and has the appropriate string references noted.




Big Bend Gal is a simple song that shows you can have a good melody without being complicated. It basically goes up the scale and down again. If something sounds out of kilter, either I’ve made a mistake in the notation or you’ve played the wrong note.

Later,
-- Al

56 – Notes For The Baritone

In this post: Reading standard notation on the baritone uke

Note: If you are new to the ukulele, I suggest you read the posts in the order in which they are numbered.

For all you baritone uke and Chicago-tuned banjo players (and that includes me), I’ve translated post 55 – By The Notes to account for the baritone’s different tuning from the standard ukulele. This tuning is DGBE with the D being tuned low. The standard uke us tuned gCEA with the g being tuned an octave higher than one would expect. For those familiar with the circle of fifths (see 36 – Circle Of Fifths), going from standard to baritone is simply a matter of moving each string pitch clockwise one position and dropping an octave. This is useful to know when dealing with chords, which we will get in due time – right after we come to grips with knowing where the notes are and how to recognize them when they are written in standard music notation.

As with the standard uke, the best place to begin is with the C scale. Doing so with the baritone is less convenient than with the standard uke because we don’t get to a C until the first fret of the 2nd string (unless we go way up the fretboard on the 3rd and 4th strings). The octave of this 1st C is then on the 8th fret of the 1st string. I’ve shown the full scale in the score and tab (in black), but in my practicing I focus on the notes that belong to the C scale (up and down) that are reachable within the first 5 frets (blue D through black A). At some point we will want to learn the notes going all the way up the fretboard on all strings, but this belongs to a subject we call “positions,” and properly comes later on.




Later,
-- Al

55 – By The Notes

In this post: Reading music "proper"

Note: If you are new to the ukulele, I suggest you read the posts in the order in which they are numbered.

How many times have you thought “If only I had the tab or the chords to such and such song?” It should go without saying that many more songs would be “available” to us if we knew how to read music “proper” as they say. It’s really not that hard, but it does take a bit of focus to learn the principles and a bit of practice to make things second nature.

I have a head start in this since I played violin for six years as a kid and more recently I have been studying saxophone. I bought a 5-string banjo a year ago and a ukulele last winter. So far I have NOT attempted to read standard music notation with the banjo and uke, but I am now ready to go. Just for consistency, I tuned my banjo (and the tenor banjo I just bought) to the same tuning as a baritone uke, which is similar to standard uke except the baritone is pitched a fourth lower and is normally tuned with a low 4th string rather than high.

Enough already. Let’s get on with it!

First, I’m not going to try to explain all that’s involved in standard music notation. There are books and websites on the subject. What I will do is make the bridge between the uke and a standard musical score.

I think the best thing to do is begin by identifying the notes of the C scale on the instrument and the score. These will serve as benchmarks. The sharps and flats are then easy, because they are just one fret one way or the other.

The standard uke is tuned very conveniently for learning the C scale. The 3rd string (the one that’s third UP from the BOTTOM when you are holding the instrument in normal right-handed playing position) just happens to be C. This is the first note (root) of the scale. Play the remaining notes up to the next higher C (the octave) as shown. Play this sequence up and down repeatedly until you remember it. (Remember when you were a kid and learned the times tables? This is the same idea. Do it repeatedly and pay attention.) Notice also the interval patterns. Try to form a mental picture of the string/fret combinations. Soon you will be able to go up and down the scale without looking. Then you will be ready for simple tunes in the key of C with no sharps or flats (called accidentals). Next time we’ll deal with them.

Here’s the C scale in standard notation and corresponding tab.



The 4th string is a special case since it’s normally tuned an octave higher than one would expect. Here’s how it plays out (pun intended). The low tuning is shown in blue.




I have limited drawing facilities, so I didn’t bother drawing in the clef at the start of the score. In both cases it would be the standard treble clef. I also haven’t bothered to discern whether or not the scale is positioned properly. In reality it may be playing an octave higher than shown. It’s often the case that high-pitched instruments are presented lower as a matter of convenience. What I’ve shown is in accordance with other published ukulele scores.

Don’t worry about chords yet. We’ll get to them.

Later,
-- Al

54 – Extending The Family

In this post: Baritone uke; plectrum and tenor banjos; tenor guitar

Note: If you are new to the ukulele, I suggest you read the posts in the order in which they are numbered.

Most ukesters know the ukulele family includes the Sopranino, Soprano, Concert, Tenor and Baritone sizes. All but the last are typically tuned GCEA. The baritone is tuned a fourth lower: DGBE.

What more is there? The obvious answer is the Banjo Uke or Banjolele, as it is often called. These are tuned like the common uke.

But there’s more. I include the plectrum banjo, tenor banjo and tenor guitar. Here’s my thinking.

The Plectrum Banjo is a 5-string banjo with the 5th string removed, by design or by act of its owner (my case). Like most banjos, there are many ways to tune the plectrum banjo, but the common way is DGBD. All you have to do is raise the first string to E and you have the baritone uke tuning of DGBE. In the banjo world, this is known as Chicago tuning.

Unlike the plectrum banjo, which evolved from the 5-string to fill a need for jazz musicians who wanted to use the instrument as part of the rhythm section of a dance band (as opposed to the traditional picking styles), the Tenor Banjo was designed flat out as a 4-string instrument with the intent of making it easy for mandolin players to move to the banjo, but with similar end purpose to the plectrum banjo. Thus the instrument is commonly tuned like a viola or violin/mandolin. The viola tuning is CGDE; the violin/mandolin tuning is GDAE. You can easily tune the tenor banjo in Chicago style, DGBE; again, the same as the baritone uke. If you do this, you will want to investigate the strings to use. There are lots of opinions on this at the various banjo forums.

One more option is the Tenor Guitar, which also can be tuned like the baritone uke. An introduction to tenor banjo and tenor guitar can be found on this YouTube video.

One thing to bear in mind about the baritone uke is that it is tuned like the top four strings of the guitar. Now, suddenly, we have tied our humble uke to banjos and guitars, If we get to know the circle of fifths, as I keep advocating, learning the baritone uke (and thus the other instruments mentioned) chords is relatively simple if you already know the ukulele chords. For example, from the circle of fifths we can read a partial sequence of neighboring scales/chords as:

    F C G D A E and so on

Any chord in common (GCEA) uke tuning is now the chord to the right (clockwise on the circle) on the baritone uke. Thus:

    Common --> Baritone

                F --> C
                C --> G
                G --> D
                D --> A
                A --> E
                E --> B

and so on. Also, you can put a capo on the fifth fret of a baritone- or Chicago-tuned instrument and have the common ukulele tuning.

In the interests of full disclosure, I have a 5-string banjo. I began to learn it 6 months before I picked up the uke. Recently I began thinking I’d like to play jazz on my uke and banjo. In the case of the banjo, it led me to investigate 4-string versions. I don’t have a tenor, but hope to try one before long. The plectrum, however, proved an easy conversion – just raising the first string one full interval – and is working out nicely. The chord formations are exactly the same as the common uke, only renamed as mentioned. I also tried the plectrum banjo using the common plectrum tuning. I find the Chicago tuning easier to play, so am planning to pursue that avenue. I hope also to get a baritone uke at some point. This will give me “stepping stones” in the form of Concert Uke, Banjolele, Baritone Uke, Plectrum Banjo. By stepping stones I’m referring to an evolution of tone and loudness. This gives me a lot of options.

For more on 4-string banjos, visit the Jazz Banjo web site. There is a baritone uke forum at ezFolk Forums.

Later,
-- Al

53 – All In The Numbers

In this post: Generic notation of notes and chords

Note: If you are new to the ukulele, I suggest you read the posts in the order in which they are numbered.

Do you sometimes get tired of saying something like “If we take the C scale, for example, we can [fill in whatever general concept you have in mind]”? In the movie “The Sound of Music” we heard the classic way of speaking generally about notes in a scale: Do, re, me, so, fa, la, ti, do. Somewhere along the line I learned that system, though I don’t recall when or where. I certainly have never used the system nor was I ever encouraged to do so. Musicians generally prefer to use numbers to refer to the notes in a scale, numbering each note in sequence: one, two, three, four, etc.

Aside from being able to speak about principles in a generic way, numbering the notes of the scale enables us to easily learn a tune or a riff in one key – the generic numeral key – and apply it to any specific key. This takes a bit of getting used to, but it forms a flexible way of knowing our music.

I first learned this from my saxophone teacher, but it applies to all instruments. (If you play the harmonica, you are probably already doing something like this, though your numbers are those above the holes in your instrument and are not exactly what I’m referring to here). As an exercise, try writing out the notes to a simple song, such as “Row, Row Your Boat” or “Mary Had A Little Lamb.” (You did get some music manuscript paper as I’ve been advising, right?)

Taking the last note of the song as the key signature, and thus the first note of the scale (this isn’t always true, but it most likely is for any common, simple song such as I’ve suggested here), identify that note as ONE. Now go back and figure out the numbers for all the other notes. Write out your song in the following manner (I’m just making up things here; this is not a real song):

    5 5 6 3 2 1
    5 5 6 3 2 5
    5 5 6 3 2 1
    1 2 3 2 3 1

If you have to go to the next octave for a particular note, put horizontal line above the number. When your sequence comes back down to the original octave, put a line below the note that takes you there. Similarly, if you go below the original octave, put a line below the note that takes you there and when you return to the original octave put a line above the that note.

If you encounter an accidental (an in-between note not in the basic scale), add a plus or a minus after the number to indicate it is raised or lowered by half an interval.

Now see if you can play the tune, using your numerical score, in several different keys, such as C, G and F for starters.

The same idea applies when working with chords rather than notes. With chords we use Roman numerals instead of Arabic numerals. If the chord is major, the Roman numerals are capped; if minor they are lower case. If the chord is something more exotic, add the appropriate indicators such as 7 or 6 or whatever. This way we can identify a sequence, for example, something like:

    I IV V7
    I IV V7
    I IV V7 IV I

(Again, I just put out some chords to show what it looks like.) Now try playing in different key signatures. Example:

Key of C:

    C F G7
    C F G7
    C F G7 F C

Key of G:

    G C D7
    G C D7
    G C D7 C G

If you are having trouble recognizing the jump from key to key, get to know the circle of fifths, discussed in post 36 - Circle of Fifths. If you are at all serious about music, sooner or later you will want to know the circle of fifths. I learned it by practicing scales on my sax, taking a different scale each day, going around the circle in sequence.

Later,
-- Al