Rllink
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Because it is something to talk about.
Bluegrass Ukulele
- Thread starter Old-Time-Twanger
- Start date
Nickie
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Campbell,
I only have one rule, when it comes to playing. Wash your hands before playing. Food and skin oils mess up frets and strings. Especially chocolate cake.
I have no problem with folks playing Bluegrass on a uke, but it will never be accepted as a Bluegrass instrument. Just as drums and pedal steel guitars won't.
If anyone comes up with an audio or video of themselves playing Bluegrass style, I'd LOVE to hear it.
Nickie
Well-known member
Thanks Campbell,
I really liked what Kris did. I could barely tell what most of Jake's rendition was.
Aaron and Fred are both coming to TBUG in just 3 weeks, maybe they'll show us some of this stuff.
I kinda grew up with Bluegrass, went to Nashville and Bean Blossom all the time. I was always very disappointed that I could not learn to play it on guitar, mandolin, or fiddle.
Maybe I can satisfy my poor ego by learning to play the simpler tunes on my uke and banjouke.
I really liked what Kris did. I could barely tell what most of Jake's rendition was.
Aaron and Fred are both coming to TBUG in just 3 weeks, maybe they'll show us some of this stuff.
I kinda grew up with Bluegrass, went to Nashville and Bean Blossom all the time. I was always very disappointed that I could not learn to play it on guitar, mandolin, or fiddle.
Maybe I can satisfy my poor ego by learning to play the simpler tunes on my uke and banjouke.
Mirek Tim Patek
Active member
I know that ukulele is not the "canonical instrument" of pure bluegrass genre. Still there are ways of emulating the sound of three canonical plucked bluegrass instruments - guitar (G-run, Carter style melody-chord picking), mandolin (back-beat chops, fast melodies), 5-string banjo (three-finger syncopated rolls).
Here is set of my tools / techniques:
1) Use low G ukulele.
You will match the low range of mandolin. You may treat the ukulele as "small guitar" and mimic the typical guitar licks (G-runs).
2) Use tenor ukulele.
You will get more volume than from concert sized instrument. There is enough space on the neck even if you use the capo.
3) Use the capo.
I play in five major keys C, D, F, G, A. For the rest I use the capo. (These keys are the same as CAGED on guitar, just moved up a perfect fourth).
4) Use the thumbpick and fingerpicks.
For mimicking the rhythm guitar sound of Lester Flatt, the thumppick and index fingerpick is needed.
For mimicking the Scruggs style banjo roll, of course the thumbpick and two fingerpicks on index and middle fingers are needed.
(Additionally I use the reversed fingerpick on my fingernail for triplet strum, which is not the bluegrass technique.)
5) Mimic the boom-chick rhythm guitar sound.
There are YouTube videos of Chris Sharp showing the right hand technique of Lester Flatt.
Old-time rhythm guitar (YouTube channel Rural guitar) is also great source.
6) Learn some guitar licks (G run).
Learn to connect chords with walking "bass"
7) Play the melody on thicker strings as in the Carter style.
8) For the banjo sound use the thumb-lead rolls
The low G ukulele has the linear tuning, so your thumb does not bother with high string - this is a job for your middle finger.
Adapt the banjo licks to linear tuning.
9) For the mandolin chops use thumbpick downstrokes and muting
Mute chords with open strings by spare left hand finger (usually little finger). Also by release of pressure of left hand fingers. Or by right hand that dampens the strings immediately after the strum.
10) For the up-to-speed solos practice two-finger (thumb + index) down-up picking on single string.
Attached is the file from my workshop that shows the possibilities of four fingerpicks on low G ukulele.
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Joe Strummer
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Aaron Keim’s fingerstyle book has some bluegrass as well as his clawhammer book. He makes the point that banjo music translates well to reentrant tuning on a uke.
Ken Middleton (https://www.kenmiddleton.co.uk/) has published some excellent fingerstyle bluegrass arrangements for the ukulele (surprisingly NOT Low G). He has quite a few free arrangements available, as well as a 12-song bluegrass e-book. His collection of Celtic tunes is also highly recommended.
captain-janeway
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Thanks for posting this!!
Oldscruggsfan
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Because I played Scruggs-style 5-string banjo for 40+ years, I can't avoid it, LOL. I use alternating finger banjo rolls but have adapted them to a high-G soprano uke which means I avoid incorporating the high-G as a drone. Two YT links should help explain.
1) This arrangement of "Grandpa Was a Carpenter confirms why one should NOT to pluck the High G open during a Key of F arrangement, LOL.
2) Though this Key of C arrangement of The Grateful Dead's "Casey Jones" is far from flawless, I consciously avoided using the G string as a drone.
Incidentally, in the description for "Casey Jones", I specified that I was using Fremont Black Lines. I did so because I intend to post a second cover of the same tune some time in the next few weeks, but using D'Addario Nyltechs. It's a little something I've been planning for the sake of objective comparison.
I'm not ready to post that 2nd cover because those soooo very white Nyltechs are still stretching & I've needed to adjust the headstock C-hole to accommodate a set of "pull off" Koaloha friction tuners in place of the ugly white-button ears that came with my DIY kit.
There is no way I show up with this (or any other) uke at a 'grass jam session. That's what mandolins are made for
.
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merlin666
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I often take a uke to the local bluegrass jam but I just do comping and not bother with soloing. I prefer to bring my six string uke that actually seems to cut through quite nicely, and I like to toss in typical uke chords like rootless ones etc. whenever possible. So far no one has complained and I got compliments on the sound of the old Kamaka.
Canada Jim
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Give ths a shot. Re- enrant tuning.
captain-janeway
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For low g just flip 3 and 4 strings?
Oldscruggsfan
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@Old-Time-Twanger, In case you haven’t already seen the alert icon, I PMed you.
Unfortunately it looks like the OP was last active in 2017, when the thread was originally posted.
I like this video, posted 6 years ago…. Bluegrass purists consider the uke unmanly … too plinky … and TOO DINKY!
Bill Sheehan
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Oldscruggsfan
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Turns out that it was worth revisiting this “dead” 6-y-o thread just to get to see that clip!
Bill Sheehan
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Hahahahaha! Cool tune, Patty, and perhaps the only song I've ever heard that actually contains the word "dinky" !!
Bill Sheehan
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Yes !!
Oldscruggsfan
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Funny how similarly-sized instruments such as mandolin and fiddle pass the "he-man" test, LOL.
In my [very loud and ringing 5-string banjo] experience at 'grass jams, much of the objection is lack of volume rather than silly macho chauvinism. I never grasped the point of jamming when you can't hear your own instrument, and others within arms-length aren't able to hear you either. My word for that is "an-noise" and I have yet to find anything fun or relaxing about it.
For at least five decades, the "go to" jam in our area was Everett's Pickin' Barn in Suwannee, GA [The city's name is unrelated in any traditional way to the Okefenokee Swamp black water river memorialized by Stephen Foster, whose headwaters are nearly 250 miles due south, and the accepted origin is that it's a Caucasian-ized version of the Creek Nation word for the Shawnee Nation.] I traveled to Everett's with friends well before I was old enough to drive. Even then, I actually enjoyed the 90-minute road trip far more than the jamming.
The Everett grounds consisted of a modest, two-story farm house with around 2 acres of lawn parking. Around the house was another half-acre of well- shaded lawn and at the northeastern edge of that lawn sat a gambrel-roof pole barn with a stage, church pews, a snack bar and a decent sound system. If it was weather-fit to pick outside, whichever tune was being performed on the barn stage was always audible, and there was constant bleed-over from the various tunes in progress ten yards away in every conceivable direction. Jamming in the house was far worse because each room typically contained at least two different circles of musicians loudly playing & singing two different tunes. Even on the coldest winter nights (defined in our area as anything below 32F/ 0C), the temperature in every room hovered at near-sauna. There are few non-hyperbolic terms to reasonably describe the structure's interior temp between July and October.
During my last two visits to Everett's, I lugged my banjo inside the house only because I wasn't comfortable leaving it in my truck's load bed. I was somewhat shocked to discover that it was both far more enjoyable and intellectually interesting to "spectate" than to participate.
ripock
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for me the main issue with bluegrass ukulele isn't the ukulele but the ukuleist. Bluegrass musicians are very accomplished and bluegrass is so fast. I wouldn't go up to a jazz quartet and presume to have the chops to sit in. Same applies to bluegrass; I wouldn't be able to contribute significantly.
