Before buying a uke, I have a lot of questions.

Hey everybody,

I like the sound of an electric ukulele. When searching for electric ukueles at a music shop's website in my area, only acoustic-electric ukes popped up.

1) What is the difference between an electric ukulele and an acoustic-electric ukulele? If an acoustic-electric ukulele is both an acoustic and an electric ukulele, why buy an electric or an acoustic ukulele when you can have 2 in 1?

2) As a total beginner, would it be okay to learn on an electric ukulele? I assume there are more tutorials for an acoustic ukulele, so would that be a better option?

3) What ukulele would you recommend for $200 or less?

4) If I buy an electric ukulele, does it have to be plugged in an amp to be heard? (I thought I saw on a video that if can be played unplugged but the volume won't be very loud)

5) If I need an amp, what would you recommend for me? I would like to be able to play with headphones on to not disturb my neighbors.

6) What tuner do you suggest I buy? Do I need to buy a pedal? Should I use a guitar pick?

7) What materials helped you become a better player? Feel free to recommend a DVD, book, video, website, whatever...

If I can think of any more questions, I'll ask them here. Thanks for taking the time to help me out!

Lets start with the last question first: Uncle Rods Ukulele Bootcamp Download the Field Guide and practice the chord sheets.

Buy a decent ukulele with a setup from someone like Mims and play it. Learn to play before you amplify or add effects. With that being said...

When you say you like the sound of an electric ukulele do you have any examples of the videos you have watched? Do you play any stringed instruments now?

There are two camps of amplified ukuleles those which are Ukulele stringed as in nylon, fluorocarbon, nylagut, etc. with a piezo pickup and those with Guitar strings of steel with a magnetic guitar like pickup. Both can be tuned the same but play much differently. A uke with normal strings with a piezo pickup will sound more like a traditional uke when amplified although this signal can be run through an effects pedal to alter as slightly or as drastically as you wish. A steel stringed uke is much rougher on the fingers and the signal is much more compressed like a guitar than a piezo.

What are you trying to play? What style of music?

Short answer, buy a Caramel Concert, CC-100 from Amazon. ~$55 and both acoustic and electric, play it without amp and have fun, 2) buy a Honeytone Amp ~$25 and rock out. Buy a Beginners book and a few sets of strings. For less than $100 invested and you'll find out what you want to know.

And... after a small search of your history I must ask, What ever happened to your Kala KA-S or potential upgrade?

Inksplosive AL said:

And... after a small search of your history I must ask, What ever happened to your Kala KA-S or potential upgrade?

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A family member let me play with it but I lost interest and gave it back to him. This time around I'm going to stick with it and my goal is to play everyday for an entire year. I have a bad habit of picking up a hobby and quitting shortly afterwards.

Here are two examples:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=igrewKQBJHE

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=7Drgw5-li4g

I have no stringed instruments and I don't know how to read music or play chords. I'm a total beginner. I played an acoustic uke a few years ago but only put in an hour of total time at most. Certain chords frustrated me, I felt like I didn't have the finger dexterity to play them. In reality though, I just needed to stick with it.

morgothaod said:

Here are two examples:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=igrewKQBJHE

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=7Drgw5-li4g

I have no stringed instruments and I don't know how to read music or play chords. I'm a total beginner. I played an acoustic uke a few years ago but only put in an hour of total time at most. Certain chords frustrated me, I felt like I didn't have the finger dexterity to play them. In reality though, I just needed to stick with it.

Click to expand...

So you are a beginner with no stringed instrument experience but you want to shred like the AC/DC example. Me too and I'm not a beginner. As your last few words so wisely state " stick with it". Forget all the questions about gear, gear wont get you there. Dedicated, disciplined practice for a couple hours a day, for a few years will.

DownUpDave said:

So you are a beginner with no stringed instrument experience but you want to shred like the AC/DC example. Me too and I'm not a beginner. As your last few words so wisely state " stick with it". Forget all the questions about gear, gear wont get you there. Dedicated, disciplined practice for a couple hours a day, for a few years will.

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Yes, of course! I was just saying that I like the rock and roll sound of the electric uke.

Hi, morgothaod!



Acoustic-electric uku has to avoid howling, hence it's unplugged sound is bit quiet but ok. It is your choice. Sound is important even in practice. We may need amp and speaker for electric ukulele every practice. Acoustic electric doesn't require them.

Yes, Dave!

DownUpDave said:

So you are a beginner with no stringed instrument experience but you want to shred like the AC/DC example. Me too and I'm not a beginner. As your last few words so wisely state " stick with it". Forget all the questions about gear, gear wont get you there. Dedicated, disciplined practice for a couple hours a day, for a few years will.

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Ukulele teaches us Three P's.

Further to what I posted this morning:

It is good that you have made a decision to put in the time to learn the Uke. Bravo!

I diddled around with a guitar for ~10 years and never learned much and took up the Uke about 3 years ago. I wanted to play music and now I had the time to invest, I thought. Since then I've learned to strum pretty well though I have problems learning new songs quickly, I find that it takes me about 1,000 tries to learn how to play a song. If I were younger or more talented I'd probably not have to beat it into my muscle memory, but I accept that.

I suggested buying a inexpensive Uke and amp because if you give up you will not have spent a lot of money. The Caramel CC-100 is a good uke though and being a concert will give you a full sounding instrument that will be set up well, sound good, look good, and be comfortable to fret. It comes with a built in tuner and 3 band equalizer that work well. While you're ordering buy the Caramel gig bag, cheap and good. I have a CC-100 and it taught me a lot that my tenor wasn't due to the larger fret span of the tenor.

Look in the resources in the stickies above and down load Uncle Rods stuff. Free and pretty good. Download a chord chart and a Key Chord chart. This will list the 7 'usual' chords in each key Major and Minor. When you get sick of playing the songs in your beginners book, and you will get sick of them, you can practice the Root, 4th and 5th and seventh of each key to build in the recognition of key structure, useful when learning new songs. It is also useful for writing your own tunes as it will suggest the chords that 'fit together'. Howling Hobbit's stuff is good too and free.

Lots of Uke music is in the key of C so concentrate on C-F-G7 and Am which will let you play a wide variety of music with simple chords quickly.

Find a fret map, I got a plastic laminated one at my local Uke shop that shows the frets, the names of the notes, and the placement of the notes on the staff. Very useful for making the connections to location on the fret board and the placement of the notes on the staff.

Get a 3 ring binder to keep all your stuff in, I have 3 of them now, Songs I'm working on, Songs by Key, and Songs alphabetically by title.

Read the threads on UU and learn about music theory while you practice your chords and keys and scales etc.

Practice twice a day 15-30 minuets. To build your finger calluses and not get stale.

Most of all have fun!

morgothaod said:

Hey everybody,

I like the sound of an electric ukulele. When searching for electric ukueles at a music shop's website in my area, only acoustic-electric ukes popped up.

1) What is the difference between an electric ukulele and an acoustic-electric ukulele? If an acoustic-electric ukulele is both an acoustic and an electric ukulele, why buy an electric or an acoustic ukulele when you can have 2 in 1?
A:An Electric ukulele makes almost no sound when not amplified. An electro acoustic is basically an acoustic ukulele which has a build in pickup so you can amplify it is you want to, or play it as an acoustic ukulele. If you use distortion etc, the acoustic sound might not be what you want. If you want to play acoustic for a large audience, the pickup on the electro-acoustic is handy.

2) As a total beginner, would it be okay to learn on an electric ukulele? I assume there are more tutorials for an acoustic ukulele, so would that be a better option?
A: You can use the same toturials, the chord shapes are the same. There will probably be a few extra toturials for how to set up the amp, I wouldn't know, I play acoustic.

3) What ukulele would you recommend for $200 or less?
A: I will pass on this, as there are so many good ones to choose from. Only, I wouldn't necessarily buy a <100$ ukulele to save money in case you stop playing. I would rather buy something a bit better, so you enjoy having it around and it tempts you to play it.

4) If I buy an electric ukulele, does it have to be plugged in an amp to be heard? (I thought I saw on a video that if can be played unplugged but the volume won't be very loud)
A: It needs to be plugged in. You might be able to hear a bit yourself, but it won't be fun.

5) If I need an amp, what would you recommend for me? I would like to be able to play with headphones on to not disturb my neighbors.
A: I pass on this one

6) What tuner do you suggest I buy? Do I need to buy a pedal? Should I use a guitar pick?
A: most people on this forum recommend the Snark. Reviews score Peterson tuners higher, but they also cost way more. I just use a generic tuner that I got with a uke. For acoustic and electro acoustic most players don't use picks, though you can try it. I dunno about electric ukes.

7) What materials helped you become a better player? Feel free to recommend a DVD, book, video, website, whatever...
A: This forum helps a lot

If I can think of any more questions, I'll ask them here. Thanks for taking the time to help me out!

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Welcome to UU!
I tried to put some answers in there. They might not cover everything, since I only play acoustic myself.

I'd suggest you forget about going electric, as you are just beginning, you will need to hear yourself & your mistakes, so that you can improve.

Start with an acoustic, I recommend concert scale, get a digital tuner, easy to keep your uke in tune, grab some chord charts, start with just a few easy ones, & don't forget that you can play melodies by picking the notes, so a fretboard map will be very useful.

Then practice - only needs to be 10~20 minutes at a time, until your finger tips harden, (& so that you don't frustrate yourself if it's not going well, leave it & come back to it later).

It takes time & practice, the more you give it, the better you will become.

The first video with the ukulele teacher is a good example of a steel stringed ukulele with a magnetic pickup. The second video is a great example of a normal stringed ukulele with a piezo pickup. The example shown looks to be a solid body. I own a few Risa stick ukuleles one of each flavor, comparable but much different.

I find when playing or heh trying to play "rock" or "metal" from my old guitar days the movable 5th chord was such an easy shape on the lower four strings of a guitar. I'm going to link to a couple of 30 second tributes I did awhile back. No Pick. They were both done on a soprano stick strung reentrant with Aquila reds being pushed through a digitech RP360 multieffect pedal using modified profiles setup for the hot piezo pickup. They are nothing special but I'm betting you'll dig the sound. To fully achieve this the ukulele was down tuned quite a bit with the two highest strings lowered a bit more to mimic the lower four strings of a guitar better, although with a reentrant string. The strings were quite slack and a pain in the butt to play. I'm quite certain there was a few note down tune effect from the pedal to correct the uke to the note I wished to play.

I chose the RP360 as it can connect to a computer quite easily and also has a headphone jack for silent playing. With a uke such as the Risa using a piezo pickup the preset configurations will need quite a bit of tweaking to get it to sound great. With a steel stringed ukulele the guitar presets are mostly spot on with the magnetic pickup signal being more compressed.

Ive since bought a tenor sized stick tuned linear and down tuned to the lower four strings of a guitar. This being a tenor has more tension on the strings making them quite playable down tuned to EADG. Sadly after buying this and a used konablaster soprano (steel stringed) I haven't plugged either in since. I play mostly at home my KA-SEM or a KA-GAS at the shop I mostly play my ULO which is quite a different beast.

Confused... sorry I really dont do theory much and use visual aids when trying to figure out strange tunings. I guess what I'm trying to say is what you should learn from reading this is:

Just try things, you dont have to read music to play music, just do it. Buy a ukulele and start playing anything. Start reentrant with uncle Rods Bootcamp this will get your hand making chord shapes. You will likely buy a few ukuleles some of us have quite a few. A few of us have an embarrassing amount of these little instruments. So buy something in your price range. Even a clean signal recorded from an acoustic can be processed with effects later.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RuSuzkNuPYc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z6GvhxR4M9A

Inksplosive AL said:

The first video with the ukulele teacher is a good example of a steel stringed ukulele with a magnetic pickup. The second video is a great example of a normal stringed ukulele with a piezo pickup. The example shown looks to be a solid body. I own a few Risa stick ukuleles one of each flavor, comparable but much different.

I find when playing or heh trying to play "rock" or "metal" from my old guitar days the movable 5th chord was such an easy shape on the lower four strings of a guitar. I'm going to link to a couple of 30 second tributes I did awhile back. No Pick. They were both done on a soprano stick strung reentrant with Aquila reds being pushed through a digitech RP360 multieffect pedal using modified profiles setup for the hot piezo pickup. They are nothing special but I'm betting you'll dig the sound. To fully achieve this the ukulele was down tuned quite a bit with the two highest strings lowered a bit more to mimic the lower four strings of a guitar better, although with a reentrant string. The strings were quite slack and a pain in the butt to play. I'm quite certain there was a few note down tune effect from the pedal to correct the uke to the note I wished to play.

I chose the RP360 as it can connect to a computer quite easily and also has a headphone jack for silent playing. With a uke such as the Risa using a piezo pickup the preset configurations will need quite a bit of tweaking to get it to sound great. With a steel stringed ukulele the guitar presets are mostly spot on with the magnetic pickup signal being more compressed.

Ive since bought a tenor sized stick tuned linear and down tuned to the lower four strings of a guitar. This being a tenor has more tension on the strings making them quite playable down tuned to EADG. Sadly after buying this and a used konablaster soprano (steel stringed) I haven't plugged either in since. I play mostly at home my KA-SEM or a KA-GAS at the shop I mostly play my ULO which is quite a different beast.

Confused... sorry I really dont do theory much and use visual aids when trying to figure out strange tunings. I guess what I'm trying to say is what you should learn from reading this is:

Just try things, you dont have to read music to play music, just do it. Buy a ukulele and start playing anything. Start reentrant with uncle Rods Bootcamp this will get your hand making chord shapes. You will likely buy a few ukuleles some of us have quite a few. A few of us have an embarrassing amount of these little instruments. So buy something in your price range. Even a clean signal recorded from an acoustic can be processed with effects later.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RuSuzkNuPYc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z6GvhxR4M9A

Click to expand...

I appreciate you taking the time to explain all of this to me. However, I am a bit lost! I'm definitely out of my realm when it comes to music and musical equipment. I just thought they bought an electric uke and started playing. I didn't realize a lot more was involved. Maybe I should just start on an acoustic? It seems like a lot less complicated.

morgothaod said:

I appreciate you taking the time to explain all of this to me. However, I am a bit lost! I'm definitely out of my realm when it comes to music and musical equipment. I just thought they bought an electric uke and started playing. I didn't realize a lot more was involved. Maybe I should just start on an acoustic? It seems like a lot less complicated.

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Morgothaod-- Since you seem basically brand new to stringed instruments, I would say this is a good place to start. You can buy a decent quality laminate ukulele for less than $150. Just get one and see how you like it. Chances are, after a few months of owning a uke, you will have continued hanging around here and scouring the Internet for information as part of your learning process. You will have acquired better knowledge and will have gained some musical experience.

At that time, you will be able to make a better informed decision.

I've only been playing ukulele for a few months, so take what I'm going to say with a grain of salt, but I'll chime in with my opinion. I bought an EleUke (concert siza) online and have been playing it as my first ukulele. Personally, I love that it's a solid body electric and that it's much quieter than a standard acoustic. I can hear it just fine (playing on my own) without any amplification but I can plug it into an amp if I want to and it even has a built in headphone jack that you can use without needing an amp or anything. It also has an mp3 input jack so if I wanted to I could use headphones and have music playing through the uke for me to play along with without needing to worry about bothering neighbours or anyone.

Is it the best sounding ukulele in the world? No. But it works really well for me right now. I can sit and play in my living room and don't have any fear about bothering someone in the next room or anything. When I'm playing in my weekly ukulele circle I also don't feel nearly as bad about all the wrong notes I still accidentally play, because it's quiet enough that I don't worry about annoying the people playing around me. At the same time, I am still able to hear myself enough to be aware of wrong chords, etc. It's a totally personal thing for me, and not the typical start, but I'm enjoying it.

I'm not saying you should definitely get this exact model of ukulele, but for me, electric was the best way to start.

Word of caution though, I'm in Canada so rather than dealing with international shipping and customs and duties I ordered the uke from a Canadian music store instead of trying to get one from Mim's or Uke Republic or HMS or the various sites that are generally recommended here. I called the store (they're a brick and mortar store, not just online, but they're in a different province so I couldn't go in person) and they assured me that they set up their instruments before selling/shipping them. I spent about $200 CDN for it, and when I tried to start learning it I found it was badly out of tune. I ended up spending another $60 to get it set up locally in order to just make it playable, and it's still not perfect. It's okay as long as I stay in the lower end of the neck towards the headstock, but if I try to move up the neck it gets worse and worse. (For anyone wondering why I didn't return the uke, there was a delay of nearly a year from when I first got it until I got around to actually trying to play it seriously so by the time I realized the issue it was way to late.)

Whatever uke you choose, if it's an option for you then I'll echo others on this site and strongly recommend you purchase from one of the recommended dealers.

I was thinking of the Eleuke Peanut when I read this.

http://www.eleuke.com/product-page/bluetooth-eleuke-pemh-free-worldwide-shipping

I also have this amp:
http://www.musiciansfriend.com/amplifiers-effects/honeytone-n-10-guitar-mini-amp

The uke linked has bluetooth. Mine is older and doe not have bluetooth. I bought it used from UU because I wanted to be able to play really quietly in my seminary dorm room.

It is a fun little uke to play with an amp. I haven't played it in forever but you can turn the amp up and get some good sound!