Strings

I am building my first baritone ukulele. I was thinking of which strings I would like to try on it. I purchased two sets of the Savarez strings for low G on my next tenor build. I was wondering if they would work on the baritone. I have the Savarez 504 and 541-543. They are guitar strings, so I thought they should work. Any opinions on these or other strings? I would like to stay with the GCEA tuning.

True baritone ukes are not tuned GCEA. If you try and tune that high with those guitar strings, the tension will be enough to break the strings, rip off the bridge, distort the top plate or all of the above. You can buy strings made for that tuning for a baritone uke, but it ain't those strings. Plus, it would not have the deep rich sound bairtone ukes have, it will sound more like a small tenor guitar

gspears said:

I am building my first baritone ukulele. I was thinking of which strings I would like to try on it. I purchased two sets of the Savarez strings for low G on my next tenor build. I was wondering if they would work on the baritone. I have the Savarez 504 and 541-543. They are guitar strings, so I thought they should work. Any opinions on these or other strings? I would like to stay with the GCEA tuning.

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Thanks for your advice. I had a baritone once before. I put South coast strings on it. They were a little squeaky once I put them on, but the squeak went away after playing it a while.

Currently there are like over a dozen companies making strings for ukulele, and each one of them makes set specifically designed for baritone.

I don't see why one would want to re-invent the wheel, without at least seeing first hand how a few of these pre-made string sets work out for you.

Elderly, HMS, Uke Republic, Strings And beyond, Strings By Mail, Just Strings, All Strings Nylon, Ukuleleworld are just a few vendors that have strings for sale online, and some have completely different inventory from the others.

I can't imagine why you would want to tune a baritone up to GCEA, but the basic rule of thumb for down-tuning is to increase the gauge one step for a single half-tone and two steps for two or three half tones. The reverse of that would be that you would need to decrease the string gauge by three steps to compensate for tuning it up five halftones. So you would go from medium strings to extra-extra-light strings - the kind you would use for a soprano/sopranino uke.... Who needs that? Baritone ukes are all about increasing the bass end - compared to a soprano with re-entrant tuning you're getting almost an octave (a minor seventh) in extra range downwards. You want trebles, get a uke that tunes to GCEA out of the box.

erich@muttcrew.net said:

I can't imagine why you would want to tune a baritone up to GCEA,

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One reason might be if the bari in question has a significantly larger soundbox, i.e., can move MORE air, it should be louder than a tenor or other uke with a smaller body (soundbox) IN THE SAME TUNING, provided you have strings that can properly drive the top to resonate as per the remainder of your post (that I did not quote, but agree with)

OK, but then you could stay with tenor scale length and just increase the box size (kinda like what you get with a dreadnought guitar) but.... box size isn't just about volume, it also affects the natural frequency range - so a bigger box is a bassier box (dreadnought).

Or you just simply keep the bari in DGBE and capo it at the fifth. Done! Big box, high tuning - but never better than a well built tenor uke.

Hi, You should really tune DGBE on a baritone. Baritone ukes do not like more than 51-53 total tension strings. Using guitar strings will probably go 56-58 lbs total tension which is dangerous ( warped top or blown bridge). I use the
D'addario T2 Titanium baritone strings and have not found any strings (have tried many) that have the volume, sustain, and
clarity. If you want GCEA tunning get a concert or tenor with low G. Just my two cents worth of advise. Regards and good
luck.
Norman2

erich@muttcrew.net said:

OK, but then you could stay with tenor scale length and just increase the box size (kinda like what you get with a dreadnought guitar) but.... box size isn't just about volume, it also affects the natural frequency range - so a bigger box is a bassier box (dreadnought).

Or you just simply keep the bari in DGBE and capo it at the fifth. Done! Big box, high tuning - but never better than a well built tenor uke.

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This is also true, but some folks don’t like to use a capo, and/or prefer the baritone scale length and fret spacing. Putting a capo on the 5th fret of a baritone actually gives you a tighter fret spacing than most tenors, and is probably closer to a concert scale fretboard, which is probably going to be uncomfortable for a player that is dedicated to playing only the baritone.

Norman2 said:

Hi, You should really tune DGBE on a baritone. Baritone ukes do not like more than 51-53 total tension strings. Using guitar strings will probably go 56-58 lbs total tension which is dangerous ( warped top or blown bridge). I use the
D'addario T2 Titanium baritone strings and have not found any strings (have tried many) that have the volume, sustain, and
clarity. If you want GCEA tunning get a concert or tenor with low G. Just my two cents worth of advise. Regards and good
luck.
Norman2

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This might be true, but Aquila has bartone gCEA string sets in both of their Nylgut and LAVA sets, Worth CL and BL can also be used (I've used these myself), as well as Ken Middleton's Living Water sets for baritone in gCEA, and then there is whatever Southcoast has, and I've seen other sets but cant recall them exactly at the moment, but I dont see why there is a need to re-invent the wheel with classical guitar strings when all the string companies already offer proper sets.

If you want an octave uke, i.e. one octave DOWN from standard tuning, but baritone scale, there are also options with Galli, Guadalupe, and via other methods using classical guitar WOUND strings. I've done it myself, and have one baritone strung with the 4 lowest-pitch strings from a Thomastik-Infeld CF128 string set.