Ukes vs. Guitars

I am surprised that so many Ukers are former Guitar/Banjo players. If one has played Guitar for so many, many years, why would he/she switch? One can finger pick it and sing with it and, in all that time, buy a really spiffy guitar. Certainly, all those years would produce a bit of ability. So . . . Why? Just because?

I have no opinion about it, I was just curious. ld:

Don't know, played guitar for many years and the mandolin too. Then one day it all stopped and I lost the desire to play either of them. much later picked up the didgeridoo and I loved it, but some time after that I got my hands on a Uke and I have been enjoying it ever since. Picked up the guitar again, but put it back down not to long after that. Got the Mandolin fixed, messed with it, and set it back down, still playing the Uke and the Didge though

I never stopped playing guitar - but two reasons:

1. Children. I bought the ukulele to see if my daughter was interested. She wasn't. But, there it was, so I started playing it.

2. Travel. I spend a lot of time in hotel rooms around the world.

Travel is a big reason for me as well. I played piano as a child and guitar through my teens, but when I got re-interested in a stringed instrument, the ukulele was exactly what I wanted. Small, portable, and fun.

didgeplayer said:

Don't know, played guitar for many years and the mandolin too. Then one day it all stopped and I lost the desire to play either of them. much later picked up the didgeridoo and I loved it, but some time after that I got my hands on a Uke and I have been enjoying it ever since. Picked up the guitar again, but put it back down not to long after that. Got the Mandolin fixed, messed with it, and set it back down, still playing the Uke and the Didge though

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I see. Well, I'll have to admit that I've sorta lost interest in my other instruments too lately. It's been a chore to pick them up for the past months. I even quit for about a month and a half recently to work on Banjolele/banjo stuff. I started playing them again (and listening to music again) a couple of days ago. But today I'm already having to push myself to go play my flute.

I think maybe I like to study and learn stuff more than I like to play songs over and over. Even if one learns new ones, they too become old hat. Maybe that's why I play so many different instruments. Being a professional musician must be very boring sometimes. One has to play well whether he/she is playing well or not.

I guess everything gets old; even things that one likes to do. Ahhh, well . . . ld:

As I've posted many times; I played guitar for almost fifty years, never got great at it, but competent. Then a little over two years ago I bought a Fender Telecaster electric, a couple weeks later was flipping though a Musicians Friend catalogue and saw a Mahalo that looked like the Telecaster for only $60, so I bought it just as a wall hanger next to the Fender.

About a week later I received my annual postcard from the Los Angeles Music Center announcing their summer play-along series, I had done it before for guitar, this time it was for ukulele. Hey, I thought, I have a ukulele now, I'll join in. Haven't touched my guitars since, and I've applied myself more to the uke than I did for the previous 20 years on guitar. The only drawback is, a few months ago I took up the bass uke and now I'm hardly playing my ukes.

I expect a lot out of my guitar playing; I don't expect so much with the uke. This, plus the fact that most uke songs are poppy fun or romantic, make it hard to resist.

Down Up Dick said:

I am surprised that so many Ukers are former Guitar/Banjo players. If one has played Guitar for so many, many years, why would he/she switch? One can finger pick it and sing with it and, in all that time, buy a really spiffy guitar. Certainly, all those years would produce a bit of ability. So . . . Why? Just because?

I have no opinion about it, I was just curious. ld:

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I do have a spiffy guitar that I had to put up in a closet when my daughter was a toddler. She was trying to put stuff in the sound holes of all our accoustic guitars. Then as she got older, I never got it back out. Then, when she was in 2nd grade, she came home and told us she joined the uke club at school, and it turned into something our whole family loves. I like the small size of the uke. It makes it way more convenient.

I played guitar for 40+ years; then tore the tendon and ligament around the left elbow, and can maybe play for around 10 minutes without severe pain.

I can play the Uke for hours before I even get an ache.

Hey, didgeplayer, I forgot to mention it before, but I was at a Bagpipe Convention a while back, and some guy was selling didgeridoos. I was ready to buy one, but the guy was busy demonstrating them and selling, and we had to go.

I guess one just can't have too many instruments. I have a few that I can't even play!--- someday . . . ld:

I tried guitar for a couple years and failed. I was following a method book that I in retrospect don't think was the right way for me to learn. I also have a mild muscular dystrophy that makes my wrists, hands and fingers weak making barres and reaches difficult if not impossible for me. The guitar also had a strong bottom end that wasn't so therapeutic for my depression.

I have played electric guitar for about 20 years, and ended up getting my degree in classical guitar performance. When I bought my first uke it was a wedding present to myself since my wife and I travel a lot and I thought, "hey, a tiny guitar that I can travel with!" (ah, the arrogance of that conceit!). As time went by I really began to appreciate the ukulele for the beautiful instrument it is. Now I play my uke way more than my guitars unless I am playing out live with a band, which is not too often for me anymore. For me, I love sitting on my porch after work and enjoying playing a uke. It just feels right. When I left the band I was in for 9 years, I think I needed something to just have fun with. I didn't have to force anything with it. I still push myself to progress, but the pressure I put on myself isn't there like it was for my band. It released something pure about music that I think I had kidn of lost in the last two or so years in my old band. So, yeah. Bought one for something to strum while I travelled, and now I'm in too deep! Also I just like having different "tools". I've got a mandolin, many ukes, a couple acoustic and a electric guitars, and just ordered a Seagull Merlin. Keyboard and some percussion instruments as well. I just enjoy the variety of sound.

kohanmike said:

I played guitar for almost fifty years, never got great at it, but competent....

... I've applied myself more to the uke than I did for the previous 20 years on guitar.

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My experience is similar to Kohanmike's as per above but for around 37 yrs with guitar...

I am finding music more exciting to play, and to figure out arrangements on uke, whereas on guitar they were too complicated for me to play, or the time investment to master the arrangement was greater than I had available or was willing to invest at the time.

For me right now, the uke has become the primary and focal instrument for my songwriting, and has allowed me to shift my paradigm, and focus in a much more satisfying way with my songwriting.

I dont spend so much time learning other songs that have been previously written by others, since now my time is spent exploring the fretboard in mostly re-entrant tunings, on only 4 strings, which provides me with a more effective and more efficient tool set than on a 6-string guitar.

On guitar I was kind of overwhelmed and found lots of classical, jazz and flamenco playing to be overwhelming. On ukulele, I have a greater level of accomplishment with these styles, and have covered more ground, and growing my ability in 2.5 yrs than I have in all the time I played guitar. Keep in mind, that when I was in high-school, I was a total guitar geek and practiced for at least an hour, every day, and took lessons until it was apparent that my teacher was useless to me, and that I could almost play any song on the radio after hearing it maybe 2-3 times...

I definitely appreciate the time that I spent with learning and playing guitar, and feel that it helped me to approach the ukulele pretty quickly, and for a while re-entrant tuning seemed 'wrong' to my ear coming from guitar, and it felt like I had to un-learn from my 'guitar brain', but now, a linear tuning seems boring and dull to me, and less appealing than a re-entrant tuning.

Also, when writing music now, it's easier to split the musical parts up across different instruments and frequency ranges. With multi-track recording, I can write a C6 tuned part for a tenor, and a G6 tuned part for a baritone to play counterpoint, and then anchor the low end with my uke bass, ALL without any instruments stepping on the frequencies of the others.

In the past, this would have been 2 guitar parts and an electric bass, and the guitar parts would overlap or get too sonically and harmonically complex, but now I don't have this problem any more.

I also used to sing and play guitar, but due to recent breathing and other health problems this is no longer something that I strive to do (mitigating these issues requires medication that has side effects much worse than not taking the medication at all), and instead the tenor uke has become my lyrical 'voice', with the baritone being the 'accompaniment' component of the music.

In the end, I feel that I am better able to work within my own limitations, while still being challenged, and even accomplish the composition of music that is more satisfying to me overall.

I didn't switch ... just expanded my horizons !!

Played guitar most of my life but I did many years of classical piano. I was actually learning old pop songs on the piano for singing and I was looking for an piano/vocal arrangement of "Tiptoe thru the Tulips" but could only find the ukulele version in Beloff's book so I bought the book thinking I would make my own piano arrangement. I knew nothing about ukes except that book explained how to tune one and there were four sizes. So, I got curious and went out and bought one thinking it would be useful for travelling if I could figure out how to play it. I would have never realized by buying my first uke, I would totally abandon the guitar.

The re-entrant tuning really confused my singing voice at first but later I started to hear a nice harmony in the uke. So, that tuning won me over first. It also generated a natural joyfulness when I would pay and sing. The guitar never did that. It also inspired me to learning new techniques: fingerpicking, clawhammer, tremolo, rasgueado, chord soloing, etc... and it was also light as a feather! hehe

Petey

At 10 years old the Ukelele was my first instrument, at 12 I was having piano lessons at 14 I had dabbled with guitar and stopped having piano lessons at 17 tried an electric guitar but played it like an acoustic and thus it went messing with all three until about 24 .Then dropped the uke / banjo Uke and piano concentrated on the guitar but got nowhere fast ..no lessons or internet stuff....Then about 1995 bought a Yamaha keyboard and started tickling the ivories again .....and the odd visit back to the UB , guitar plodding along.....2008 bought a Variax and hooked up with a guitar buddy ...best thing you can ever do....in 7 years both our playings came on leaps and bounds ....in 2011 I bought a new cheap uke and revisited it entertained a brief flurry of UAS and I've had enough Uke now .

I want to concentrate on the Guitar , Banjo,Piano,Piano Accordion, Single Row Melodeon (Cajun Accordion to you), Hamonica,Mandolin occasionally and a bit more Balalaika......and Didge...I can get it to "boom" (?) ...but I cannot work out the circular breathing.

I've played guitar for about 20 years. I tend to go through stages where I get a bit burnt out on guitar, put it down and try something else. I put down the guitar and picked up amplified blues harp, picked up the guitar, got burnt out, picked up a mandolin, picked up the guitar again, got burnt out, picked up the upright bass, picked up the guitar again, got burnt out, picked up the ukulele. I've always been of fan of Polynesian Pop/Tiki culture, Aloha Spirit, Swing and Beach vibes so the uke was an obvious choice. As I slip into middle age and mellow a bit (like a fine wine) it seems to suite me better than trying to crank up a 50W tube amp and crank out the guitar riffs.

It seems like there are so many guitar players out there, I like to have an alternate instrument to play when jamming with other guitar players. Does the jam really need the voicing of 6 guitars?

I also love the size and portability. Plus, after years of trying to get my wife and kids to play something all three are 110% in. No more searching for jam partners!

Uke is less work and more fun.

Bill1 said:

Ukulele and guitar, not ukulele vs guitar.
the two instruments are complimentary, one leads to the other and then back again. People move between instruments because they want to make some music and not happy with what they have, they have a problem and look for a solution. If you are young and want to enjoy a musical life choose both instruments and use each as appropriate, even include a wind instrument like a whistle or recorder.

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Interesting you mentioned a wind instrument such as recorder. For me, like you, it is ukulele and guitar, as well as piano and recorder. All music is good, as are the instruments on which to make that music.

Tony

Well, I got in a good Classical music hour with my concert flute, and now I'm free for a while.

It seems to me that all of us Ukers aren't quitting our old instruments but only adding new weapons to our arsenals. Well, that's really good I think. Or maybe, as kypfer says, we've just expanded our horizons. We'll just have more instruments to play different sessions to keep us interested. Maybe when we become tired of our Ukes we can dig up the old stuff to play.

But those who have moved on from their old instruments maybe just needed to change and experiment. Lots of hobbies become stale and boring, and a change can keep one fresh.
ld: