Is a Ukulele a type of Guitar?

nomis

nomis

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That is to say does it belong to this group of "Guitar Instruments"

Renaissance, Baroque, Classical, Flamenco, Resonator or Dobro, 12-string, Guitarrón, Tenor guitar, Guitar battente, Parlor guitar, Baritone guitar, Lap steel guitar (aka Hawaiian guitar), Pedal steel guitar etc.

or the other main group of "Non-Guitar Instrument"

Cello, Banjo, Polynesian Nose flute, Stylophone (and one or two others)?

On my copy of Sibelius its notation comes under "Hawaiian Guitars", is this correct?
 
I'm going to be a jerk and say, "Why not?"

But, a little more seriously, it might be fair to class ukes with guitars, as their strings are tuned similarly (4ths: guitar 6th string EFGA 5th string)--say, in the same way that mandolins and violins are a class of instruments tuned in the same manner (5ths: mandolin 4th string GABCD 3rd string).
 
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When I bought a ukulele from Italy, and it needed to be classified for import duty to the USA, it was classified as a "non-guitar".
–Lori
 
As a square is a type of rectangle, a ukulele is a type of guitar.
 
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A small guitar????? :wtf:

I've heard the uke called a Kazoo with strings.....but a guitar?!?
 
Personally a "Kazoo with strings" would be less insulting.
 
Lori said:
When I bought a ukulele from Italy, and it needed to be classified for import duty to the USA, it was classified as a "non-guitar".
–Lori
Click to expand...

You expect the bureaucrats at Customs to know the difference? Actually, they have to work from a non-musical standard based on trade issues. It's along the lines of why Scottish whiskeys cost so much here in the States. IOW, I wouldn't use your import duty experience as a gauge.
 
Sheesh. You all have it backwards.
A guitar is a type of bass. If it's tuned right. The bass, that is.
The bass is a type of ukulele. Therefore,
a guitar is a ukulele.
It's so simple.
 
I would say yes and no. Quoteth John King:

In the time of J.S. Bach—some years before Capt. James Cook stumbled upon the island he called Owyhee—guitarists armed with re-entrantly tuned instruments had pioneered a style of playing they called campanela, which means little bell sounds. The bottom line is, they played each note of a melody on a different string, creating a sound like a harp—or little, pealing bells—where notes over-rang one another. I taught myself an appropriate Bach tune using the campanela technique and applied it to my mother’s pineapple. It was a revelation.
Click to expand...

Guitars used to be re-entrant tuned. The ukulele is re-entrant tuned and John King has said elsewhere in his notes that the re-entrant tuning was borrowed from a 5-string Portugese guitar (obviously borrowed into the uke's forerunner, the braguina/machete). In a way, the uke is a fork of the guitar family, kind of in the same way that American English is a fork of 1700's English, Quebecci is a fork of French and so on...

However, quoteth the mighty wikipedia (emphasis mine):

The ukulele, (pronounced /ˌjuːkəˈleɪliː/ YOO-kə-LAY-lee, from Hawaiian: ʻukulele [ˈʔukuˈlele]; variantly spelled ukelele in the UK), sometimes abbreviated to uke, is a chordophone classified as a plucked lute; it is a subset of the guitar family of instruments, generally with four nylon or gut strings or four courses of strings.[1]
Click to expand...

A lute??? Forsooth thine knave forthwith, henceforth to thy tavern and drink hearty mead!
 
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I would consider the ukulele to be part of the guitar family, broadly speaking. It is clearly more a guitar than a banjo is. It's constructed like a guitar and tuned more or less the same way as a guitar (granted, to a different pitch, but the same intervals). So, it's closer to a guitar than it is to any other instrument, and closer to a guitar than other instruments like mandolin, banjo etc are.
 
I think ceviche hit it right off. As players, we pick something up and try to play it. A guitar player can pick up an uke and play it. An uke player can pick up a guitar and play it (albeit without the requisite alien 5th and 6th fingers) So, the concept of 'family of instruments' seems logical to me. I used to play the violin, and the mandolin would have been a manageable adjustment. So, from a players perspective, I'm going to come down on the 'yes' side of the fence. whetu is absolutely right in introducing the word 'fork' into this can of worms. For a treat, check here to see the incredible amount of forking thats been going on: http://www.atlasofpluckedinstruments.com/
 
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Ukes are considered to be chordophones, so can be classified as similar to guitar.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chordophone

A chordophone is any musical instrument which makes sound by way of a vibrating string or strings stretched between two points. It is one of the four main divisions of instruments in the original Hornbostel-Sachs scheme of musical instrument classification.

What many would call string instruments are classified as chordophones. Violins, guitars, lyres and harps are some examples.
 
Yes, I guess it was intended as a sort of discussion opener. Although, I'm quite surprised that so far most people say it IS a type of guitar. I expected much more snarling. It amazes me how many people who walk into my home (why are these people walking through my home?) say things like ,"put that guitar down and stop making such a racket" when in fact I'm playing an instrument that's a quarter the size of a normal guitar. It's as if they only see the shape.

The other thing which I find quite interesting is that most normal punters (musically illiterate people) here in the UK make no connection whatsoever between the Ukulele and Hawaii. I think the reason here is clear in that the uke became a seminal part of British culture in the hands of the the comedy actor George Fornby. In the UK I think the two are inexorably linked. This has also gone a long way towards casting the Ukulele as a comedy instrument here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sfmAeijj5cM

I wonder how well George is known outside the UK, although i have to say his style didn't personally inspire me to play.

P.S. These are my favourite quotes from this thread so far
.....and applied it to my mother’s pineapple. It was a revelation.
Click to expand...
whetu is absolutely right in introducing the word 'fork' into this can of worms.
Click to expand...

 
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