ZekewithUke
Member
Does anybody know of a solid website, video, or can explain how to transpose guitar chords to the Uke? Just standard tuning on the guitar...what would for example a G be?
Transferring Guitar chords to the Uke
- Thread starter ZekewithUke
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chiefnoda
Well-known member
Hi ekewithUke
A G chord is always a G chord, no matter what intrument it is played on. The fingering will be different but that's not a matter of transposition.
Sometimes, a guitar music is written with a capo on, and unfortunately it is often written in the fingering as if there were no capo. For example, sheet music may say "play C with capo 4". What it really means is that you will play a C shape chord with a capo on 4th fret, and the actual music is an E chord. To resolve it, you just have to look up what the actual chord is being played with a capo in a certain fret. I'm sure there are many websites offering a chart like that.
Once you figure out the actual chord being played, it is simple for you - A C chord is C chord.
Cheers
Chief
A G chord is always a G chord, no matter what intrument it is played on. The fingering will be different but that's not a matter of transposition.
Sometimes, a guitar music is written with a capo on, and unfortunately it is often written in the fingering as if there were no capo. For example, sheet music may say "play C with capo 4". What it really means is that you will play a C shape chord with a capo on 4th fret, and the actual music is an E chord. To resolve it, you just have to look up what the actual chord is being played with a capo in a certain fret. I'm sure there are many websites offering a chart like that.
Once you figure out the actual chord being played, it is simple for you - A C chord is C chord.
Cheers
Chief
The shapes of the chords are basically the same, but the tuning is different.
Let's use only the first 4 strings as an example, and look at them as DGBE on the guitar. The Ukulele's standard "C" tuning is 4 notes higher - two steps GCEA (We won't even talk about the reentrant tuning - low versus high G, as a G is a G.)
So when you play an A chord on a ukulele, shown in tab as 2100, that has the same structure as an E chord on a guitar. Barre it at the 5th fret, and the Uke plays D, the guitar plays A. 7th fret is Uke/Guitar E/D. (Using these chords for simple 12-bar blues/ country/rock triad.) Take the names of the chords away, and the folks who know theory call it a I/IV/V - I can barely understand that, and don't read music, but I can hear the notes.
So simply, if you can play a 12-bar blues on a guitar, you can play it on a ukulele. Play the same shapes, but the names of the shapes are two steps higher.
The G-shape on the guitar - 0003 - is a C chord on the uke; 0003 the same shape, just a different name.
There are a lot of people on this forum who know and understand music a lot better than I do - or to quote John Sebastian, "and anyone who unpacks his guitar (uke) can play twice as better than I will." - but that is how I have taught myself to play ukulele. I may have a hard time remembering the names of the strings, but after more than 40 years of playing guitar, and two months of playing ukulele, I think I play the uke better than I ever played the guitar. (not that that's saying much....)
Good luck, and I hope I helped some.
-Kurt
Let's use only the first 4 strings as an example, and look at them as DGBE on the guitar. The Ukulele's standard "C" tuning is 4 notes higher - two steps GCEA (We won't even talk about the reentrant tuning - low versus high G, as a G is a G.)
So when you play an A chord on a ukulele, shown in tab as 2100, that has the same structure as an E chord on a guitar. Barre it at the 5th fret, and the Uke plays D, the guitar plays A. 7th fret is Uke/Guitar E/D. (Using these chords for simple 12-bar blues/ country/rock triad.) Take the names of the chords away, and the folks who know theory call it a I/IV/V - I can barely understand that, and don't read music, but I can hear the notes.
So simply, if you can play a 12-bar blues on a guitar, you can play it on a ukulele. Play the same shapes, but the names of the shapes are two steps higher.
The G-shape on the guitar - 0003 - is a C chord on the uke; 0003 the same shape, just a different name.
There are a lot of people on this forum who know and understand music a lot better than I do - or to quote John Sebastian, "and anyone who unpacks his guitar (uke) can play twice as better than I will." - but that is how I have taught myself to play ukulele. I may have a hard time remembering the names of the strings, but after more than 40 years of playing guitar, and two months of playing ukulele, I think I play the uke better than I ever played the guitar. (not that that's saying much....)
Good luck, and I hope I helped some.
-Kurt
Ukulele JJ
Super Moderator
Bingo.
If you're faced with a piece of music that was written for guitar, the steps are simple:
- Look at the name of the guitar chord. There might be a chord diagram, telling you how to form the chord on a guitar, but you should completely ignore that. Just look at the name of the chord: G, or Cm, or F#, or whatever.
- Get yourself a chart of ukulele chords. Here's one that I like, but a Google search will turn up many others. There are also iPhone apps and such.
- Look up the same chord name on your ukulele chord chart. Refer to the diagram you see there. Put your fingers where the diagrams says.
That's basically it!
JJ
That's what I get for typing at 3:30 am.... The standard tuning is 5 notes higher - three steps, or a "third".
Other folks have good advice. Remember that you aren't transposing the Chord, you're simply using a different shape to get that chord.
If you are used to playing a song on a guitar in G, using G, C, and D (The I/IV/V I mentioned earlier), then you will continue to play that song in G on the ukulele, but you will use different shapes. I think of it as rotating 45 degrees. The C chord on a ukulele uses what I spent 40 years calling the "G" shape on the guitar. In Uke tab, it is 0232. C on a uke is 0003, and D is 2220. These are, of course, simple first position chords. (I also want to point out that I have an absolutely terrible time attempting to read guitar or banjo tab - but I'm starting to understand Uke tab. Go figure.)
One of the uke books ( The Fretboard Roadmap) is very good, in that it tries to get you to understand where the notes are, rather than relying on the shapes for names, and works in using concepts such as "the circle of fifths". Now, I don't pretend to understand everything Fred Sokolaw says in that book, but I realized I've been doing a lot of what he advocates over the years, when improvising, or joining a group of players - or even playing along with the radio (now the YouTube videos....).
I'll agree with Ukulele JJ - a ukulele chord chart is a great place to start - that's how I started on Guitar. But as you play, finding sheet music with different chords and forms (some of which I still can't find in the chord charts!) is a great help.
I can also recommend the Dr. Uke web site www.doctoruke.com as a great site, lots of songs, some audio files, some videos, and many lessons.
So good luck, Zeke. Keep on Ukin'!
-Kurt
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If your playing on your own, then just use the chord shapes your familiar with on the guitar. Just remember that you will be playing in the key of 'F', not 'C'
You need to adjust your singing voice obviously, but the chord shapes for uke and guitar are pretty similar once you ignore what you would do with the E and A strings, which your uke does not possess of course.
If you are playing with other uke players, or a guitar player, then you will need to form the shapes '5 up'. Your guitar 'G' is now a 'C'. your guitar 'A' is now a 'D', etc etc
Its pretty easy to create a transpose card for your Uke chords, just label two cards A, A#, B, C, C#, D, D#, E, F, F#, G, G#, A, then line them up with the C and G, and you can see what chord you are playing for your familiar chord shapes.
Alternatively, if you have a tenor uke, you can get DGBE strings for it, and of course Baritone ukes are most often tuned DGBE (but you can get GCEA strings for them if you want).
It's the great thing about Ukes, they require very lttle work to adjust to if you already play guitar. I once picked up a Mandolin, and felt confused for days......
You need to adjust your singing voice obviously, but the chord shapes for uke and guitar are pretty similar once you ignore what you would do with the E and A strings, which your uke does not possess of course.
If you are playing with other uke players, or a guitar player, then you will need to form the shapes '5 up'. Your guitar 'G' is now a 'C'. your guitar 'A' is now a 'D', etc etc
Its pretty easy to create a transpose card for your Uke chords, just label two cards A, A#, B, C, C#, D, D#, E, F, F#, G, G#, A, then line them up with the C and G, and you can see what chord you are playing for your familiar chord shapes.
Alternatively, if you have a tenor uke, you can get DGBE strings for it, and of course Baritone ukes are most often tuned DGBE (but you can get GCEA strings for them if you want).
It's the great thing about Ukes, they require very lttle work to adjust to if you already play guitar. I once picked up a Mandolin, and felt confused for days......
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