My New Ukulele

So I finally decided to get the Makai MT-70 form newenglandmusicstore.com. Thanks everyone for helping me make my decision. My sisters bought it for my birthday two weeks ago and it just arrived today. Jim at newenglandmusicstore was really helpful. He answered all of my questions and he put Aquila strings on for me at no extra cost. It cost $88 with free shipping. The price is now up to $91, but it's still well worth the money. They set each ukulele up and the action seems pretty good. There's no fret buzz and the intonation seems fine. You really can't beat this deal for $88. At the last minute my sister decided she wanted one too, so we got two of them and they both play really well.

Congratulations on getting your new uke!!! And.....Happy Birthday!!! Your uke looks nice and the fact that the dealer put on the aquila strings makes it even better!!!
Have fun!!!

Thanks a lot. I have one question. I have a Korg TM-40 tuner that I payed close to $40, but it turned out to be a piece of junk. It won't tune my basses and it won't tune my ukulele either. What is a good tuner to buy that I could also use for my electric bass?

shaylie214 said:

Thanks a lot. I have one question. I have a Korg TM-40 tuner that I payed close to $40, but it turned out to be a piece of junk. It won't tune my basses and it won't tune my ukulele either. What is a good tuner to buy that I could also use for my electric bass?

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obviously there are several out there. I use the KALA clip on tuner and it will tune a bass it costs around $20.00.
Don

I have two tuners, a korg CA-1 ($10 on Amazon), which works by microphone or plug in your electric bass. An I also have a Snark ($12 on Amazon), which clips on the end of the headstock and works by vibration. Both work great and tune to any note you wish.

Congratulations and happy birthday! It's great to be able to have someone set up a new ukulele for you, and while not everyone likes Aquila strings, I think they tend to enhance the sound and volume on less expensive ukuleles.

Kala makes the KC02, which is a good, inexpensive tuner. You can set it to ukulele C tuning, ukulele D tuning, or chromatic tuning (for guitars, basses and other stringed instruments).

Here's a list of online places to buy one. A local music shop may also sell them.

I have a couple of the Kala tuners and they work well, but I just got a Snark SN-2 that works great in vib and also has a mic mode and a built in metronome, all for about $12!

The crazy thing about my KORG tuner is even with my bass plugged in and the volume turned all the way up it still doesn't usually register. I don't think I would purchase another KORG tuner. I'm thinking of sending it back to KORG as it's still under warranty, but I think they're probably all like that and I wouldn't want to pay for shipping just to get a new one that works just as poorly. The metronome is the only thing that works properly on my tuner. I'm going to look into all of the tuners that were mentioned and I'll probably make a decision by the end of the week.

My ukulele came at about 11:00 a.m. and I haven't put it down for more than 10 minutes since then. I'm really loving it. I'm pretty happy with the Aquila strings. I've heard that Worth strings provide a warmer sound on a spruce top uke, so I might try them next. For now the Aquila strings are fine and much better than the GHS strings.

I didn't get to try a tenor before I made my purchase, but I definitely like this size the best. I like the spacing on the tenor neck much more than that of the soprano or concert ukuleles that I tried. Coming from the bass the frets were just too tiny and my fingers felt really cramped on the smaller ukuleles. The tenor feels like the perfect size for me. Anyway it's a great birthday present and I'm really enjoying it so far. Thanks for all the help everyone.

shaylie214 said:

The crazy thing about my KORG tuner is even with my bass plugged in and the volume turned all the way up it still doesn't usually register. I don't think I would purchase another KORG tuner.

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Korg tuners are usually pretty reliable. You might change the battery and see what happens. I have been using Korg tuners since 1979 and never had a problem.

I've had my tuner since last September and I've changed batteries more than once to no avail. It seems to be getting increasingly worse. At first I thought it might be because it couldn't pick up the lower frequencies of the bass, but it doesn't work well with the ukulele either. It works alright with my father's guitars, but not great. Before I got the Korg I used my sisters Fender tuner and it worked fine. We have a Korg synthesizer that's great, so I know Korg is a good company I just don't know why I've been having these problems. I guess I'll send it back and hopefully get a better one. Being out $5 or $6 for shipping is better than being out $35 for a tuner that never really worked. This is my tuner http://www.korg.com/tm40 I haven't read any bad reviews on it, so maybe I just got a dud.

DAPuke said:

obviously there are several out there. I use the KALA clip on tuner and it will tune a bass it costs around $20.00.
Don

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I use this same tuner and it works great!!! Tunes in C, D & Chromatic.

Congrats on the new uke! Glad it's comfortable and sounding good! And belated happy birthday!!

Good luck finding the best tuner for your needs. No clue which ones work. (I tune by ear to the nearest good note---a tuning fork or get-tuned.com.)