The Ukulele Duets

What with the friendly reception the Ukulele Etudes are getting, I thought I'd plug my next effort: The Ukulele Duets.

No. They're not finished. They're hardly started. But I am trying to map them out, and thought I'd ask for your help.

It all started when I began the first one. It basically asks the question, "If Mozart had played the ukulele, what might he have written?" And so I wrote this little duet, and called it "Vienna 1781".

Then I came up with another idea for a piece, a jazz waltz, VERY loosely inspired by "Up Jumped Spring" by Freddie Hubbard. And called it "New York 1966".

See where I'm going here?

So, I've come up with a few others:

Weimar 1722 - A Baroque invention
Rio de Janeiro 1959 - A Bossa Nova tune
Sedalia 1899 - A rag
Seville 1870 - A flamenco tune

That makes 6. I want 10. Possibly released in 2 volumes. We'll see how quickly I get on, and how big it all gets. But I'd like it to involve a pretty wide range of styles. The basic premise is to compose for genres in which the ukulele does not traditionally appear - to write original, idiomatic ukulele music in those styles.

So, and this is where I hope it gets fun for you, I was hoping some of you could help me come up with the last 4. The trick is pretty obvious, methinks. A place and year associated with a particular kind of music.

Thanks in advance!

Hello John

Clarksdale 1936??? - (My logic was that call-and-response blues might be good for a duet?)

Anyway, how are you? I'm glad the Etudes are doing well. Good for you

Saint Louis 1898 - Joplin / Ragtime

New Orleans 1900 - Bolden; Morton / Jazz

San Francisco 1968 -- it was the Summer of Love (i.e., the Summer of the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, and psychedelic rock).

Boston 1976 -- You could go in different directions here. Boston was a "Birthplace of the Revolution," and 1976 was the United States Bicentennial, so you could write something in the style of John Phillip Sousa (see, e.g., Jake and Bruce Shimabukuro playing Stars and Stripes Forever), but it was also the heyday of Boston area big hair bands like, well, Boston ("More Than A Feeling").

southcoastukes said:

Saint Louis 1898 - Joplin / Ragtime

New Orleans 1900 - Bolden; Morton / Jazz

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Sedalia was where Joplin was living in those years, I believe. So, got that one covered. I figured ragtime would be more specific, and maybe a bit more straightforward to right a duet for.

AnnaUK said:

Hello John

Clarksdale 1936??? - (My logic was that call-and-response blues might be good for a duet?)

Anyway, how are you? I'm glad the Etudes are doing well. Good for you

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That's a really good one!

I'm pretty good. Just back from a month in California. Looks like you've been busy collating songbooks.

Duets YES!
How about movie music, mid - late 20th Century USA? That could cover anything from a musical (Rogers and Hammerstein, Frederick Loewe, The Sherman Brothers, Oliver!, Wizard of Oz, etc), to a score (John Barry, John Williams, Bernard Herman, etc).
–Lori

Lori said:

How about movie music, mid - late 20th Century USA? That could cover anything from a musical (Rogers and Hammerstein, Frederick Loewe, The Sherman Brothers, Oliver!, Wizard of Oz, etc), to a score (John Barry, John Williams, Bernard Herman, etc).

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Except now you're moving into copyrighted territory where no matter how original the arrangements, you'd have to negotiate with the copyright holders and pay royalties, something I imagine the OP would rather avoid, both for the sake of simplicity and not having to share any of the profits.

"VERY loosely inspired by" is a lot different than using a recognizable copyrighted tune. "Jazz waltz" and "bossa nova" are both styles where the OP can incorporate a wide range of influences without infringing upon any individual copyrights.

Trying to do something Bernard Hermann-esque on 2 ukuleles... now there's a challenge. Need to think about that. For a long time.

Itsme, I assume Lori was suggesting an "in the style of" type thing. Trying to actually arrange film scores would be an epic adventure all its own.

Well, after a few months of banging my head against the proverbial wall, I'm taking a chacge of tack with my duets. The 1st is done. Just needs recording. The 2nd is 90% done, but isn't what I had originally intended.

I kept trying to compose these little homages, but I've found that I just keep getting composer's block. So, what I've done is to just focus on 6 classical (with a small c) pieces. The first is fairly Mozart. The second is a waltz, a bit Straussy. Given all the interest on UU lately about classical ukulele, and duets as well, it seemed the best course to take, and I'm finding the little black dots are flowing more freely. Like the etudes, I'm trying to keep the focus on idiomatic writing.

I'm hoping to release these in the summer, hopefully (fingers crossed, and technology permitting) with "live" split screen videos.

For those of you working through the Etudes, I'm also hoping to do some tutorial-style videos sooner than later. But that depends on borrowing a camera and editing facilities from work. But those I can just post as and when they're finished.

Thanks as per usual to those of you who have provided such support and encouragement.

Mozart MUST have played the Ukulele (despite all the bogus pictures showing him at a keyboard; that is just propaganda from the piano industry.) I know this because the first uke piece you play is Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and that was penned by Mozart. See my comments on this in my review of "Fingerstyle Ukulele." As to duets, Quantz (royal composer to Frederick the II) wrote quite a few duets for flute--they may be transposable to uke. And there were other composers, the French Devienne for one. As to walzes, what about Chopin?

These aren't arrangements, but originals in a classical vein. My composing started due to my frustration at all the arrangements out there, and the relatively small number of original compositions.

And I'm afraid Mozart didn't write Twinkle Twinkle. It was a well-known French folk tune, on which he wrote a series of variations. Sorry.

Ok. Done. Well, the composing is done. The PDF file is done. But I still need to put the videos together. Which is much trickier, as I'm playing both parts, and I want some actual video of me playing, as some people have said they don't like staring at slightly blurry black dots floating around...

6 duets. 76 pages, including parts, etc.

1. Salzburg - A fairly Mozarty sort of tune. Not a genuine Sonatina, but Sonatina-ish.
2. Vienna - A waltz, with a B section which would be tough to dance to. Slowwwww. But it fit, so I kept it. That was my general philosophy. I tried to let the ukulele lead the way. Turns out it's much more imaginative than me.
3. Paris - Probably my favourite accompaniment part. The first player doesn't actually play for the first 20 bars or so. It's one of those parts which I find feels good to play.
4. Louisville - My take on bluegrass. Inspired partly by recent discussions here about Bill Monroe. I read somewhere that Bill's brothers took half the strings off his mandolin as a kid. Well, that leaves himn learning music on a small, four-stringed instrument......................
5. Weimar - A little Baroque piece which tackles chorale textures as well as some more imitative, contrapuntal bits. I think it's the shortest. Is it the shortest? I think so. After writing it, I realised I've played very little Baroque music. Notes, notes and more notes.
6. Bloomington - my ode to Hoagy Carmichael. I really wanted to end on a tuneful tune with some nice chords. It's probably the least balanced duet, as one player literally thumps out chords to a steady beat. But I'm quite pleased with it, and the chords fit nicely under the hand. I think it would be good for an advancing beginner with an intermediate friend.

I've ordered some software so that I can do splitscreen video. <gulp> So, need to get hold of a camcorder, which I can do through work.

Watch this space!

hey John, I'm really looking forward to these. I'm excited to have some good uke music to multitrack record.

Do you know when you'll be posting the ebook to your website? Maybe you'll release a few PDF teasers for us faithful Ukulele Etudes players...?

Really looking forward to this, John. Ode to Hoagy Carmichael? I can hardly wait!

JamieFromOntario said:

hey John, I'm really looking forward to these. I'm excited to have some good uke music to multitrack record.

Do you know when you'll be posting the ebook to your website? Maybe you'll release a few PDF teasers for us faithful Ukulele Etudes players...?

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My plan is to get the videos sorted before I put it up on my website. That way, people will know what they're getting.

Teasers? Yeah. That's tempting...

I've been looking forward to this from you for a long time, exciting! It's actually kind of shocking what a complete void it is out there when it comes to duet/trio/quartet music for ukulele. Janeray turned me on to a book in Japanese book that has a lot of arrangements for multiple ukes that I've been playing with some friends from our local uke club, but that's almost all I've been able to find. We've started to try to do our own arrangements since there is really practically nothing out there published. I hope Jim Beloff and others of his ilk are paying attention....we want more music for multiple ukes!

pepamahina said:

I've been looking forward to this from you for a long time, exciting! It's actually kind of shocking what a complete void it is out there when it comes to duet/trio/quartet music for ukulele. Janeray turned me on to a book in Japanese book that has a lot of arrangements for multiple ukes that I've been playing with some friends from our local uke club, but that's almost all I've been able to find. We've started to try to do our own arrangements since there is really practically nothing out there published. I hope Jim Beloff and others of his ilk are paying attention....we want more music for multiple ukes!

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Well, after the duets are all done, I'll be putting out my arrangement of Eine Kleine Nachtmusik for ukulele quartet. I've got the first 2 movements finished. And I will release that when I'm done with a MIDI file. I'm not going to worry about the video first, as I'm figuring anyone who wants it knows how it goes. And the MIDI file will give a reasonable approximation of how it should sound on ukulele.

pulelehua said:

Well, after the duets are all done, I'll be putting out my arrangement of Eine Kleine Nachtmusik for ukulele quartet. I've got the first 2 movements finished. And I will release that when I'm done with a MIDI file. I'm not going to worry about the video first, as I'm figuring anyone who wants it knows how it goes. And the MIDI file will give a reasonable approximation of how it should sound on ukulele.

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I am really interested in this. Keep up the good work, 'cause I'm ready! MIDI is fine. Videos take too much time.
–Lori

Lori said:

I am really interested in this. Keep up the good work, 'cause I'm ready! MIDI is fine. Videos take too much time.
–Lori

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I agree re: MIDI vs. video. I rarely watch videos; instead I download the sound file as .mp3.