2012 Year of the Baritone

Seems like there has been a surge in interest in baritones since New Year's. Could it be because it's the only size some people don't have yet?

I noticed I was an oddity in the 60-70's with my baritone uke but now with the renewed interest in GCEA ukes a lot of the old guitar players who are jumping on board are finding the DGBE tuning is somewhat easier on the old brain cells.
Also if you have a lot of old songs with the words tumbling around in your brain the familiarity is somewhat kinder.

I like baritones strung GCEA. It's nice to have an uke that has lots of volume, more tonal color, and longer sustain. That makes them excellent for fingerstyle.


I just need baris with wide nut-widths. Wishing that Islander (Kanilea) would make a bari.

I got one to play in our Ukulele Ensemble. It adds a lot when you have a lot of players and only 3 parts to play. A baritone can add a part an octave lower. Another ensemble player got one too.

–Lori

I'm waiting for a good deal to come along here in the Martketplace...

I like the baritone for the larger finger board.
Although tenor is my go to size, some of the old jazz tunes I play sound so great on a baritone.
I also believe senior fingers like the larger spacing.

One of my baritones has Fremont low G tenor strings on it. They are long enough to accommodate the 20 inch scale with length to spare. It is low G C E A. As GVlog has written earlier.........
"""I like baritones strung GCEA. It's nice to have an uke that has lots of volume, more tonal color, and longer sustain. That makes them excellent for fingerstyle."""
PS: Edited for spelling 'accomadate' incorrectly. Naughty naughty Jimmy. 100 pushups and 10 lashes with a wet noodle for you.

I'm glad to see that the Baritone is garnering more attention. As ukuleles go, it's really a versatile and extraordinary instrument. The larger body accommodates my frame well and the extra space on the fretboard offers real flexibility with more complex chord voicings etc. I tune GCEA with Southcoast Linear strings. Below is our current list of baritone in the collection.


'12 Ko'olau CE-1 Baritone (L.R.Baggs)
'11 Pono Acacia Deluxe Baritone (MiSi)
'09 Pono Mahogany Deluxe Baritone (MiSi)
'08 Pono Macassar Ebony and Cedar top (Fishman Infinity)
'64 Guild BU-1 Baritone
'64 Favilla B2 Baritone
'72 Yasuma Model 51 Baritone
'75 C.F. Mountain Model 51 Baritone
'53 Vega Arthur Godfrey Solo Lute (K and K Twinspot)
'55 Vega Arthur Godfrey Baritone Deluxe Sunburst
'52 Vega Arthur Godfrey Baritone Standard
'55 Harmony Model 695 Baritone
'65 Harmony Model 695 Baritone
'65 Airline Baritone
'59 Biltmore Short Scale Baritone
'71 Bobby Henshaw Baritone
'55 Kent Carmencita Baritone
'55 Kustom Kraft Baritone
'68 Lyra Baritone
'70 Giannini Baritone
'66 Aria Model 1255 Baritone
'10 Eleuke Mahogany Baritone
'72 Regal Spruce top Baritone
'68 Silvertone Baritone
'09 Kala KA-B Mahogany Baritone
'11 Cordoba Cuatro (as Baritone)
'09 Jupiter Creek Telecaster Steel String Baritone
'09 Oscar Schmidt OU55CE Koa Baritone
'70 Maccaferri Islander Plastic Baritone

What! The ukulele cowboy society does not have a Martin baritone???

I own a Harmony baritone, and it's got a nice tone, but I find I don't play it all that much. In fact, I continually gravitate towards smaller and smaller instruments, and I've been playing my sopranino a lot this week. It's amusing to look at the baritone and the sopranino together. I've heard that if you plant a sopranino in fertile ground, it will eventually grow into a baritone...or, if you leave it there too long, a guitar.

jackwhale said:

What! The ukulele cowboy society does not have a Martin baritone???

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or a Gibson!


checkout my fat frets!

Gorgeous. You ever want to sell or trade, please let me know.

The sudden upswing in interest in the baritone may have a lot to do with the amazing recent baritone vids by drbekken and Eugene_Ukulele! Those have certainly peaked my interest!

John

question: if one was going to play a baritone, couldn't they simply play the more ubiquitous acoustic guitar? Much more versatile (despite what we'd all like to think) than the uke and fifty times as much music and tabs out there for guitars. Hmm.

coolkayaker1 said:

question: if one was going to play a baritone, couldn't they simply play the more ubiquitous acoustic guitar? Much more versatile (despite what we'd all like to think) than the uke and fifty times as much music and tabs out there for guitars. Hmm.

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no, a completely different animal

coolkayaker1 said:

question: if one was going to play a baritone, couldn't they simply play the more ubiquitous acoustic guitar? Much more versatile (despite what we'd all like to think) than the uke and fifty times as much music and tabs out there for guitars. Hmm.

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Well...I don't like to play guitar, that's one thing. I love the deeper sound of the baritone ukulele, with the 'uke' feeling intact. The question is a bit like asking Segovia if he'd care for a strat.

drbekken said:

Well...I don't like to play guitar, that's one thing. I love the deeper sound of the baritone ukulele, with the 'uke' feeling intact. The question is a bit like asking Segovia if he'd care for a strat.

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more like asking him if he'd care for a mandolin, at least a strat is a guitar.

coolkayaker1 said:

question: if one was going to play a baritone, couldn't they simply play the more ubiquitous acoustic guitar? Much more versatile (despite what we'd all like to think) than the uke and fifty times as much music and tabs out there for guitars. Hmm.

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More versatile, yes, but they don't sound the same at all. I love playing my guitars, but the reason I like ukulele more (these days anyways) is the depth, warmth, and definition of every note I play. I strum away on both, and love the sounds of both, but for me the ukulele has more warmth and clarity on its fur strings than my guitar. That's partially a string difference thing...nylon or CF strings are warmer than unwound steel strings, and steel strings make the guitar sound punchier and crisper on the attack while also increasing the sustain. That's great when you have a huge (in my guitar's case, jumbo-sized) body to get the warmth and volume that you otherwise lose in steel strings. On the uke, the warmer strings and the fact that there's fewer of them is a huge plus, in my opinion. The body does a great job of projecting the right volume and keeps muddiness to a minimum.

I agree that the ukulele is probably less versatile than the guitar. I also think that a well made ukulele has the potential to be a perfect instrument for an enormous range of music styles. It also has to be harder to build that perfect ukulele because on a guitar, it is easy to add more or subtract a little from the body to balance the instrument. On the uke you're mostly working more with a set body size and style (due to popularity) and trying to make it as light and loud and balanced as possible, knowing that in the end each set of strings will change the voice of the instrument.

I'd like to pick up a bari soon, although I don't know that I want to open that can of worms just yet. Tenor is keeping me occupied at the moment, and I don't want to stray too far from the classic ukulele sound that I love!

coolkayaker1 said:

question: if one was going to play a baritone, couldn't they simply play the more ubiquitous acoustic guitar? Much more versatile (despite what we'd all like to think) than the uke and fifty times as much music and tabs out there for guitars. Hmm.

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I'll be the oddball and (somewhat) agree with you - provided that you're talking about a 3/4 or 1/2 size classical (nylon string) guitar and, honestly, because those are mostly viewed as instruments for children it's hard to find really high-quality guitars of that type. So, yeah, you could play the four treble strings on a 1/2 size classical guitar and it would be pretty close to the sound you would get from a cheap baritone uke (close, not identical, because the guitar body of even a 1/2 size is probably still going to be deeper and thus project more bass). Still, given the caveats above the difference in tone between a 1/2 size classical guitar (playing only the treble strings) and a baritone uke would probably fall wtihin the range of variation in tones from different models of baritone uke.

The difference is this - if your main interest is ukulele, why would you buy a guitar to make uke sounds? On the other hand, if you're a guitar player with a 1/2 size classical guitar of great quality the purchase of a baritone uke might be frivolous. But, if you're a uke and guitar player and you want really top quality you're more likely to be attracted to a baritone uke than to a 1/2 size classical guitar. Even many of the laminated baritone ukes are of better quality and have better tone than most of the 1/2 size classical guitars on the market because they haven't been "overbuilt" to handle the tension of the "extra" strings and the abuse likely to be received at the hands of a child.

John

ukulelecowboy said:

Gorgeous. You ever want to sell or trade, please let me know.

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Hey Mike I tried and I'm still waiting..LOL his fingers are glued to that gibson...mine would be too....ha ha don't blame him one bit...