So, tell me about your uke playing

Normagal

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I'm curious...when you started out, what were your plans for playing, or your goals? Did you have serious intentions of working a lot at it and getting really good? Was it something you just wanted to do and had no idea where it would lead? Do you get together and play with others?

Or if you are still a beginner, what are our plans? Are you teaching yourself? Are you taking lessons on line or in person?

Tell me all about your uke playing.

I, for one, just started out wanting to learn enough to be able to share music with my little granddaughters. I didn't realize I would fall in love with the thing and want to play it every day. I'm just fiddling around learning here on the Internet, haven't really purchased any on line lessons or anything. I went to a club one time and got to play with a group of beginners-it was actually like a group lesson. It was fun-but being an hour from my home realistically I don't know if I'll keep going back. I don't know of anyone to play with otherwise. So I don't really know where I'm headed with it, it's just fun to play and I love the sweet little sounds that it makes.
 
I got my first uke from my friend. It had been sitting in the corner of his room for years. It was a Hawaiian tourist uke and not very playable. I had already been playing violin for 3 years so it was fairly easy for me to learn. I just played for fun, and I got pretty good after almost a year and a half. I play with people all the time. Ukes and music in general are very popular at my school, so I play about3 different ukes just in a school day. I also do performances with my freind who plays guitar, and the uke club at my school which I kind of lead. Check out my YT vids to see how much I have advanced in almost a year in a half.
 
Very impressive,Yestyn. I doubt that's possible for me,though. I have absolutely no musical background whatsoever. Thanks for sharing.
 
First off it is wonderful you are sharing music with your grandchildren.

I started playing to fill the void of no music. I have always been very involved with music growing up. Starting with choir, then trumpet, then college ensembles. I found myself at 20 years old, working 2 jobs, and for the first time, no music to look forward to. I find playing trumpet alone unsatisfying. I have a friend who bought a Luna guitar. I was browsing their site and saw their ukuleles. The more I read about ukes, the more I wanted one. I bought a Luna and became hooked.

Fast Forward 1 year and 1/2...

Still obsessed. I am now a full time pre-k teacher and I am finding more ways to use ukulele in the classroom each day. I have a student who got a ukulele and wants to be like me. [so cute :D] So many kids want to play my ukulele we have a sign up list for it each day.

I have emailed 7 people this week about starting ukulele/ recruiting for uke club. I am in the Dayton uke club.

I went to a uke gathering in September and I am going to The Tampa Bay Ukulele Getaway in a few weeks.

My 12 year old cousin plays ukulele and I work with her every week.

One of my ukes is on loan to a friend and I am considering loaning out a second one.
I got to see Jake Shimabukuro and The UOGB live.

I am trying to be brief, but ukulele is such a big part of my life. I am excited to see people around me showing interest and I cannot wait to see what happens next. I could blab about this all day. :D
 
I'm still very much a beginner. I've always had an interest in the guitar but was never any good at it. Then I saw the ukulele display at Guitar Center. As soon as I picked one up, I knew I had to have it. Now I'm totally addicted.
I tried taking lessons locally but found the instructor to be completely unenthusiastic so I went to the Internet. I subscribe to the UU lessons and search YouTube.
I'd love to find a local group but the nearest group that I know of is a couple of hours away.
 
I am enjoying reading your replies. Mandalyn-I would love to hear how you are using the Uke to teach the kids. I am always looking for ways to teach/entertain my grands. Are your pre k kids actually learning how to play it? As far as I have gotten with my girls is teaching them the string names and the C chord. That's with the 7 year old. There are 3 girls-7,5 and 3.
 
We bought my daughter a soprano at a craft fair in early May. Within two days I had bought myself one and had joined the local uke group that conveniently meets in my village pub once a week. 6 months on I have owned 5 different ukes, two of which have now gone and have a custom baritone and a custom soprano on order.

I try to play daily, though with two kids under 5 that's not always possible.

I have no specific goals but am trying a bit of everything to see what I like. Fingerstyle, swing/jazz stuff as well as the usual Ain't she sweet etc with the group. I've just bought a slide to try that as well.

I have a background in playing ensemble music from a young age but this is the first group stuff I've done in over 20 years and I now realise just how much I was missing it.
 
I started playing the uke on the 15th June 2011, I was on the sick from work with stones in my gall bladder, I was bored so I decided to learn to play an instrument, at this time I was reading a book and the main character played the uke, so I decided to have a go at it myself and bought a cheapie from the local music shop, I have never played any instrument before, so I was a complete newbie, I joined this site and started to learn some simple 2 and 3 chord songs and i also downloaded Uncle Rods Boot Camp, I was hooked, I invested in a better uke took some private lessons and slowly progressed, in November last year I met through this site another uke player from my town, we decided to start our own uke club because there wasn't one in our town, we opened on 7th February this year, we now boast 70+ members, in March this year I decided to get a ukulele band together, we have between 10 and 15 players depending on who can make it and we have currently done about 7 gigs with one coming up in November, December we are fully booked up until after christmas and we also have 2 weddings to perform at in the new year, the uke has truly changed my once mundane life to one of excitement and fun, I have made some really caring fantastic friends worldwide via this site and some really lovely friends from my home town and surrounding areas, thats my uke story
kaizer
some pics of the band

ukoholix3.jpgukoholix4.jpgukoholix5.jpgcider fest2.jpgcider fest1.jpg
 
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What a fantastic story, kaisersoza! I'd love to hear your band.
 
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Grew up with music on a daily basis, as my father had a group
he recorded for columbia records etc. etc. When in high school
decided i wanted to learn guitar so my dad said here is a guitar
and here is a book of chords. This is a 6 string chord you learn it
you know 12 chords. That was it. From that was on my own. So
tinkered with guitar basics for a couple of years and when my
guitar was stolen then sort of let it all fall away. OK 2008 went
to Hawaii and the Uke festival was on. Came home with a lovely
Kamaka but stowed it away in the closet. Just drug it out a couple
of months ago and the rest is history am off and running and enjoying
every minute of it. Took a bit to remember the guitar chords and figure
out how they related to 4 strings. But it's coming along and now i have
the uke fever. Have spent most of time concentrating on singing so the
uke is a great addition easily transportable and you don't have to look
for someone to accompany you. The singing is coming back after being
on hiatus for over 20 years as well. Am going to a uke meet up tomorrow
night but am not a greatly social person have always been more of a
loner type. So in a nutshell have been playing now a couple of months
and doubt it will end any time soon. Have my eye on my ultimate uke
but will be a long wait for that to show up.
 
I'm still a rank beginner. My ukes are better than I deserve. I aspire to be worthy of them some day.

I took my family to Maui. My daughter begged and begged for a ukulele we saw in a small shop. I finally relented and bought her a little mahogany soprano, very inexpensive, and a book. However, no one in my house had any musical education of any kind, and the thing didn't play itself, so it kind of went no where.

Fast forward two years to about 10 months ago. I took the uke out of my daughter's closet and decided to play it myself, starting with page one of the beginner uke book. Every time I'd get it out, my other daughter would take it away from me. She was much more adept at it than me. Between that and that I struggled with the tiny scale, I decided to get myself a concert so we could both play. As I shopped (and shopped and shopped) for one, my expectations re quality and sound grew and grew until I doubled my budget and got a beautiful Ohana that just struck a chord in me (pun not intended). I also tossed the crummy plastic nut and saddle on the soprano and replaced them with bone. Much nicer! Surprisingly, it's a pretty nice little uke.

My daughter hasn't so much lost interest as she feels kind of intimidated by playing chords, even simple ones. (She likes to pluck notes on songs like Love Me Tender and Little Brown jug, stuff like that). I haven't been able to find her a ukulele teacher close by, but I'd like to. Myself, someone made me an offer I couldn't refuse last spring on a guitar and I kind of veered off in that direction. So now, I can't really play either, LOL.

As you might guess by my presence here, my interest in learning the uke has been rekindled, and I just bought two Pono's in the last two weeks. (Is there a cure for UAD/UAS?) Now I'm starting from scratch with the Ukulele Boot Camp exercises (it's easier this time around), and my daughter is getting out her soprano a little in response. So, there's hope!

Normagal, are you sure you wanted to hear this story? LOL
 
I am loving everyone's stories. Kaisersoza-I can't believe how you have come so far in such a short time!

I really don't have a clue where I am headed with this. I need to make contact again with someone we know that plays in a string band. He mentioned wanting to get together, but I don't know him all that well and am feeling shy about calling. I wish there was a local club-that would be ideal.

I am very grateful to have found this forum and all of you with your excellent advice.
 
I am enjoying reading your replies. Mandalyn-I would love to hear how you are using the Uke to teach the kids. I am always looking for ways to teach/entertain my grands. Are your pre k kids actually learning how to play it? As far as I have gotten with my girls is teaching them the string names and the C chord. That's with the 7 year old. There are 3 girls-7,5 and 3.

I do not get to teach the kids how to play the uke in pre-k. I use it in different learning activities. They really like to do movement with music. Recently I have started playing with nursery rhymes and the kids love it. I really want to do fairy tales with music. I also do latch key after school. The kids are allowed to play my ukulele. I just show them how to hold it and where to strum it. After a while they start asking how to play a song. Since I cannot spend my day with just that kid, I show one chord and have them practice it. I have a few kids that know 4 chords and like to show others how to play. If more kids become interested in ukulele, I would love to give lessons. I have had a parent ask me about it, but the kid wants to play trumpet.
 
I'm curious...when you started out, what were your plans for playing, or your goals? Did you have serious intentions of working a lot at it and getting really good? Was it something you just wanted to do and had no idea where it would lead? Do you get together and play with others?

Or if you are still a beginner, what are our plans? Are you teaching yourself? Are you taking lessons on line or in person?

Tell me all about your uke playing.

Looking for more life balance and what makes me really happy, I realized I haven't made music since after high school. I was a percussionist for 8 years, drum major, in drum corps, etc. I had bought a piano once but got bored and gave it away. Based on that, and fiddling around with my daughter's guitar, I decided I wanted something small, portable, easy, and pleasing to the ear. It was either uke or mandolin, and while I like the look of mandolins I found picks and many strings to be intimidating, plus I don't like the sound solo.

I think picking up a basic level of proficiency was pretty easy because I have good rhythm and can read music. I really lack at fingerpicking and any improv type stuff. I am a straight up chord strummer and I'm okay with that. I even went to UWC and played twice solo on stage.

There was a very inactive uke club in my town, so after six months I started my own club, and it is doing pretty well, I think. I like playing with others. I like the social aspect of it. I jam with others OFTEN! :) Michigan has a very active uke community.

I work with disabled adults and had thought learning uke would be fun for them. However, time proved that while a couple of them will sing with me, most are more interested in television!

I took about three Skype lessons, I think. I think if I was more focused it could have been productive, but I lack that focus at this point in my life. Maybe in a while. In fact, I'm even waiting to take UU+ till I can devote some real time and attention to it.

I do have carpal tunnel and tendinitis and they have flared up a lot this year, so I have had to cut down on my playing a lot. Now I only play about 2-3 days a week, 2 hrs with a lot of breaks.

Over time enough people have commented (nicely) on my singing that I started to want to develop my voice, so now I've joined the Sweet Adelines to learn more about vocal performance.

So I'm alternating between singing and singing/playing and enjoying myself a lot.
 
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At first, I thought I was only going to play the ukulele just for fun, like just messing around with chords and melodies and stuff while someone else sang. I took lessons from Roy Sakuma for eight years, and the atmosphere was really laid back. Every year, there's this ukulele festival at Waikiki. I honestly never believed I could play as well as some the guest performers there (Jake Shimabukuro, James Hill, Kalei Gamiao).

The turning point for me was when I listened to Jake's Blue Roses Falling. That song kinda motivated me to take the uke more seriously. So, I started by trying to play this song as close to the original as possible. I trained my music ear to translate the song into chords and notes, and I watched a ton of videos on youtube to try to get the playing techniques down. I remember typing the term "ringing bell sound on the 12th fret" the first time I tried to search for artificial harmonics lol

Eventually, I got the song close enough (imo), so I worked on some other songs. That got boring super quickly, so I tried learning how to improvise. I watched a ton of music theory videos from this guy and practiced improvising over songs on the radio. I still suck, but whatevvs

Then, I got interested in Sungha Jung's playing style (dat right hand wizardry that can combine rhythm and chords with his melodies). So, I tried learning from watching him play. And it's frikkin hard.

I don't think I'll ever stop playing ukulele because it's awesome liddat. And as for skill, I'm gonna say that I'm definitely not a beginner. On the flipside, I can't sing xD
 
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I'm in an extremely stressful profession, and play and sometimes arrange to unwind after hours. My current project is a take on The look of love, I'm working it up from a lead sheet.

I originally picked up a uke because my clarinet is just too loud for after midnight, but now I like it because its such a cool instrument in its own way. I like jazz and jazz theory, American standards, bossa nova, and am not a fan of tin pan alley or any of the more traditional sounds and uses of the uke. Of course I wind up playing all that because I sometimes play with a guitarist friend and with the local uke club. I'm switching over to a baritone as my primary instrument, so I imagine eventually I'll wind up playing jazz guitar.

At the end of the day, I'm just playing for myself.
 
First off it is wonderful you are sharing music with your grandchildren.

I started playing to fill the void of no music. I have always been very involved with music growing up. Starting with choir, then trumpet, then college ensembles. I found myself at 20 years old, working 2 jobs, and for the first time, no music to look forward to. I find playing trumpet alone unsatisfying. I have a friend who bought a Luna guitar. I was browsing their site and saw their ukuleles. The more I read about ukes, the more I wanted one. I bought a Luna and became hooked.



Fast Forward 1 year and 1/2...

Still obsessed. I am now a full time pre-k teacher and I am finding more ways to use ukulele in the classroom each day. I have a student who got a ukulele and wants to be like me. [so cute :D] So many kids want to play my ukulele we have a sign up list for it each day.

I have emailed 7 people this week about starting ukulele/ recruiting for uke club. I am in the Dayton uke club.

I went to a uke gathering in September and I am going to The Tampa Bay Ukulele Getaway in a few weeks.

My 12 year old cousin plays ukulele and I work with her every week.

One of my ukes is on loan to a friend and I am considering loaning out a second one.
I got to see Jake Shimabukuro and The UOGB live.

I am trying to be brief, but ukulele is such a big part of my life. I am excited to see people around me showing interest and I cannot wait to see what happens next. I could blab about this all day. :D

Hi Mandalyn, I too got to go see the UOoGB and Jake! I will be at the Tampa Bay Ukulele Society Getaway too! I hope we get to meet. I am such a big ukulelegeek!
I started out playing just for fun, then decided it might be nice to try and play for my patients and their families (I'm a hospice nurse). Now I'm the "unofficial music therapist" and I tell people I'm a music therapist disguised as a nurse... I have the coolest job and the coolest hobby!
 
Still very much a novice and my progress is slow.

I started playing playing the ukulele about 6 months or so ago. I had been playing the bodhran for quite a few years but then i got talking to a ukulele player at a local folk festival and got hooked.

Being disabled following a stroke means that i spend a great deal of my time housebound and music stops me from going 'stir crazy'. The ukulele has come to be a big part of my life and i play for a couple of hours just about every day. My goal is to be able to take my ukulele to the festival next year and join in a session or two. I know that I may never be a very proficient player but the ukulele is just such an easy instrument to pick up and play and is very addictive.

My young grandson has also taken to the ukulele and one of the great joys in my life is playing ukulele with him.
 
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