Tuning baritone strings up one full step - bad idea?

mds725

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So I've learned to play "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas" on my baritone ukes in the key of G (what would be C chord shapes on an ukulele tuned GCEA), but that key is just a bit low for my voice and I would prefer to sing this song in the key of A. I know I could use a capo at the first fret, but I'm wondering if it would damage the strings or the ukuleles to tune up one full step from DGBE. Would that put too much tension on the necks or the bridge or cause other problems? My baritones are a Pono mahogany, a Kamaka and a Mya-Moe, all with the strings they came with. Any thoughts? Thanks!
 
I wouldn't expect it to damage the uke unless you are already using higher than normal tension strings. I think I would experiment on the Pono, not just because it's the least expensive but because it's got a pretty beefy neck and an adjustable truss rod (don't know the other ukes well enough to know what the necks are like). For example, my Mainland baritone is strung with some rather heavy fluorocarbon strings and a very heavy wound guitar string for the D (was all fluorocarbon reentrant but I'm experimenting with some strings). The tension is noticeably higher than the Ko'Olau strings on my Pono so I don't think I'd raise that one up. The strings are floppy enough on the Pono that I wouldn't hesitate to crank it up a step, though.

Doing this may or may not sound good and intonate well depending on a ton of factors.

John
 
I sometimes tune my baritone ukulele's up one SEMI-tone to D#, G#, C, F without any issue. To go up 2 semi-tones to E, A, C#, F# I would use a capo.

Anthony
 
Thanks for the responses!
. I'm going to try tuning my baritone up one semi-tone to see if that's enough of a change to accommodate my voice. I'm not fond of capos but that may be an alternative if one semi-tone isn't enough to get my voice to reach the low notes.
 
What I find with capo's is that I need to retune the instrument after fitting a capo so I always do. If you tune without a capo and then fit one then yes it will sound out of tune because it is. Fit capo and tune. Usually its best to go under pitch and then bring the pitch back up.

Anthony
 
So I've learned to play "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas" on my baritone ukes in the key of G (what would be C chord shapes on an ukulele tuned GCEA), but that key is just a bit low for my voice and I would prefer to sing this song in the key of A. I know I could use a capo at the first fret, but I'm wondering if it would damage the strings or the ukuleles to tune up one full step from DGBE. Would that put too much tension on the necks or the bridge or cause other problems? My baritones are a Pono mahogany, a Kamaka and a Mya-Moe, all with the strings they came with. Any thoughts? Thanks!

Talk to Southcoast strings, Dirk will give you all sorts of ideas and reasons why you should retune your baritone up a few tones and then sell you some appropriate strings. Mmmmmm....flatwounds.
 
You don't mention if you are using a linear or rentrant 4th string. I play in linear and wrote Dirk a few days ago looking for a set of strings in linear G tuning. This is what he wrote back about tunings in linear(low 4th string). That man is amazing. I learn something from him everytime I get a message back.

From Dirk:
Just coming up for air – have been in “lockdown” trying to get this website (and all the new strings & accessories) ready to go. Man, will I be glad when it’s done!

My original goal was to have it up tomorrow – the “revised” goal is for the end of this week.

There haven’t been many changes in the Linear sets (as opposed to the reentrants where there are lots!). The names have changed as you noted. However we’ve never made a linear set heavy enough to give G tuning on a Baritone. We have no plans for one either, as in spite of the fact that the Baritone was “designed” (I use the term loosely) for that tuning – sound was not a primary element in that design. The primary goal was to produce a little “trainer guitar” for youngsters whose hands weren’t big enough for 6 strings.

As a result, the body resonates at d# - too high to give proper resonance to a d string. No string material will ever change the acoustics of that situation, so we won’t go there. The new site will have 4 options for reentrant G tuning @20” – two tensions, each with the option of a wound 3rd. If you want to stick to linear, then A tuning or B flat is all we can give you @ 20”.
 
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