Recommendations for fingerstyle songs

remy26

remy26

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Whatcha got for a beginner?

I'm working on my strumming, but I like to mix it up a bit in between for some variety. So far, I've got a couple of easy ones down (Silent Night, Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star) and I'm working on a couple that are a little more difficult for me (Stairway to Heaven, Halllelujah). What else do you recommend for a beginner that isn't too difficult but will make me stretch a bit?
 
give mark nelsons fingerstyle book a try, i have just bought it and find it handy to change to from strumming
 
wallyboy said:
give mark nelsons fingerstyle book a try, i have just bought it and find it handy to change to from strumming
Click to expand...

I second that. I have that book and am working through it. I'm only up to "All Through the Night," but have found it very rewarding.

Also, "From Lute to Uke" is a great book.
 
Thanks for the recs so far. Just to make sure that I'm looking at the right one, is it "Mel Bay Learn To Play Fingerstyle Solos for Ukulele"

Thanks again! Keep 'em coming if you have more!
 
I ordered that finger style book and its arriving tomorrow :D I've got a week off work next week, something to keep me occupied. Looking forward to it arriving after hearing it recommended several times on this site. On amazon UK though its got less than 20 reviews, if you guys haven't already leave it a review as I discounted it when it was first suggested to me by amazon as it didn't seem that popular.
 
Check out Ken Middleton's tabs. Google them. I am not a computer guru. Sorry
 
remy26 said:
Whatcha got for a beginner?

I'm working on my strumming, but I like to mix it up a bit in between for some variety. So far, I've got a couple of easy ones down (Silent Night, Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star) and I'm working on a couple that are a little more difficult for me (Stairway to Heaven, Halllelujah). What else do you recommend for a beginner that isn't too difficult but will make me stretch a bit?
Click to expand...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-al5oqt3nyM

http://dominator.ukeland.com/Images/no_woman_no_cry.pdf

Please share if you find any good ones.
 
Thanks for the ideas everyone! The Nelson book is ordered and on the way. Now, off to check out some of those other suggestions until it gets here!
 
The right book is the Learn to Play book by Nelson: highly recommended for beginngers to learn fingerstyle. He starts with Twinkle Twinkle and if you perfect his version, you quickly go on to learn many other tunes, including two versions of my fave Kue Morning Dew. Another good fingerstyle book is Twenty Baroque Spanish Pieces by Roy Mackillop. He has a number of fingerstyle books, including a Celtic one as well.
 
The fingerstyle book is good, but I don't like the baroque Spanish book. I bought it and went through the CD to see what songs I was interested in learning, and none were to my taste. That's certainly a matter of opinion, but unfortunately you're unable to preview the song list or the performances before buying.

So unless you know you like baroque Spanish music, I'd avoid that one.

For me, the best books in my collection are the fingerstyle book mentioned twice in this thread already and "From Lute to Uke," (http://amzn.com/1458406512).

Also, another good one with some pretty and fairly easy songs is "Easy Classical Ukulele Solos (http://amzn.com/1461139856). If you start with "In the Hall of the Mountain King" and "Ode to Joy" you'll pick them up really fast and then be ready tackly slightly more challenging ones, such as "Spring (Four Seasons)."
 
OK, I checked out Ken's tabs...very nice selection there. I'll definitely be trying to work through some of those. I'll probably look at the Easy Classical Ukulele solos as well. They have a Kindle version for that which would be handy.

Whew, looks like I have some work to do! (It's not really work when it's fun, is it?) :D
 
I just posted four (very) short videos with songs from two of the books I recommended. This is me playing pretty recently. I haven't been playing very long yet, so if they sound decent then that's a credit to the fact that these are pretty good songs to get started with. I also posted this link to the videos forum, so feel free to leave feedback there.

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLVDo8CJLGYvBmz52_fqHsNBvrBZEozskQ&feature=view_all

Shawn
 
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