Transposing for newbies...

Firstly, apologies to anyone who clicked on here thinking it was a guide, it's a request... Check back after a few replies though & hopefully there'll be some useful info here!?

So sorry if this has already been covered a million times, I'm not a newbie to uke but transposing has always baffled & scared me so I've steered clear thus far.

Basically just want to be able to play songs I may have in my guitar books on the uke & vice versa but obviously guitar is tuned to E & uke to C so need to learn how to transpose both ways?

Also, I need to know how to transpose from E to D (banjo uke) & vice versa, and C to D (uke to banjo uke).

Please provide as much info & detail as possible but try to keep it simple & easy to follow... Big ask I know!? Hopefully this thread can not only benefit me, but plenty of other users too!

Cheers guys...

If a song calls for a "c" chord on a guitar, it's still a "c" chord on the ukulele. They are just fingered differently. A "c" chord is a "c" chord no matter what instrument it is played on.

I hope this helps and that I understood your question correctly.

A C is a C yes, provided the instruments are tuned to the same key. As uke, guitar & banjo uke are all tuned differently you have to step up & step down the scales etc... Tones & semi tones & all that if I remember correctly?

To put it simply, a C on a standard tuned uke is not a C on a uke tuned to D. Same fingering position but it now becomes a D...

Me and my uncle did this thing for making guitar chords into ukulele chords I'm pretty sure it's not technically right however it sounded right to me. I told him that the A chord on the ukulele sounded like the E chord on the guitar. So from guitar to ukulele it goes
Guitar: E, F#,G
Ukulele:A, B, C etc.

Hope this helps

Sounds like you've confusing a few different issues here.
Typically, ukuleles and guitars are all tuned at concert pitch. This means that when you play a C on your uke, it's going to sound like a C on the guitar; the same goes for chords. Carol was quite right in saying that no transposing is needed if you are just reading chords from a book.

The only time when you will need to transpose on the fly is when you are playing an instrument that is not at concert pitch. Generally, the only instruments that are not at concert pitch are band instruments like brass and woodwinds. However, many ukulele players, myself including, tune their different ukuleles at different (from concert) pitches to better suit either the size or style of the instrument.
When you say that you banjo-uke is tuned in D, you indicate to me that the concert pitches of the strings 4 through 1 are: ADF#B. I'm guessing that, the chord shape you call a "C" on your regular uke, you still call a "C" on your banjo-uke. This means that if you want things to sound at the same pitch on your banjo-uke, you'll need to transpose everything down one tone (i.e.: when you're playing the banjo-uke and you see a C chord, you'll play it as a Bb chord; a G chord will become F; a D chord will become a C; etc.).

I hope this is a somewhat helpful explanation. If I get my act together (and decide I don't want to do any more work today) i'll maybe make a quick video to demonstrate.

rock_and_roll_camera said:

A C is a C yes, provided the instruments are tuned to the same key. As uke, guitar & banjo uke are all tuned differently you have to step up & step down the scales etc... Tones & semi tones & all that if I remember correctly?

Click to expand...

Ukulele and guitar are absolutely in the same key; I believe that banjo is as well. The strings on a guitar are: EADGBE; the strings on a standard uke are: GCEA; the strings on a 5-string banjo are: GDGBD.
The G strings on each of these instruments sound exactly the same. The D strings on the guitar and banjo sound the same. The E strings on the guitar and uke sound the same. If I play a C chord on ukulele and a C chord on guitar, they will sound the same. It can be confusing since some of the chord shapes are very similar, particularly between guitar and uke. Don't be a confused: a chord shape has nothing to do with the actual chord and notes that get produced.

To put it simply, a C on a standard tuned uke is not a C on a uke tuned to D. Same fingering position but it now becomes a D...

Click to expand...

This statement is absolutely correct. As I mentioned in my previous post, you will need to transpose everything played on your D-tuned uke down one whole tone so that it lines up with the standard tuning (i.e.: concert pitch).

rock_and_roll_camera said:

A C is a C yes, provided the instruments are tuned to the same key. As uke, guitar & banjo uke are all tuned differently you have to step up & step down the scales etc... Tones & semi tones & all that if I remember correctly?

To put it simply, a C on a standard tuned uke is not a C on a uke tuned to D. Same fingering position but it now becomes a D...

Click to expand...

no offense intended, but when you play an open C string, you hear a C note. when you play the corresponding open string on an instrument tuned to D, do you expect to hear a C note or a D note?
instruments that are tuned differently utilize different chord shapes to play the same chord. that's just the way it is.
sure, it can get confusing when you're playing multiple instruments with different tunings, but there's not much you can do about it. if you want all of your instruments to use the same chord shapes, you'll have to tune all of them the same way.