Just Ordered a Kala Ka-ATP-CTG.....

FrankB

FrankB

Well-known member
Joined
Jan 7, 2014
Messages
424
Reaction score
0
Location
Suburban Philadelphia
Along with a Stagg tweed case. Looks swank, but I hate buying before trying. I got it off ebay, Pennylanemusicemporium, but they aren't listed as an authorized Kala dealer. Found that out two minutes after sending payment.....DUH! They have a brick and mortar store, so maybe it'll be okay. I could've bought the same uke from HMS for the same price, but thought free shipping was a good deal....DUH AGAIN! :rolleyes:

It's supposed to be here by Wednesday, so I'll update when it arrives.

P.S. I just heard back from the seller, and he said he IS an authorized Kala dealer. He gave me Kala's phone number, and told me to check with them. Now I can dream better tonight... :)
 
Last edited:
FrankB said:
Along with a Stagg tweed case. Looks swank, but I hate buying before trying. I got it off ebay, Pennylanemusicemporium, but they aren't listed as an authorized Kala dealer. Found that out two minutes after sending payment.....DUH! They have a brick and mortar store, so maybe it'll be okay. I could've bought the same uke from HMS for the same price, but thought free shipping was a good deal....DUH AGAIN! :rolleyes:

It's supposed to be here by Wednesday, so I'll update when it arrives.

P.S. I just heard back from the seller, and he said he IS an authorized Kala dealer. He gave me Kala's phone number, and told me to check with them. Now I can dream better tonight... :)
Click to expand...

I've got the same one except it's a concert! I love it!
 
I'm sure it'll be okay. Even straight from the factory, Kala ukuleles are generally alright to play. Atleast in my experiences from local music stores who don't do set ups.
 
The seller had plenty of pics, and it looks fine. Waiting is the worst part. I bought a flamenco guitar about 10 years ago, and even though it was shipped overnight, it was a long wait...LOL!

Kala does provide a list of unauthorized sellers for ebay and Amazon (including counterfeit sellers), and this seller is not on the list. He said he's been an authorized seller for 3 years, so that's good enough for now.
 
The pics may look good, but the action could be really bad. You can always trust HMS to have a great setup which is why the extra shipping wouldn't have been an issue for me. The difference between my setup Uke and my Uke that wasn't set up is insane. Hope you got a good one!
 
Hi Kyle,
I've been doing all the work on my guitars for years: nuts, saddles, fret dressing, and even two stripped and refinished guitars. After my wife brought her new Cordoba 20TM to the office, a colleague asked her if I could dress the frets on his baritone uke. It's a Woods cheapie, but was fun to play with during the snow storm we had earlier this week. I also lowered the action at the nut, and installed end pins for a strap. He's sending his concert uke home with my wife today, for the same treatment (sans end pins). He and my wife are doing a ukelele duet next Thursday for a retiring company Vice President, so I don't mind. It's another Woods, and the baritone was actually quite nice for the price.
 
Update on Penny Lane Music Emporium: I decided to call Kala, and as soon as I mentioned the store's name, the rep said they're an authorized dealer, and she was very familiar with them. Kala needs to update their site...

Is it Wednesday yet? :D
 
Love mine! Installed a preamp and pickup too. Put low G south coast strings on, it really loves them! Wonderful uke! Enjoy!
 
Hi Patrick,
I was browsing the forum a few hours ago, and noticed that you bought the same model back in December.... I think. It looks great, so I can't wait. It's been shipped, but the day it's scheduled to arrive is forecasted to be 15 degrees high, and 0 degrees for the low. I'll have to let it warm up for a while before introducing it to my lovely 17% RH living room. Maybe it's time for a new room humidifier. My other guitars and uke are slurping water from their Oasis humidifiers at an insane rate!

I'll run over to Sam Ash, and see if they have any string sets with a low G. Otherwise I'll put another order in at Strings by Mail.
 
Southcoast strings are sold on their website, just google their name. Easy ordering once you get the hang of their site. I get the Medium weight with wound C & G for the Low G. Wound C mediums for reentrant tuning. They are great strings and I think they sound much better than the aquilas they come with, but I will say, even the aquilas sounded good on this uke! I changed out the nut and saddle for bone and shaped the saddle for better intonation when I installed the pickup.

I try to keep my music room at 47% and up at 68-72 degrees. It's tough when it's 10 or less degrees outside, that room is sucking up the water too!

Post some pics when you get it! Enjoy!
 
Oh Man..... My wife and I stopped at a Sam Ash store this afternoon, and they had the Kala concert size version of the KA ATP CTG. Looked great, sounded awful. Basically, plink, plink, plink, plink awful. It was easily the worst sounding concert uke in the store, and they had plenty. There was a Cordoba 20CM there, and it was light years ahead of this Kala. My wife bought a Cordoba 20TM nearly a month ago, and it's pretty nice. The Kala bridge was lifting a hair along the tie block edge, and bass wing was lifting even more. I play classical and some flamenco, and that uke did not respond to finger style playing. It did respond to strumming with my thumb, but that only brought the tone and volume up to the Cordoba with fingers.

Hopefully this one was bad, or the concert model is not as good as the tenor. I'll be shopping at HMS and UkeRepublic tonight, just in case......
 
flyingace said:
Love mine! Installed a preamp and pickup too. Put low G south coast strings on, it really loves them! Wonderful uke! Enjoy!
Click to expand...

Hi Patrick,
I was about to give up on the Kala: It sounded choked, especially the C and E strings. Thuddy, thumping choked. I came across a thread discussing string tension on lighter/thinner tops in the Tips and Tricks forum, and tuned down one whole step. The Kala suddenly rang out on all four strings, and any thud from the C and E strings disappeared! Volume remained the same, and sustain went through the roof. I ordered some Southcoast light medium strings, and a set of Oasis. Hopefully they'll allow me to play in C, but without driving the thin top too hard.
 
Last edited:
Interesting stuff. I love mine entirely. It's wonderful. I"d be playing nonstop if it wasn't for having a case of Uke Elbow.
 
Captain America said:
Interesting stuff. I love mine entirely. It's wonderful. I"d be playing nonstop if it wasn't for having a case of Uke Elbow.
Click to expand...

It was causing pain in my fretting arm as well, and my wife's Cordoba 20TM had much less string tension. I thought that was strange, since both ukes have the exact same action, and the Cordoba has measurably shorter frets. Maybe a stiffer top doesn't require that the same set of strings be brought to a higher tension to reach pitch. When tuned to C, the Aquilas were much more taut on the Kala. Pushing on the Kala's bridge while plucking open strings eliminated any thuddy tones, and increased sustain. I've used putty on classical guitars to shift (or even eliminate) thuddy notes on a particular string, but the Kala required more pressure on the bridge than a bit of putty would have provided.

Sophie Madeleine tunes her ukes down a whole tone to help playability. She discusses it on one of her you tube videos.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

C
Just ordered first uke - Kala KA-TEM, hopefully done ok.
Replies
11
Views
821
foxfair
foxfair
dredey
OMG!!! I ordered a KAMAKA HF3 and got shipped a KALA KA-SMHT instead!!!
2 3
Replies
45
Views
5K
Trinimon
Trinimon
Chap
Ordered Kala Travel...concert size!
Replies
4
Views
481
Gmoney
Gmoney
J
Kala Acacia Tenor - Just Ordered
Replies
17
Views
2K
rogue_wave
rogue_wave
SamWise
Ordered a Kala Archtop
Replies
2
Views
373
Link
Link
Top Bottom