It must be baritone season! Do you play baritone?

Uke Republic

Uke Republic

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Over the last few months we have seen a lot more interest in baritones again. As a ukulele shop we have seen it before but maybe it's here to stay this time. The interesting thing is more makers are offering more variety.
The Daily Ukulele Bari edition is also another testimony of the growing popularity of the bari. At any rate they are lots of fun. So do you play baritone and if so do you play it gCEA or DGBE ?

Ahh it's such a bari beautiful ting! :D
 
I enjoy my baritone. I usually have it in DGBE tuning, but some dealers asked about making a GCEA set for it, so I have had it in that. I will probably bring it into the office tomorrow and see how a dGBE set would sound, as I had a lot of requests for that at the Mighty Uke Day this past weekend.
 
Definitely love my bari's. They're all strung DGBE. I also have a very sweet tenor. For a while it was strung reentrant gcea but I switched to a low g string. Love the bass emphasis. I probably play the baritones 80-90 percent of the time. The tenor does sound better on some of the "beach" type songs, though.
 
I love my baritone (which I tune high d, but have a low g on my littler ukes - go figure), but really want a nice tenor someday soon.
 
Definitely love the Bari, especially after switching the 3rd & 4th strings on the RipTide UB-2N to non-wound Aquila Reds (73U & 74U).
The wounds were too metallic sounding on it for me, but I did experiment with some concerts at CGEA & it was lovely, but not a baritone anymore. It is more balanced & to my tastes now. The Kala with Nylguts booms a little, but it gives me variety. :)
 
Love my Pono MBD tuned to DGBE.
 
I have several baritone ukuleles, including an 8-string. I really like the deeper voice. Maybe this is related to the growing popularity of the baritone, but Kala is launching a tenor (4 string) guitar sometime later this year. My own tenor guitar, a Blueridge steel string, is tuned DGBE (aka Chicago tuning), so I can play it the way I'd play a baritone ukulele.
 
I have one, it was my second Ukulele. It has the standard Bari tuning. I ADORE IT! I don't play it a lot because I have learned regular ukulele chords and its confusing to try to switch to pseudo guitar chords being so new to learning stringed instruments I just play my standard ukulele chords on my bari for fun and don't try to learn songs for it because the chord changes will confuse me!

I love my bari best!! tempted sometimes to ditch regular uke for it :)
 
Uke Republic said:
Over the last few months we have seen a lot more interest in baritones again. As a ukulele shop we have seen it before but maybe it's here to stay this time. The interesting thing is more makers are offering more variety.
The Daily Ukulele Bari edition is also another testimony of the growing popularity of the bari. At any rate they are lots of fun. So do you play baritone and if so do you play it gCEA or DGBE ?

Ahh it's such a bari beautiful ting! :D
Click to expand...
My first uke was a baritone, play it DGBE. Still play it all the time. I always wondered, what is the difference between a baritone uke an Tenor Guitar?
 
Ukuleleblues said:
My first uke was a baritone, play it DGBE. Still play it all the time. I always wondered, what is the difference between a baritone uke an Tenor Guitar?
Click to expand...

Tenor guitar has a 3" longer scale and steel strings, typically.

I play a good deal more baritone than I ever thought I would, but I've been teetering on the "commit to bari" fence for months.
 
Tenor guitar tuning is normally in 5ths CGDA (same as tenor banjo) but they work great with DGBE tuning.
 
I own a couple of solid mahogany baris. They came with (allegedly) Aquilas. From the get-go, neither of them had any cutting power whatsoever. Neither of them sounded like a uke. Neither of them sounded like a guitar. They both just sounded blah.

I restrung one to GCEA. Thus I was able to transform a listless bari into a listless tenor.

I re-tuned the other to linear A. No improvement whatsoever.

I find my baris are a joy to play (just not a joy to hear). When I play either of them, my cat Tora runs out of the room.

I suppose I shall try switching one of them to new/different strings, but I fear doing so will be like dressing a pig in an evening gown. Maybe I should just give them to people that I don't really like all that much.
 
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I play the baritone a good bit. Mine is an Oceana, made at the time in Ecuador. I play all sorts of stuff on it, but I really like playing classical things as it is somewhat reminiscent of a baroque guitar.

Jon
 
Baritones are awesome!

My husband's old mahogany baritone had been living with his sister in NM, but is now in my dining room, getting some TLC. (The desert air has been unkind to it.) It's tuned DGBE.

I got it for Rich years ago, and it's nice to have it back. While we both loved the sound, it turned out to be too big for playing in the cockpit of our sailboat. (The headstock hit the bimini pole. D'oh.) We got him set up with a dGBE tenor and he found it to be a perfect fit.
 
Ukuleleblues said:
My first uke was a baritone, play it DGBE. Still play it all the time. I always wondered, what is the difference between a baritone uke an Tenor Guitar?
Click to expand...

For an interesting discussion on the differences between a baritone ukulele and a tenor guitar (and to see how blurry the lines can be) check out this thread: http://forum.ukuleleunderground.com/showthread.php?94877-Octave-Ukulele

bellgamin said:
I own a couple of solid mahogany baris. They came with (allegedly) Aquilas. From the get-go, neither of them had any cutting power whatsoever. Neither of them sounded like a uke. Neither of them sounded like a guitar. They both just sounded blah.

I restrung one to GCEA. Thus I was able to transform a listless bari into a listless tenor.

I re-tuned the other to linear A. No improvement whatsoever.

I find my baris are a joy to play (just not a joy to hear). When I play either of them, my cat Tora runs out of the room.

I suppose I shall try switching one of them to new/different strings, but I fear doing so will be like dressing a pig in an evening gown. Maybe I should just give them to people that I don't really like all that much.
Click to expand...

Try fouorocarbon strings, like Worths or Living Waters, or get Southcoast strings. Depending on the ukes themselves, strings can transform listless sounding ukes into beautiful instruments.
 
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I really enjoy my Kamaka Baritone tuned to a linear C (low G). The standard baritone tuning sounded too much
like a guitar. I didn't want a guitar I wanted a uke. Using SC LL NW's, they can be mellow and they can wail. The best of both worlds.
 
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I have nothing against baritone ukes, but doubt I'll ever own one. 30+ years on the guitar with poor posture and technique led to a nasty case of carpal tunnel and who knows what else. I can't play anymore for more than 30 minutes without my fingers going numb. Enter tenor ukulele…life got better, I could play for extended periods of time and still found plenty of room to move about the fretboard. Another year or so in and I found that the soprano uke allows me unlimited play and the fretboard seems quite generous now. I'll enjoy bari's with my ears and eyes, but if I bought one, it would probably take up residence next to my unplayed U-Bass.
 
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