Learning to play and whistle all the Beatles songs

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Hi! Nice name of this blog subforum...!

My intention is to do this: first learn these eight chords by heart: https://ukulele-chords.com/charts/must-know-ukulele-chords-soprano.pdf, I'm on my way. Then learn these 96 chords: https://ukulele-chords.com/charts/common-ukulele-chords-soprano.pdf, should be enough?

Then learn to play and whistle all the Beatles songs, and post the soundtracks/videos here. Why whistle? It's a bit special, and maybe there aren't much around?

My background: https://forum.ukuleleunderground.com/showthread.php?127097-Hi-there! Joined one and a half year ago, things got in between, think I'm serious now!
 
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I think learning the 8+96 chords is inefficient based on your goal. I would just start. Go to "A Day in the Life" and get the 12 or so chords you need. Perfect it, and then go to "A Hard Day's Night" and learn its chords. If you wait to learn those 104 chords before you even start, it will take forever. However, if you just start at the beginning of the catalog and work your way through it, you will gain a lot of experience with maj7's, minors, minor 7's, etc, as you go. By the time you reach songs starting with the letter B you will have a lot of experience.
 
Thanks, but I love the chords themselves. Just trying them out, learn and listen. The Beatles probably sneaks in with time. Must also learn how to make the youtubes. Until then will have to be content with reporting verbally, maybe better so, some quality wouldn't hurt before posting the tracks/vids!

I'd like to just take up the uke, and immediately know the chords in the songs. Having to look them up every time breaks the flow, imo. So will do the basic work thoroughly, a bit like you.
 
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I am glad you said it. I was just trying to appear open-minded and supportive but by my nature I am more of a chord-collector myself but I didn't want to impose my methodology on this conversation. When I started ukulele, I didn't learn songs, I learned chord voicings: all the major chords, all the minor chords, all the dominant 7 chords, all the minor dominant 7 chords. To me, that was the basics. Then I learned other things that seemed necessary for jazz like maj7 chords and diminished chords.

So I agree with your choice, but most people would consider us unorthodox. Enjoy your journey
 
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You are very lucky having access to Michelle Kiba's content.

Here is what is in my homemade ukulele book:

1. modes
2. pentatonic shapes
3. major and minor 6 chords
4. maj7 and min maj7
5. 7b5
6. 9 chords
7. dim and aug chords
8. sus2 and sus4
9, maj, min, 7, and m7 chords

You'll notice that your curriculum and what I made up is almost identical. However, it is already laid out for you. I had to screw things up and struggle to get it all together and get it accurate. You are set up for success.
 
So, now I know the first 8, included the "dreaded" E-chord. Next will try to learn all the major-major7-minor-minor7s, that's 4x12 -8 = 40 "new" chords. Will not be enough, but it'll be a start, will take some time, don't really know how long. Then could try out my favorite Beatles songs and see what's missing. Will be good practice to switch between the chords too.
 
Of course just practicing a few chords would be boring. The biggest part of my sessions seem to be this: using my right thumb flesh part, trying out every conceivable chord there is without guidelines, listening, absorbing. That develops muscle memory also. Can do this any time, day or night, with this technique the sound is not too loud. Then I also look up and learn the "official" chords, which will enable me to play actual songs, but that's not quite as fun, so be it. It will be fun later, when mastering them.
 
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Just using the mouth. Honestly don't think I'm very bad at it :eek:
 
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Started with checking out the first song in my e-book "The Beatles for Fingerstyle Ukulele" by Hal Leonard: Can't Buy Me Love. The major-minors (7) look to be enough until...Gm11 ! The "complete" ukulele charts on the internet don't show it. But here it is: https://riffspot.com/chords/ukulele/ (29 chords for every key!) The Gm11 versions in there don't cover the one in the e-book though. A wide landscape is opening up…

Then there are the (6) chords, also look to be standard, better learn them.

Edit: the next song, Across the Universe, contains variations of the (9) chords and so on. A long and winding road...have apparently not chosen the easiest start, but at least I know and like the songs!

This may be my ultimate standard chord chart, the goal would be to know them all, 15 different per key: https://ukuchords.com/files/UkuChords_Complete180ChordChartsPDF_Standard.pdf?x65827. You will have to draw a fuzzy line somewhere.
 
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Found this: https://ukutabs.com/t/the-beatles/across-the-universe/. I'm already doing it, playing and whistling. You can train chords also as a parallel process. Now will try to find out how to post youtubes, and you will get the first version (to be improved!). It can take days to weeks (months), have to feel it's ready enough anyway.

You've got to have some standards, as long as they aren't too high!
 
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Now think its time to just play the chords in the songs, and get the transitions smooth. So the five chords in Eleanor Rigby, going between them in different orders, until they become second nature...
 
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Will try to also develop the video part of my uke-whistling tracks. In the testing video I used the cell phone video recorder, camera downwards, meaning...black. Will have to get suitable photos/clips matched into the videos. Why not filming me? You know, screen name, not totally public real life. Maybe more importantly though, showing my face whistling probably would look stupid or at least too undynamic. And just showing the uke and the hands...no, what is that to show?

So when getting to New York, New York by Frankie, I will get in some nice pictures of the city.
 
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I seem to train chords like this: have the print with 15 chords of each key, then I just pick one key and go through all the 15 chords. Think you ripock trained specific chords in every key, starting with all the minors. We all need to find a way that suits us, as long as we are doing something…

Anyhow I think it's good to get the potential to play every chord cleanly.
 
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Things are going forward, I can play the 180 chords if trying hard enough. Got a vision to do this: will learn to play the 15 chords in 12 keys in three minutes, one chord per second, and then post a soundclip when being able to do it nicely. Then I'd have the fretting technique at least somehow in place.

This could take even months, don't know, let's see!
 
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I seem to train chords like this: have the print with 15 chords of each key, then I just pick one key and go through all the 15 chords. Think you ripock trained specific chords in every key, starting with all the minors. We all need to find a way that suits us, as long as we are doing something…

Anyhow I think it's good to get the potential to play every chord cleanly.

Yeah, that's my methodology. I'll take a certain chord quality, like a maj7 or a m7b5, and learn it for all keys. However, lately I have been focusing on one key, E, and playing progressions in E, playing all the modes of E, using those modes to make new harmonizations for new progressions, playing the blues in E using all the pentatonic shapes in E, etc. But I couldn't do the specific work in E if I didn't know all my other keys. For example, I really like to groove on an E minor Harmonic progression: E minor, B7, A minor, D# dim. Obviously you need to know your minor qualities, your dominant 7s and your diminished.
 
I don't know why I'm jumping into this thread as I do not have much to contribute. I am not a chord collector. But I'm a singer first, ukulele player for accompaniment, and sometimes if I'm trying to learn a new song I'll try whistling it before singing it. Seems to be a good intermediate step for me if a song is problematic.
 
I've been an avid "whistler" for most of my life. When I get separated from my wife in a busy store, she just keeps her ears open...like as not, I'm whistling some tune.
OP, have you taught yourself to whistle while inhaling? I trained myself to do that when I was a kid for some reason....It really helps to be able to breathe in and out while whistling.
 
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