Epiphone Hummingbird Tenor Ukulele - REVIEW

bazmaz

Well-known member
Joined
Sep 5, 2009
Messages
5,522
Reaction score
991
Location
UK
I always find the guitar copies kind of odd. I am not sure if the idea is to appeal to guitar players or to uke players who are insecure about not playing guitar. I am sure it appeals to many.
 
Neato, Baz. There was a rumor flying around a while back that Gibson was gonna produce another uke.
 
Just wish they'd produce a higher end model. They used to do a Masterbilt Epiphone and by all accounts it was superb.
 
To me, in the end it’s all about the sound. Kamara make a concert with a sort of guitar shape. I have np problem with either. I’d would like to have heard this ukulele played with some nice flurocarbon string and perhaps a good set up. I bet is would sound and sustain much better. That being said, one of the faults of guitar builders making a Uke is they over build. So, comment on thickness of gloss, well noted. I’d hope builder would pay attention to top thickness, making a lighter build, shipping with better strings. They could have something here if they paid attention. I don’t like the scratch plate. Not needed on a Uke and who are we kidding .....it’s not a hummingbird guitar.... more inspired by. Good review. I’d love to try on with better strings and a good set up. Super heavy gloss finish not necessary.
 
Thanks for the review Baz!

I am a fan of both Gibson and Epiphone for their guitars, but really wish they would do something more innovative instead of just copying the guitar shapes and scaling them down.
 
i would just plug it into an amp, and the issues with sustain and sound volume go away.
Some ukes are designed to be used with an amp, I suspect this model is one of them. I would recommend against buying it if you like to play in the lounge watching TV with no amplification, the review has identified some issues which would annoy you if thats how you play the uke. BazMaz likes the way he plays his ukes and he writes great reviews, but his reviews are about how he uses his ukes, which seems to be mostly unamplified.
If you are going to play the Hummingbird at a venue with amplification to a large crowd, possibly using a plastic pick, I think it will probably do a lot better than many other ukes in that price range. Today in Australia it is retail at around AU$360.

Wrong actually - I play both - when I want to go electric i own a couple of solid body electrics for that purpose. I also quite fancy one of the UFOS from Italy.

I also have electro acoustics which I sometimes plug in and sometimes don't - in fact I usually fit passive pickups to most of my acoustics as a matter of course. The reason I rarely plug them in on videos is because I can't give a representative sound - Depends on what amp you use. I DO play electric though. Often.

I don't believe Epiphone built this to be electric only. This is a standard ukulele build, and if you read the review there is no real issue with volume, only sustain. I am 100% sure that a string change will alleviate that point quite a bit. The Les Paul on the other hand - yes, that was designed to be an electric, which was one of the reasons I still have no clue why they put a pointless sound chamber in it. This is different though.
 
Thanks for the review Baz!

I am a fan of both Gibson and Epiphone for their guitars, but really wish they would do something more innovative instead of just copying the guitar shapes and scaling them down.


That's my gripe - I so wish they went back to making the Masterbilt ukulele - they were supposed to be excellent. They CAN do it!
 
Top Bottom