KoaKat
Active member
Hello, everyone. I’ve been lurking for a few weeks and decided to introduce myself. My name is Kathy. I am probably one of the oldest members of this forum and the least experienced. I started teaching myself ukulele a month ago.
Last Christmas I gave my niece a kalimba and decided to get one for myself, as well. I have close to zero musical ability but the kalimba sounded so lovely and seemed to be fairly easy to learn. Within a few weeks I had four kalimbas and was playing every day (just for my own enjoyment).
One day I was looking at kalimbas on the Bondi site (because of course FOUR kalimbas was not enough) and started looking at their ukuleles. I fell in love with two of them — a spalted mango and a koa. I thought, “Wow, if I learn to play ukulele I can buy one of those!” So I did some research and bought a concert-size Enya Nova (flowered! so pretty!) and started watching YouTube videos.
As some of you may know, the Enya has a slightly narrower neck than average. Unfortunately, I have short chunky fingers. I also have crooked little fingers. They look like they were broken and healed without being set properly but, in fact, I was born with them. As a result, I was struggling with some of the chords. I had trouble keeping my fat fingers in the little spaces and also had trouble reaching far enough to play some chords.
After more research, I decided that a soprano with a wide neck might work better for me. I found a cheap ($35 with shipping) wide neck Mahalo Kahiko and it arrived yesterday. I know it is a crappy instrument, even as cheap beginner instruments go, but I decided for 35 bucks I would take a chance. If it didn’t help, I would pass it along to my grandson.
Well, that cheap little thing fits my hands! I can now play chords that I can’t play on the Enya. YAY!! One of these days I hope to find a NICE uke with the same dimensions but for now I am a happy camper playing my little Mahalo.
Thanks to everyone who takes the time to contribute information to this site. It is an amazing resource for beginners like me.
kathy
Last Christmas I gave my niece a kalimba and decided to get one for myself, as well. I have close to zero musical ability but the kalimba sounded so lovely and seemed to be fairly easy to learn. Within a few weeks I had four kalimbas and was playing every day (just for my own enjoyment).
One day I was looking at kalimbas on the Bondi site (because of course FOUR kalimbas was not enough) and started looking at their ukuleles. I fell in love with two of them — a spalted mango and a koa. I thought, “Wow, if I learn to play ukulele I can buy one of those!” So I did some research and bought a concert-size Enya Nova (flowered! so pretty!) and started watching YouTube videos.
As some of you may know, the Enya has a slightly narrower neck than average. Unfortunately, I have short chunky fingers. I also have crooked little fingers. They look like they were broken and healed without being set properly but, in fact, I was born with them. As a result, I was struggling with some of the chords. I had trouble keeping my fat fingers in the little spaces and also had trouble reaching far enough to play some chords.
After more research, I decided that a soprano with a wide neck might work better for me. I found a cheap ($35 with shipping) wide neck Mahalo Kahiko and it arrived yesterday. I know it is a crappy instrument, even as cheap beginner instruments go, but I decided for 35 bucks I would take a chance. If it didn’t help, I would pass it along to my grandson.
Well, that cheap little thing fits my hands! I can now play chords that I can’t play on the Enya. YAY!! One of these days I hope to find a NICE uke with the same dimensions but for now I am a happy camper playing my little Mahalo.
Thanks to everyone who takes the time to contribute information to this site. It is an amazing resource for beginners like me.
kathy
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