Guitalele chords?

I play baritone ukulele, tuned DGBE, using guitar chords. The following instrument,a YAMAHA GL1 GUITALELE (GUITAR UKULELE) is half guitar, half uke! A mini 6-string guitar that is sized like a baritone uke and plays like a standard guitar.

However, the tuning is pitched up a fourth to "A" at A/D/G/C/E/A. I guessit's like having a Capo on the 5th fret.


Question - if I wanted to play with others (as I do) who might be playing a song in D E and A, how do I achieve the same chord sounds as the other band members? Do I simply transpose to G A D and so on?

Cheers

Glynne

New Zealand

well because it is tuned higher your going to have a different sound.

The bet thing would be to study up on chord 'inversions' for the guitar, and find out what chords are at the 5 fret on a standard guitar. the guitarlele is esentialy the same as if you hd a guitar capoed at the 5th fret, this now becoms your open strings.

Stuying the 'caged' pattern can be a big help in this. and this applies to any ukulele with a standard type tuning as well. you are just in a different range of notes and fewer strings

http://www.cagedguitarsystem.net/

I'm working on this too Glynne! I found this chord chart that really helps. Use the same chords as everyone else, but the fingering is as shown on this chart.

http://www.paradiseukes.com/content/free_guitalele_chord_chart.pdf

you highest pitched 4 strings are tuned the same as a soprano ukulele. so you're chords will be very much that same as soprano uke chords with the added 2 low strings of course. your fingering will be the same as a guitar except you'll actually be playing chords a perfect fourth higher than what your guitar chord chart says you're playing. maybe this will help, G stands for guitar chords (left column) and U stands for Uke chords (right column).

G-U
E-A
F-Bb
Gb-B
G-C
Ab-Db
A-D
Bb-Eb
B-E
C-F
Db-Gb
D-G
Eb-Ab

so when your guitar chord chart says DMaj you'll be playing a GMaj on your guitalele. if you want to play an Fmin on your Guitalele look up Cmin on your guitar chord chart. the shapes stay the same for all the types of chords like major minor diminish seventh chords etc... just the spot on the fret board move, like a bar chord. i started out playing Guitar (tuned much like a baritone uke) then went to soprano Ukulele (tuned much like a guitalele). you'll be surprised at how quickly you'll figure out that all of the chord shapes are the same just a perfect 4th higher, i know i was.