Hal Leonard Easy Songs for Ukulele

ohmless

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Cover: http://images.thomann.de/pics/prod/232271.jpg

Song list: http://www.di-arezzo.co.uk/multimedia/images/halleonard/couv/hl00695904_2.jpg

Sample: http://www.musicroom.com/Images/Catalogue/samples/HL00695904.jpg

I have to admit that after learning the basics for fingerpicking in Ukulele for Dummies, that I didn't keep up with the skill for months while I was busy learning how to strum and change chords(there was a little bit of practicing the c scale but minimal). After a while of that I wanted to learn a bit of variety and bought this book from a local Guitar Center. It was not poly bagged so was able to inspect the music first to see if it fit my needed specs. This book has all the notation needed to play this song on ukulele for either rhythm or melody(no bass tab given in this book). This book also contains the number style tabulature for those that cannot read melody lines.

I got home and first day easily memorized the pattern for the All My Loving melody. It really helped that I didn't totally forget the C scale from earlier training. After this song, I thought it was easier to skip a couple songs I wanted to learn because they were in 3/4 time instead of common time. So next was Woody Guthrie's "This Land is Your Land" and "Yesterday". Knowing "Yesterday" is sort of handy now that I am looking for an intermediate level ukulele as I can now play a song that I can use to test higher on the fretboard for intonation.

After having this book for about 6 weeks I started to get a feel for 3/4 time and started to practice a couple more songs that have this in the book("Goodnight Irene", "Last Night I had the Strangest Dream" and "The House of the Rising Sun".)

I DID NOT REVIEW THE CD

Final assessment: definitely worth the few bucks for this book to learn some basic fingerpicking melodies to recognizable songs. Now that I am getting more into reading the melody notes, the less I care to see the "cheater" notation below it. If someone is already past this stage they would be better suited buying "Jumpin' Jim's '60s Uke-In" as it has the standard melody notation without the tab below it.
 
Does the book really leave out the entire chorus from "Yesterday"? You know, the part that goes "Why she had to go, I don't know, she wouldn't say..."

Also, please don't think that reading tablature is somehow cheating! Traditional or staff music notation is great for non-stringed instruments. But stringed instruments are unique in that there are many ways to play certain notes, making the translation between staff notation and fretted notes a rather complex affair, especially when chords are involved. Tablature is has been around since the 1300's - at least as long as staff notation. It's a perfectly respectable and sensible notation for stringed instruments.
 
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there is a second page to the notation for that song so it is complete to the best of my knowledge from reading while listening to the youtube vid.
 
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