learning the ukulele

week 1

For music class, I have chosen to take on the task of learning to play several songs on the ukulele. This is a brand new instrument for me and felt quite unnatural using my fingers to pluck the chords (as I am a piano player and have never picked up a guitar, banjo, or ukulele before in my life). However, I am super excited about this project as I have always found it to be a very beautiful and calming instrument. I picked up my own ukulele from the music store, and have already learned where and how to place my fingers, and how to strum the C, G, E and Am chords. Tonight I plan on beginning to learn my very first had song which will be “Jhonny One Hammer”. Hopefully all goes well! 🙂

week 2

I found when I picked up my ukulele today it was slightly out of tune. Instead of downloading a pricy tuning app, I found this free, very helpful video on Youtube, showing the proper sounds for each chord.

Last week, when I first tried to play “Jhonny One Hammer” I’d realized I couldn’t remember how to read sheet music (didn’t know if the same rules applied with Piano), or which chord was which when looked at on the sheet.

By watching a youtube video it came back to me that to read sheet music, you could make up a little rhyme to remember which note is which. I recalled that for line notes the one I used to use for piano was “Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge” So the bottom line is E, then going up is G, B, D, F. This is an easy way to remember how to play the treble clef notes. Then the space notes simply spell out ‘F.A.C.E’. These are such great tips for remembering your notes!

This week, by practicing every day I believe I now know how to play “Jhonny One Hammer successfully! I still do not know if I am placing the correct fingers on the correct notes, but that is something I am going to continue to look into and try to understand. My goal for next week is to be able to play this song on beat, and with the correct fingers, now that I know how to play the notes quite confidently.

week 3

This week, I begun practicing my song “row, row, row your boat” and now know how to strum the G7 chord!

I’m really enjoying the feeling of progressing with my knowledge of how to read and play notes. I am finding it is gradually getting easier with practice. I am very confident in tuning and holding the ukulele and playing the C and G7 chords. This week I took videos of myself playing the song “Jhonny 1 Hammer in chord C.” My plan for this week before the midterm is to really ace my “row row row your boat” (second piece) and also upload a video of that song as well.

I have found it is helpful for me to hum along to the songs so I keep on beat, I also have noticed I nod my head automatically to the music when I play. These techniques help me stay on track!