New Ukulele

I almost forgot to post about my new instrument. It's a Lanakai Concert Ukulele that I bought and had shipped to me. I love the sound and the slightly larger fingerboard. I played around with it and decided I love the low G tuning. I'm leaving the high G on the soprano just in case I feel the need for it.
I'm playing more bluegrass tunes now and attending some acoustic and BG jams. Having a great time.

Tab Edit

I found a neat program that allows you to put notes in and it transposes them into tab for whatever instrument you want. I started trying to transpose "After You've Gone" but it's not an easy program to use. I lost it all. I'll try again later when I have nothing else to do. I think it will help me with the singing since it plays back in a midi. It's called "TabEdit" if you're looking for it. I can't exactly remember where I found it. I think if was on a dulcimer player's web site.

Two tunes I am working on are After You've Gone and Ukulele Lady. They have quite a few chords and I needed to learn chords. I also already knew the melodies so that helped. Changing chords fast is still a struggle but it's getting easier. I found an old recording of After You've Gone by Coon Sanders Nighthawks (circa 1919) on YouTube that I can play along with. I think I'm going to break down and buy the song if not the whole album.

One of my main reasons for wanting to have a ukulele, was the ability to play in any key. My sister has just decided to take up the banjo. She loves bluegrass, and everything she has learned so far is in the key of G. My dulcimer is in the key of D and G is hard to get to.
The other reason is that I can't find a comfortable place to play the dulcimer. It won't stay on my lap and I hate being strapped in to whatever I'm doing. I jump up and down too much. Besides, I don't have much of a lap left. I don't have a comfortable chair for the dulcimer either. My only two chairs are a low slung lawn chair and a straight chair that is falling apart. The dulcimer is too long to fit on the first and the second is stationed in front of the loom and not easy to access.
The little ukulele fits right in my lap and takes up hardly any room. I can relax in front of a movie on the computer in that low slung chair and practice chords or strumming.
My fingers are pretty large and I'd love to have a tenor uke. But for now, I'm happy to have this little antique.
Here's a video of some members of the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain playing even smaller ukes.

Starting From Here

 My sting bass fell apart. A friend said he could fix it. He never did. I left to move back home without it. I had sold my wonderful Fender fretless jazz bass to pay the mortgage. I lost my house anyway. I started really playing my lovely dulcimer, but being limited to one or two keys was frustrating. I wanted a ukulele. .By some miracle, I was given one. I'm having a blast with it.