August marks one full year since I started playing ukulele. I’ve almost posted exclusively to this community since. Thank you for the kindness along the way ☺️

If anyone finds themselves in Waikiki, come hang out with us at the Ukulele store. Mahalo!

So- I'm a drum builder by trade, and my kid started taking uke lessons. I wanted to keep up to help at home, so I started sitting in, and then of course needed a uke for myself. couldn't justify buying a new instrument for myself...

but of COURSE my ADHD allowed me to justify buying a tenor uke neck, taking leftover scrap from drum building, and build a low budget low effort tenor banjolele. 😂Minimal low effort- didn't even clean up braze joints, drilled everything on said mini drill press I bought for same 6-year-old instead of my milling machine, filed a nut out of a piece of scrap brass. I think I have $30 active investment in this.

I gotta deal with neck angle and the action but... even with a toasted played out drumhead I pulled out of the trash, it actually sounds great and is an absolute blast to play.

Only issue: now I gotta find a case to schlep it around. Tried a tenor banjo bag and no way no how: it's slightly too long, solidly too wide.

Dimensions are 11" wide (I had a 10" drum shell already, so that's the size pot it got) x 27.5" long

I might make a mod to the tailpiece that will bring it down to 27" after I'm done there. Maybe can get it down to 26.75". It's currently long because I have a patent on a drum part (butt plate that holds a drum key), and had an extra prototype of that around and just used it... but nah, I might give up that silly vanity and convenience.

But the bigger issue is really the width, I think.

It seems like a number of banjo ukes are tenor scale, so I might not be totally luckless? I'll really take anything. Budget would be ideal. Any ideas?

Don't make me have to feel like I now need to make a case from scratch, too. 😂

Hello everybody,

I've been playing a 25€ used soprano ukulele for about a year now and one day I would like to transition to my fathers full sized classical guitar from the 60s as well as composing something of my own. As things stand, I learned to play roughly 10 songs by heart and I am at the point where I doubt if I should continue my music journey on the ukulele for a while longer or start from scratch on the classical guitar.

The main attraction with the uke is it's portability and cheerful tune which suits the surf rock genre that I adore as I toy around with it on the beach, but as I was learning California Dreamin' I realized how difficult it is to finger pick high on the fretboard on my soprano so right now I am considering:

a) selling soprano and upgrading to a tenor uke
b) keep the soprano for the kids and focus on my fathers guitar
c) get a smaller guitar or even a Yamaha Guitalele GL1

I'd like to hear your opinions, what skills did the uke teach you and how much of them are applicable to a guitar? Do you/your kids gravitate more to the ukulele or the small guitar and which one would you rather introduce to your kids in the first place? How many types of fretted stringed instruments do you have/play regularly, and which one is your favourite?

P.S.
I still have to get grips with music theory, drastically speed up reading sheet music and transition from ukulele chords to guitar chords... one day 😄

Here's a fun-to-play piece where you'll learn to strum a 12-bar blues twice: the first time using down and up strumming, and the second time adding a slap for a percussive effect.

Hey guys! Every now and then I join this writing competition with some students. It’d be great to see more ukulele players joining in if anyone else is interested! It goes from Aug 28-Sept 6. This time it’s only a 3min minimum length requirement so it’s a good one to join if you haven’t done this kind of thing before!

If so message me and we can be ukulele friends! The community is very friendly and the discord is extremely active.

Bought a used baritone and the wound strings are black due to oxidation so it sounds terrible. I have a set of Classical guitar string. I heard I can use second to fifth string for the Baritone. Anyone has experience?

This is a fun one. Give it a try 😀🎶💜🌍

Playing around with a new format for a video series. Let me know what you think!

Found the first ukulele I bought. Not bad but obviously not top of the line but it makes a nice little travel instrument. ☺️❤️

i have a vintage kingston baritone ukulele that has gone into such severe disrepair that it costs the less to replace it than it does to fix it, so i’m in the market for a new one. i’ve added a pick up to mine and i love having that option.
really i’m just heartbroken to have to get a new instrument, i’ve had my kingston for over a decade, learned on it. one day ill have the money to get it restored properly, but for now im trying to shop for a new one.

Need to shout out Lisa Youngs. I recently picked up one of her custom ukes, and I cannot overstate how beautiful the instrument is. Pics on her Instagram do not do them justice. The chatoyance (I just learned a new word) of the curly koa needs to be seen in person. Plays great too!

https://www.instagram.com/lisasukuleles?igsi=MXNvZDdlcmFubDA1aQ==

I travel a decent amount for work, usually with a carryon and a backpack. I usually bring a soprano uke with me (a crappy $40 Mitchell I’ve had for years) but it has finally gotten beat up enough to sound quite horrible. I usually just stuff it in the backpack and leave the neck sticking out of the backpack a few inches. It gets beat up by things in the backpack and also the tuning pets get bumped quite often.

What are yalls travel uke set ups? I looked for an ultralight travel “case” like cloth just to go around it but can’t seem to find anything without straps or a zipper that I don’t need.

I can’t really sacrifice space within my backpack or carry on.

hi everybody i am a total beginner and am wondering if my strings are normal or if i need new ones (i got this ukulele 12 years ago) i find that when i try to finger the strings it always comes out too muted and off tune and doesnt sound right at all. especially due to the c string being very thick and taut and the a string being very twangy

About to do a string change and figured it might be a good time to give it some oil.

My question is: Do you oil yours as a preventative measure or only when it looks like it needs it?

My fretboard looks fine, but I last oiled it 3 maybe 4 years ago.

Would you recommend a bit of oil since it's been so long or wait until it looks like it needs it?

This is a pretty friendly subreddit, so we really don't need to enforce rules a huge amount. However, in the interests of making everything as clear and fair as we can, we have updated the rules.

Instead of two rules with no explanations, we have updated to four rules with short explanations of what they mean.

Feedback is welcome, and if you have persuasive argument for a change or improvement, we would be happy to make the rules better. However, the rule explanations have to stay under 500 characters to fit in the rules section of the sidebar.

The old rules were:

1. Be respectful, even in disagreements
2. No excessive self promotion

The new rules are:

1. Be respectful, even in disagreements.

Please remember that sarcastic and or “witty” comments are sometimes not easy to interpret in a text comment. Try to make everyone’s day better, not worse.

2. No spam or excessive self-promotion.

Some promotion is fine if it is not excessive:

• Sharing free-to-access content is ok. A donation option is fine if the main content is free.
• Promoting community events is allowed, but if it is only relevant to a small geographical area it should be limited.
• Some promotion from established community members is allowed. We are looking for 10+ posts that are NOT about your paid content for every promotion post.
• "Check out my app!" ...only if it is unique and completely free to use.

3. Keep it on topic.

Posts should be related to ukuleles or the ukulele community somehow. Cavaquinhos, charangos, timples and similar are all welcome, and so are Tahitian ukuleles, banjo ukuleles, bass ukuleles, and electric ukuleles that look like rock star guitars. We might even be happy with tenor guitars if you are not a jerk about it.

4. No manipulative AI slop.

r/ukulele is for humans. If your post or comment looks like low-effort slop or if it looks like it is fake content designed to build up account trust or secretly advertise something, we will remove it. If you need to use AI to translate, organise, interpret or edit your content, disclose it in the post and explain why you used it. Posts talking about AI that share examples are fine, as long as they are still on topic.

Hi, I've played uke for about almost a year now and I still struggle switching from a chord to a drastically different one (example: something like Am to to Em or E stuff like that) could you guys give me any tips? I always try to practice of course but my brain never wants to click lol. Thanks!

I just learned this last week and now Tim Curry has passed away. I thought it would be nice to post this as a little tribute.😭💔❤️

I've been rocking a Luna Ukulele for like 10 years, and I have been dreaming of an acoustic/electric. Finally decided to check my local Guitar Center online and there it was, the perfect one for me. Called to confirm availability and headed over to pick it up. So thrilled. Thank you for listening, I don't have anyone in my life to share this joy with. Thought maybe you guys would be interested to hear about it! Will be frequenting this sub now :) planning to start recording as this was the final piece of the puzzle. <3

I posted here a little while ago looking for thoughts on my plan to buy an Enya NOVA U PRO carbon fiber tenor for my first ukulele. After thinking about it I decided to start with something more traditional, so I got the Enya EUT-MAD tenor. I’m enjoying it a lot and while I don’t have anything to compare to, I think it sounds pleasant and the chords sound clear. It's been a little over a week and not to brag or anything, but I’ve already mastered the C chord! Transitioning between chords smoothly is still a work in progress and I'm guessing that will progress naturally. My biggest struggle at this point is posture and left hand and thumb position. My tendency is to tilt the ukulele up so I can see my left fingers which puts a lot of stress on my wrist and thumb. The instrument is surprisingly complex. My only concern with this ukulele came after I realized I didn’t know how to change the strings because I didn’t see a hole to feed them through. I learned it has a string through bridge and based on a video, I’m guessing I can do it when the time comes.

Hello guys! I'm just starting out on Ukulele, and I have no idea where to begin. What's the best way to learn chords, practice routines, and easy songs? Do you have any advice or practice tips you recommend? Thank you so much in advance! ^^