Sneak peak of a custom case

Shortly after I received my William King ebony/spruce LS-concert, I decided to get an Ameritage case for it. The uke had come with a pretty nice Oahu concert case, but it was an extremely tight fit and the headstock was solidly against the wall of the case. The reason for the tight fit is because the neck is slightly longer than a normal concert with its 16" scale. When ordered through Fine Cases, it is possible to make custom specifications for the case and I took the opportunity to specify the dimensions of the uke for a custom fitting case. Since this is a custom case, I decided to alter the colors slightly as well. The upcharge for exterior and interior color changes from the default color is quite steep at $44 each, so I opted for just an exterior color change to an all black exterior. It may seem pretty boring to specify an all black case, but I have not seen an all black Ameritage ukulele case yet and I wanted to keep with the "ebony" theme of the ukulele itself.


The case was ordered on April 17th and having ordered a custom Ameritage in the past, I knew it would take a while for the case to be completed. I had almost forgot about it but today I was pleasantly surprised by an email from Fine Cases with a few pictures taken by Ameritage of my case. It looks great and I'm looking forward to putting the King concert in its proper throne. I just hope I didn't screw up the dimensions!


Now the pictures:

Happy 4th of July!

It's a day early, but I may not get a chance to post tomorrow, so here's an early happy 4th of July to all of you ukulele lovers out there.

I had learned Stars & Stripes Forever from Dominator's tabs for quite a while now, but never really tried to get it down. I thought this Independence day is finally the time to post a video of this arrangement. I also just got a Dominator T-Shirt so what better shirt to wear playing the ukulele for this video?

Dominator has been a huge influence in my sustained interest in ukuleles. Without his tabs and guidance on how to play some songs, I'm sure I would not have been as interested in the ukulele today as I am now. So I'm forever grateful to Dom for his contributions to the ukulele world. Thanks Dom!

Anyway, here's another imperfect video brought to you by the Ukulele Ghetto! Enjoy.

Finger stretcher!

Long time no post! I've been both busy and lazy with regards to posting on this blog of late, but that seems to happen when summer rolls around, so hopefully you'll keep this little blog in the back of your mind and check back once in a while because I'll definitely keep it going, even if it's slow goings in the summer.

With some nice weather out (finally!), I decided to give Piano Forte a shot on my deck. I have been playing this one a lot lately but have not really been able to be too smooth at it. As you might know, this one requires some serious finger stretches in a couple of sections. Trying to be like Jake and play it on a tenor is doable but rather difficult, so I've been playing it on my William King long-scale concert, which is basically the only uke I've been playing in the last month or so anyway. To my surprise it only took two takes to get a relatively clean run through the song. I like this song quite a bit and it's a good one to demonstrate the ukulele as a finger picking instrument to people who don't know much about it.

Oh, if you're wondering about the thing that's hanging off the headstock, it's a little rabbit made out of jade. It's hung on the uke by my inner Aldrine Guerrero wannabe, or something...LOL! :P

This and that

Well, it's been pretty quiet here this month. Coming off a record 21 posts in April, I've made one post here in May so far. I was away on a couple of trips earlier this month, and had been recovering from a little bit of jet lag last week. Of course, the real reason I haven't been posting is due to laziness. :p But with summer coming up, it'll probably be a little slow in the ghetto, much like last summer. I guess we'll see. Do check back once in a while as I do have plans to post videos and reviews here.

I think I may have found a cure for my UAS! Unfortunately it might be in the form of an even more expensive hobby. On the Taiwan trip I bought a Swiss made mechanical watch and I've been inflicted with a bit of "WAS" (as far as I know there isn't an equivalent term to UAS, but it's pretty much the same thing). I've been checking out a lot of Chinese made mechanical watches (I'm talking about non-counterfeit Chinese brand stuff. I didn't even know they existed a few weeks ago.) after reading a lot about mechanical watches on the 'net. Getting a Swiss made watch then looking into the Chinese made stuff is a lot like buying a William King ukulele then looking into Kala and Ohana stuff, but that's precisely what I've been doing with ukuleles anyway. LOL! I guess rather than saying that I might have cured UAS, it's more like I may have switched my "AS"...

Anyway, since catching the mechanical watch bug, I haven not looked at ukes that much on ebay or the various market places. But before you think I've lost interest in ukes, know that lately I've probably played the ukulele as much or more than usual, so it has only affected the "acquisition" aspect of my ukulele life.

Since returning from Taiwan, where I brought my Collings concert along, I've been almost exclusively playing the William King ebony concert. I'm really enjoying this ukulele and would have to say it's my favorite right now. I will say that in terms of sound, I might prefer a few of the tenors more just because they are louder, punchier, etc. But in terms of looks, playability, complexity and clarity of sound, and playing feel, the King concert is pretty hard to beat right now as a total package. Maybe another reason I've not looked around for ukes lately is because I realized that I haven't even spent much time playing many of my other great ukes (again, almost all playing time has gone to the King concert) so I'm not finding much motivation to look into getting more ukes. Yes, I know UAS can and probably will bite again, but hopefully not for a while as I pursue my other "AS". :P

So what have I been playing? I've been trying to learn "Piano Forte". It's a song from Jake Shimabukuro's "Live" CD. It's a nice little song that requires some pretty big finger stretches. Even on a concert uke it makes me stretch pretty close to my limit. On the King LS-tenor, I have to stretch past my limit to play it. I've been practicing mostly on the King LS-concert, and have it mostly down but not very smooth yet. Hopefully I can post a video of it soon.

As always, thanks for checking out this blog and have a great summer!

Where no Collings (uke) has gone before...

...At least that what I think. This week I'm in Taiwan visiting some family and decided to bring the new Collings ukulele with me during the short trip. The picture you see is the Collings uke with Taipei 101 in the background. Taipei 101 was the tallest structure in the world when it was built (I'm not sure if that's still the case) and some serious engineering needed to be done on it since Taiwan is in an active earthquake zone.

The ukulele is pretty much an unknown instrument in Taiwan. I don't even know what its name in Chinese is (or if it even has a Chinese name). I know there are some ghetto (i.e. bad quality) inlaid ukes being sold on ebay that are made in Taiwan, but I'm willing to bet that 10 out of 10 people you run into on the streets couldn't tell you what a ukulele is around here. Being introduced into the market very recently, I'm guessing this is the only Collings ukulele that has ever set..(foot? heel? butt?)...onto Taiwan. But then again, stranger things has happened, so maybe, maybe not.

Having spent a little more time with the Collings UC-1 now, I'm continued to be impressed with it. I've had to adjust to the narrower nut width (I prefer 1.5", Collings is 1-3/8") and the 12-fret joined neck (only other 12-fret join ukes I have are sopranos), but the sound is excellent. I love loud ukes and this one definitely has that covered. It also offers very nice feel and vibration feedback that is similar to some of the custom ukes I have. I've been spoiled by the as-low-as possible action on the William King concert and Kepasa Gypsy Rose, so the Collings doesn't feel quite as low as it probably is. But it's still very easy to play and I have not encountered any action related difficulties with it so far. All in all, I'm still very happy with it and it makes a hell of a travel uke.

Collings confession

Oh what the hell...So perhaps you've noticed that I've wrote a couple of times about Collings ukulele recently. That's because I've been completely fascinated by them. To me they represent a chance to re-live the glory days of Martin ukuleles back in the early parts of the last century. I mean, ukes were credited with helping C.F. Martin get through the depression, and right now we're almost in one, so perhaps Collings is looking to the ukulele to help getting through some tough times right? Ok, maybe not. But as I wrote in the last post, I do seem some similarity to C.F. Martin in the way Collings ukuleles are playing out right now.

So, once I decided that these might be the modern day "Martin ukes", I became seriously interested. Then I learned that only the initial batch of UC-1's will have the Collings "haircut" style headstock while subsequent ones will have the Martin style headstock, which made them even more intriguing to me. I like the "haircut" headstock a lot more than the Martin style, so if they aren't going to make anymore UC-1's with the cool headstock, I'd better get it now right??? So I finally relented to the UAS whirlwind and got me a UC-1 this week. To be honest, I'm kind of embarrassed to have bought so many ukes in such a short time this year. I'm fully aware that I only have two hands, but sometimes it's hard to fight the urge to try that very interesting ukulele.

Anyway, since I have the Collings ukulele now, I'll post some early impressions:

-Very light weight. It really reminds me of a vintage Martin in that it almost feels like air. It could also be that I've been toting around the ebony William King concert a lot lately so anything feels light by comparison. But the Collings really does feel super light to me.

-Very loud. I think the KoAloha concert probably has the biggest volume among production concert ukes I've heard. I don't have a KoAloha concert to compare it with, but I think it's close to the KoAloha in volume if I remember them correctly.

-Sounds great with the stock Aquila strings. I've come to dislike Aquila strings on most ukes, including stock ones that come on the Honu, both Kanile'as, and the LoPrinzi mahogany tenor, but it sounds great on this uke. I think I will keep the Aquilas on this uke for a while before trying out some Worth CDs.

-Nice bright and clear sound. Seems "ukey" enough to me. I think Collings is trying to build a ukulele instead of a uke that sounds like a guitar. I can't say I really know what a "guitar-like" uke sound like, but to me this uke has a fairly traditional ukulele sound.

-Beautiful mahogany. Dark color like the mahogany found on vintage Martins and Kiwaya KTS series ukes. I much prefer this over the "ribbon" mahogany found on many import ukes. And I like it more than the mahogany found on my LoPrinzi mahogany tenor as well.

-It has a gentle radiused fretboard, which was a surprise to me. Comparing it to the King concert that has a 16" radius, it looks about the same to the naked eye. I haven't found a radiused fingerboard to be a necessity and even though I play my two radiused King ukes all the time, I have found flat fretboards perfectly fine to play on. Still, I do like radiused fingerboards and it's a nice surprise to see it on this uke.

-Well setup and easy to play. You can alway adjust setup yourself, but it's nice when it comes ready to play with great setup.

-Outstanding workmanship. Very clean on the inside and well built. Collings has a great reputation for quality workmanship. This is the first Collings instrument I have ever seen in person and it meets that reputation.

I've only had it for a very short time, but I think it has exceeded my expectations. I think it would really be a hit if they can bring the price more in line with the Hawaiian factory makers. But as is, they seem to be selling well right now, especially the base model UC-1. I think Collings is in this market for real.

Radiused fredboard. I think it's 16"-18".

Soundhole label. I believe this one is the 7th prototype (P-7).

Treasures from Austin (L: Collings, R: King). Are you sure the ukulele didn't originate from Texas???

Regarding Collings ukuleles

The last poll asked about the new Collings ukuleles, specifically the entry model UC-1 concert ukulele. I had put up a poll about the approach of various guitar companies' approach to the ukulele, and I had lumped Collings with the likes of Breedlove and SCGC as building very high end custom ukuleles. Well, I think it would be more accurate to put Collings in the same category as Martin now that we have more information about how the Collings ukuleles will play out in the marketplace. By the way, I'm fairly surprised that such a large percentage of voters (almost half) didn't know who Collings was. I guess I didn't know much about them myself but checking around the 'net leads me to believe Collings is one of the more highly regarded guitar builders today. They are more or less positioned between the giant guitar builders such as Taylor or Martin and the sole custom shop luthier. They don't crank out a ton of instruments per year but apparently their quality is very high.

According to what I've gathered so far from some of the Collings' dealer websites (Collings website has yet to include a product page for their ukes), there will be 3 models available. The UC-1, UC-2, and UC-3:

-UC-1 (list $1150): Basic mahogany uke similar to a Martin style 0 of the old days. No bindings. Martin style headstock. Satin finish.
-UC-2 (list $1600): Mahogany or Koa with body bindings. Collings "haircut" headstock". Gloss finish.
-UC-3 (list $2600): Fancy koa ukes with headstock, body & fingerboard bindings . Collings "haircut" headstock. Possibly varnish gloss finish.

This is fairly similar to how Martin divided up their lineup in the old days with the various styles (0, 1, 2, 3, 5). Given that Collings has built a pretty good reputation of quality for themselves, these might have a chance to be the modern day "vintage Martin" ukes in the future.

In terms of pricing, my reaction to the $1k street price of the UC-1 is that it is actually something I would consider. $1k is not cheap by any stretch of the imagination, and with a LoPrinzi model A concert costing about $500, the Collings UC-1 appears to be pretty expensive. But if you compare it with say a Kamaka concert, which usually runs about $800+, it became a little bit more reasonable. It is a handcrafted ukulele by a highly respected guitar company, and compared to the Martin re-issue style 3 sopranos, which costs in excess of $1500 and are also made by a respected guitar company, the cost of these Collings concerts seem to be within reason, at least to me. This, of course, assumes that these Collings ukes have great sound quality. Based on the reputation of their guitars and mandolins, and also comments from musicguymic, who has a couple of these, I think it should be safe to assume that they are at least very good, if not outstanding.

The UC-2 & UC-3 models seem pretty expensive at MSRP of $1600 & 2600 respectively. But they more or less correspond to the Kanile'a K-3 & K-4 models, which are in fact roughly in the same price brackets. The Kanile'a K-4 has more blingy pearls & abalone, but the UC-3 appears to have a varnish finish, so the cost for those might be a wash. To be sure, I think these higher model Collings are REALLY expensive ukes, but perhaps not as outrageous as they initially appeared.

I think what Collings is doing with ukes is closing in on what I would personally like to see good guitar builders do. That is to provide ukuleles that compete in the price bracket of the Hawaiian builders such as Kamaka. The Collings UC-1 is a bit north of the Hawaiian makes in terms of price, but they are roughly in the same ballpark. I believe these will be a hit if they put the "haircut" style headstock on the UC-1 (their plan is to use the Martin style headstock on UC-1 and "haircut" style on UC-2 & UC-3). A high quality U.S. built mahogany uke for about a grand just might find a nice little niche market. The UC-1s I've seen on the internet have all sold pretty quickly, so the market appears to be there for them.

Here are links to some pictures of prototype Collings ukes from Acoustic Music Works (I'm not sure how long these links will be good for):


UC-1 (prototype w/"haircut" headstock)
UC-2 Koa & Cedar
UC-2 Mahogany
UC-2 Mahogany sunburst
UC-3 Koa


Poll results:

The new basic Collings concert uke (UC-1) sells for about $1k, your reaction is:

-Not bad at all! Sign me up!: 3 votes (8%)
-It's a fair price, I would consider it: 1 vote (2%)
-It's a fair price, but I will pass.: 11 votes (29%)
-It's outrageous! I'll stick with LoPrinzi, thank you.: 5 votes (13%)
-Who is Collings???: 17 votes (45%)

Sucky first public performance

I got a chance to play a song on the ukulele at a family friend's birthday party last night. I decided to play While My Guitar Gently Weeps since I've been playing it for like a year and a half and it might be somewhat "impressive" to people who have not heard of the ukulele (which is probably most of the people there). There were about 140 guests and unfortunately I could not get my nerves under control and screwed up pretty bad in the middle. I managed to finish the song but could not tear my eyes away from the fretboard. LOL! Anyway, it was a learning experience and I think before I'm ready to play the ukulele in public I will need to figure out how to calm the nerves.

My dad got it on video and I'm posting it to Youtube despite the embarrassing mistakes in the middle. Hey, I never claimed that I'm Jake right?

"Studio" shots, reprise

Well, I decided to try a few more portraits for the King LS-concert today. I took the most of the pictures with underexposure for a dark effect. These are just taken on the dining room table. I guess for some decent quality shots, I would need some sort of a background paper or something. It can be fun to come up with some cool pictures for ukes. Of course, playing it is still the first priority.

"Studio" shots

I had some time this weekend to shoot some pictures in my studio (i.e. living room couch). In addition to the lineup update pictures, I shot a few other pictures centered around the William King ukes. The pictures are taken using a Nikon D300. If the motivation hits me, I might try my hand on some more William King style pictures with props and stuff. For now, here are a few pictures for your viewing pleasure.

William King LS-concert.


Macassar ebony back.


Check out the rosette. It is macassar ebony with a ring of abalone in the center. Really classy looking.


Two spruce top/koa back & side ukes. A big King tenor and small Dasilva soprano.


Koa backs


William King LS-tenor and LS-concert.