Saturday, May 7, 2011

Comparing a few concert ukes

Since receiving the Mya-Moe concert ukulele, I've been meaning to do some sort of a demo between it and some other concert ukes I have.  I got some free time this weekend so I decided to make a video playing it and three other ukes: William King ls-concert, Glyph mezzo-soprano, Collings UC-1.

Each of these ukuleles were strung with different kind of strings, so perhaps the comparison isn't as un-bias as it could be.  But I have found that at this level of ukulele, strings don't really change the basic dynamic of their sound anyway.  These ukes pretty much should sound good with any reasonably good strings.  The string setup:

Collings UC-1 (Aquila strings)
William King long-scale concert (Southcoast medium tension)
Glyph mezzo-soprano (Worth CD)
Mya-Moe concert (Worth CM)

Besides sharing the same scale length (the King is 1" longer than the rest), all of these ukes have radiused fretboards.  The Collings have a 1-3/8" nut while the other three have 1.5" nuts.  The string spacing are also all different, with the Mya-Moe being the widest followed by Glyph, King, and Collings.  This made it slightly challenging to quickly play the same things on these ukes in succession, as you will see a few mess ups and messy playing on the video.  But I think it gets the point across.

I won't make any comments on what I personally thought about the sound of each of these ukes, so you can form your own opinion.  I'm actually not sure if this exercise is of any benefit to anyone, but I guess it could just be a fun excuse to post a video featuring four different ukes or something.

Anyway, here's the vid:

4 comments:

jadoo said...

very very nice good

mikeplaysukulele said...

I've been interested in purchasing a concert sized uke someday, but I'm so used to playing my soprano, that it would be quite the switch.

Jac said...

IMO the Glyph and Mya-Moe stood out by having brightness with plenty of warmth.

Anonymous said...

First off I'd like to mention how much I like to check in on your blog from time to time.
I think it is really great that you take the time to post these comparisons, I think the reveal quite a bit about each instrument.
I this comparison I think the Glyph took it hands down.
I only wish Dave was accepting new orders, I have a bad case of UAS for one.
Keep up the good work/..play

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