Jake Shimabukuro Tab Book

Since Jake Shimabukuro burst onto the scene with the Gently Weeps Youtube video, people have been looking for tabs of Jake's compositions in hopes of learning how to play them.  While Dominator had some tabs he transcribed, these were taken down at the request of Jake's representatives a while ago.  This year, Jake has finally released the long awaited (by ukulele fans anyway) tab book with tabs for all the songs from his Peace, Love, Ukulele album plus tabs for Gently Weeps and Hula Girl.

When this tab book was announced, I have not been paying much attention to ukulele related happenings online, so I had no idea when it was actually announced.  By the time I found out such a book was being released, it was less than a month before the release date.  Being a big Jake Shimabukuro fan, I promptly ordered it on Amazon.com.  I've already learned many of the songs from this album, but they are all from watching various youtube videos and trying to learn from watching and listening.  So this tab book would not only help me learn some new songs to play, it would also correct what I have learned before.

The book was delivered to me on 2/17, about 10 days after its official release date.  The songs I was most interested in checking out initially were Bohemian Rhapsody and Bring Your Adz.  I learned these songs by watching Youtube videos and was eager to see how close I came.  I knew I was quite a bit off on Bring Your Adz as I played the first section differently than how it sounded on the CD, so I can now practice how to play it correctly.  As for Bohemian Rhapsody, I think I got most of it right, with some minor adjustments needed.  I haven't really dug into the songs I don't know how to play yet, but I will tackle them as time allows.

The tabs featured in this book are pretty much exactly as how Jake plays them, and they are definitely not dumbed down at all.  This means the difficulty of the tabs is pretty advanced.  As I worked through a couple of the tabs of songs I've already learned, I found a couple of instances where the fingering presented is quite a bit harder to do than the way I learned them, despite the exact same notes being played.  I think in these instances, it's OK to go with the easier fingering.  I think while the book is advanced, it is not impossible.  With enough practice and also if you listen to the CD enough so you know how the songs should sound like, I think most of the songs are possible to learn for most people with some work.

Overall, I think it is great to have this tab book out there.  It may be too hard at first for many of the ukulele players out there, but it is something to aspire to, and I'm pretty sure people would buy it just to see what Jake's music actually look like.  Hopefully Jake will issue more tab books in the future.

Here are some pictures showing a few pages from the book:

The Unknown...

I've been working on learning Kalei Gamiao's The Unknown in the past week after seeing the first of Dominator's tutorial on the song.  I had heard this song before, but didn't pay much attention to it.  Having checked it out again after seeing the tutorial, I thought it was a cool song and decided to try to learn it.  Dominator has posted tutorials on the first two sections so far and they helped a lot getting me off the ground on it.  I was eager to learn the song so I went ahead and tried to learn the rest of it by watching a couple of videos of Kalei playing it, and it came together for me (well, to my ghetto standards anyway) a lot faster than I anticipated.  The key to learning this song is what this particular tutorial called a "Kalei Gamiao Strum".  Using this strum, or fast picking technique, you can get it to sound close to how Kalei plays it.  So in my excitement on learning how to play this song, I wanted to upload a video of it, hence the video that appear on this post.

I guess taking a video of yourself playing the ukulele is a good way to see what needs improvement.  I noticed that I'm a lot worse at the "Kalei Gamiao Strum" than I thought when watching the video, and I could do a better job with the pace of my strumming.  So I hope I can get a better take on playing this sometime later.  But here it is, the patented ghetto attempt on The Unknown by yours truly:

Cowboy is very busy???

This post isn't going to make much sense unless you're either Taiwanese/Chinese or if you are a fan of Jay Chou (周杰倫, the guy who played Cato in the recent Green Hornet movie).

So I was watching some videos on Youtube a couple of nights ago trying to re-learn Ukulolo (still one of my all time favorite uke arrangements), and some of the related videos were made by some people from Taiwan.  So after clicking around some links, I arrived at this instrumental cover of 牛仔很忙, which literally translates to Cowboy Is Very Busy.  I've heard this song many times before, and while I wouldn't come close to counting it as one of my favorite songs, it's so campy and weird it's actually kind of catchy.

So I set out to learn that instrumental version and it turned out to be pretty simple.  Of course, it would take more than a few days to get smooth playing anything, but I tried taking a video of it anyway.  My daughters were near by and decided to join in on the fun by doing silly dances and monkeying around while I played, so I decided to just upload one of  these videos.  The cover is basically just messing around with the ukulele, so I guess a ghetto version is appropriate.

Hey Jude

A few years ago I came across an instrumental cover of the Beatles' Hey Jude by WS64 on Youtube.  I thought it was a great arrangement and later found that someone had tabbed it on the Ukulele Underground forum.  The tabs were not totally complete, but there was enough to help me learn this arrangement.  So I've been playing this on and off for a couple of years now.  It's pretty easy and fun to play, and although I stopped playing it for a while, I recently started playing it again and it came back to me pretty quickly.  I've been meaning to record a video of this song, but haven't really tried to find time to do it until now.

I decided to play it on the Leolani super-soprano I have laying around the couch lately.  This ukulele was the very first ukulele I bought during a trip to Honolulu at the Aloha Stadium flea market.  I probably overpaid for it at $125, and it is the one responsible for starting the UAS madness for me.  I had loaned it out to someone for a couple of years, and last year it was returned to me.  Playing around it over the last couple of months, I was surprised by how nice it sounded to me.  Even when I was an inexperienced beginner, I found other ukes such as a Flea I once owned to be better sounding.  But today, for some reason, this Leolani is actually holding its own even against the solid wood ukes I own.  The fact that it's a laminated ukulele means I can just leave it out all the time, so it's very handy.  I'm glad it has returned to my possession after a couple of years away.

Bring Your What???

Your Adz, that is.  So I have no idea what Adz means and I'm too lazy to google it, but I managed to learn a reasonable facsimile of this song from Jake Shimabukuro's "Peace Love Ukulele" album a few months ago.  The video was recorded a couple of months ago, but I haven't had time (read: lazy) to post it until now.  I'm pretty sure I played the main riff incorrectly, but I haven't tried to learn the correct way.  In fact, I don't think I can play this song all the way through right now because I haven't played it at all lately.  Maybe I should try to re-learn it at a later date.  Perhaps wait until Jake's "Peace Love Ukulele" tab book is released! (I just learned about this tab book today.  Too bad it won't have Blue Roses Falling in it.  I get many messages via Youtube asking for Blue Roses Falling for some reason)

Anyway, here's the video.  I think I've reached my ceiling as an ukulele player as I don't feel like I've improved in the last year or so.  That's OK though.  Considering I'm playing stuff now that I never dreamed that I would be able to play when I started playing the ukulele, I'm happy just being a hack!

Happy New Year! (2012)

Aloha!  And happy 2012!

Holy buckets!  I can't believe it's been almost half a year since I've posted on this blog.  If you've been reading this blog, you probably figured that I've moved on from ukuleles.  After all, not only have I not written any posts here in a long time, I've also not been active at all on the ukulele forums.  But, while it's true that my online ukulele presence (ha, I said presence...) have been minimal, I've been playing my ukuleles as much as ever.  So why have I not been updating this blog or visiting uke forums very much?  Basically there are a couple of reasons.  First reason is that I have 3 kids that are now 1.5, 4, and 6 years old.  Those of you out there with kids might be able to relate.  I have to say my kids are actually very well behaving for the most part, but because of my wife's work schedule, I have to take care of the kids by myself quite a bit, so it seems like I never feel the motivation to type these posts when I get some free time.  Also, as a byproduct of this, I don't seem to have time to record one of my ghetto videos to post here (although I do have one recorded a few months ago that I haven't had a chance to upload).

The second reason is that I've basically been UAS-free.  Since this has kind of been a blog about my UAS advantures, this means I don't have a lot of content I can post.  The last ukulele I bought was the Les Paul, but that was pretty much just for shiznits and giggles.  The last real ukulele I bought was the Mya-Moe.  While that ukulele was received in April, I ordered it in 2010, so I think that qualifies me to the no-new-real-uke purchase club for 2011 right???  Anyway, I really have been satisfied with the ukes I own now, and hopefully it stays that way.  I mean, why would anyone need 15 ukuleles???

So, what does the future hold for the ukulele ghetto?  I'm not sure.  I do want to keep it going, and while I don't have a heck of a lot to post about, I have been dragging my feet on a post about Eddie Vedder's ukulele album (pretty old news now), and besides the one ghetto video I have recorded, I could probably do another one or two now.  I guess we'll see if I can get around to it.

Now for some ukulele related new year resolutions:

1. I'd like to learn a few new songs to play.  I'm playing the ukulele pretty much everyday right now, but I mostly cycle through stuff that I've already learned.  The songs I play the most now are Kalei Gamiao's "Shore Break", "Bohemian Rhapsody", and WS64's version of "Hey Jude".  I'm not sure what new songs I'd like to learn, but hopefully I get motivated to learn some new ones real soon.

2. Continue to be UAS-free.  This has been pretty easy, as I've been happy playing the ukes I have and haven't looked at ukes online for a while now.  I do have a potential temptation in the form of a trip to Hawaii this year, but I do plan to bring the Glyph with me, so hopefully that takes care of my ukulele playing needs on the trip.  Still, when you are in ukulele paradise, it's hard not to think about getting another one.

3. Play more of my ukes.  Right now I rotate through my concerts pretty good.  The King LS-concert and Glyph gets the lion's share of playing time, but the Mya-Moe is also getting some decent playing time.  My tenors have not been played a heck of a lot though, and I plan to make it a point to play them more.

Anyway, I have no idea what I'll be posting on this blog down the road.  Hopefully I find some energy to devote to this blog and post more.  But whether or not I do, I hope you guys who stumble upon this blog continue to enjoy playing the ukulele.  Ukulele is in my blood now, whether you see me much online or not, I'll always be strumming.

Is Les more???

Whoa, it has been 2 months since I last posted here.  Not sure if anyone is still checking this blog, but it's not dead.  I just got more busy as summer has finally rolled around in Minnesota.  Also, I've contracted some other "AS" so UAS is in remission, thus less stuff to post here.

Regardless, I had ordered an Epiphone Les Paul uke after it was announced at one of the NAMM shows.  I ordered it from Sam Ash, and it took quite a while until they finally had stock to ship around the middle of June.

So why would I even bother with something like this?  After all, it's more or less a novelty uke made with laminated wood.  Well, the reason is simple.  I've always been a fan of Les Pauls.  No, I can't play guitar, but I've always thought Les Pauls looked cool in the hands of guys like Slash.  I once bought a Kiwaya K-Wave ukulele because it resembled a Les Paul, and I've wanted an Earnest La Paula for the same reason.  A Les Paul shaped ukulele made by Epiphone, no matter how bad an instrument it turns out to be, would be an actual, genuine Les Paul, and that's enough for me to want to get one.  The fact that these sell for $99 made it a no brainer.

So now I've had this ukulele for a little while, I will do a quick review of it.  First off, the stock strings that came with it are complete garbage.  The ukulele sounded pretty bad and dead out of the box.  I don't know what those strings are, and frankly I don't care, as they probably sound worse than my dental floss would have sounded strung to this uke.  So my initial impression wasn't good.  I thought I had bought a $99 novelty.  At that point, I figure it wouldn't hurt to slap some Aquila strings onto this uke.  I'm not a fan of Aquila strings, and pretty much every uke I have that came strung with Aquilas got a string change in quick order.  So I had plenty of Aquila strings on hand.  I know Aquilas were at least good for bringing low end laminated ukes to life, so I gave it a shot.  I wasn't expecting much, but to my surprise, the Aquilas significantly improved the sound of this uke.  With the Aquila strings installed, the ukulele actually sounded pretty good.  In fact, I liked the sound better than some lower end solid wood ukes I've played before.  This was quite a pleasant surprise, and immediately made the ukulele worth the $99 and more.

The next thing I noted was the action.  It's setup probably on the high side of acceptability for me.  I have no problem strumming on it, but finger picking beyond say the first 3~5 frets takes a little bit of an effort.  Do keep in mind I'm pretty used to playing some custom ukes with very easy playing actions, so it's probably better than what I've described.  I've read that the nut and saddle are plastic and rather crudely finished, and that was the case on mine.  On the saddle, there is a mold line right on the edge where the strings contact the saddle.  Pretty terrible place for a mold line in my opinion.  So I took a sandpaper and sanded off that mold line.  The nut slots also looked a bit crude with some burrs on the sides of the slots.  However, other than looking bad, I didn't think there was enough of an issue for me to work on it.  The overall action was acceptable for me, so I didn't do anything to lower it.  It does have a bolt-on neck, so if needed, it should be rather easy to adjust the action.

Reviewing this backwards, let's talk a little bit about the package.  It comes packaged in a trapezoid box with Epiphone graphics on it.  Beside the ukulele, it comes with a very thin gig-bag and a chord to plug it into an amp.  The box also contained some Epiphone catalogs and an Epiphone bumper sticker.  Not a bad package for $99.

The Les Paul uke has an undersaddle pickup installed.  I only used it once so far, but I thought it worked really well.  The volume was pretty balanced from string to string, and it was fun playing it using various effects on my amp.  So as an electric uke, it seems to do the job.

While the sound, once the Aquilas were installed, surprised me, the looks was what I expected.  The sunburst on the body looked great, as is the curls in the laminated wood.  The workmanship besides the nut and saddle looked good to me.  The uke is on the heavy side, but that was expected as I've read that the body (besides the top) was routed from a block rather than glued together, making the sides and back fairly thick.  One quirk I found is that the normal ukulele position dot at the 10th fret is now at the 9th fret, which is where they place a dot on the guitar.  This does screw me up a bit because I usually look at the side markers (the Les Paul also have side markers) when I play, and having the one at 10th fret moved to 9th fret will take some mental adjustment.  It's not a huge deal, but it would have made the uke more playable for me if the dot was at the 10th fret.

Overall, I'm very pleased with the Epiphone Les Paul.  As long as you make sure to change out the crappy stock strings, I think it's a pretty fun ukulele that sounds surprisingly good.  I've actually played it a lot more than I thought I would.  I think it makes a good knock around ukulele, one that you don't need to worry too much about humidifying and can just leave anywhere in the house.  It looks cool, sounds pretty good, and is cheap.  In my book it's well worth the $99 price of admission.

Front shot

Back shot

Hey, it's a Les Paul!

The bolted neck.

Bridge & saddle.

Pickup plug.

Back of the headstock.  It's made in Indonesia.

Notice the position dot at the 9th fret.

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:

Curly Brothers

My Glyph mezzo soprano had been back at Dave Mean's shop the last month for a little fretboard issue caused by winter dryness.  The issue occurred during the winter and caused me to play the uke a lot less than I would have liked (I wanted to wait until the weather warmed up a bit before sending it back for repair).  So in effect I basically have not played it for what seems like 4-5 months.

The repair is a minor one and the ukulele returned today.  Man I really missed playing this ukulele.  When it's right, it's perhaps my favorite sounding ukulele, certainly one of the very best I have.  Like the great custom built ukulele it is, it plays effortlessly and feels really alive while I play it.  It's hard to explain but the notes really bounce out of this thing.  I guess I better pay better attention to humidifying it next winter so I won't be without it for an extended length of time again.

Anyway, as I've been playing the Mya-Moe myrtle concert a lot lately, I just had to compare the curly wood found on these ukes.  The Glyph was supposed to be AAAA curly koa, and next to it, the Mya-Moe looks to be similarly curled.  I like this type of curly appearance very much, and I'm very happy with the appearance of both of these ukes.

One thing I noticed is that the scale length of the Glyph mezzo soprano is exactly the same as the Mya-Moe concert.  The mezzo is sort of a "long-scale" mezzo soprano in that it was joined at the 14th fret and Dave Means make the scale longer to place the bridge at the ideal spot.  I thought the scale length is just a little less than a concert scale but at least when compared with the Mya-Moe concert, it is exactly the same.  So I guess the mezzo soprano is something of a large bodied super-soprano, or a small bodied concert.  Or a long-scale mezzo soprano...

Ok, enough of that, a couple of more pictures of the curly bros:

Curly sides

Curly backs

What do you get with your Mya-Moe?

I've had my Mya-Moe myrtle concert ukulele for about a week now and for most of the past week, I've been playing it almost exclusively to get accustomed to it and also kind of start the break-in process.  So far it's proven to be a nice and robust ukulele and I've enjoyed playing it.  I plugged it in a few days ago and am very happy with the performance of the pickup.  This is the first ukulele I have with a K&K twin spot pickup.  The three other acoustic ukes I have with pickups all have Mi-Si.  I plugged it to my cheap acoustic amplifier through an L.R. Baggs DI and I thought it sounded pretty good.  All strings sounded loud and clear through the speaker, and that's all I pretty much ask for.  I'm still hoping that in time the sound will open up a little more, but even if it stays the same, it is a good sounding ukulele and I can't really complain.

So what else do you get with a Mya-Moe besides the ukulele itself?  If you ordered a Tradition model, which is the least expensive model they have, you're supposed to get a canvas foam case.  However, mine came with an upgraded Uke Crazy case.  I did upgrade the wood to curly myrtle and added the pickup, so perhaps they just threw in the case upgrade.  I don't know.  It's a pretty nice case, but the latches it has makes me just a little bit nervous.  They are the flip open type (you can see that they are in the open position in the above picture).  There are only two of them and they strike me as being easy to open.  They are probably just fine, but they just don't feel as secure as the "hook & latch" type found on Ko'olau and Ameritage cases.  I guess I'll just take extra precaution if I ever take the case out of the house.

Besides the case, you get a Mya-Moe micro-fiber cloth, a small bottle of lemon oil, a Mya-Moe sticker, and a spec sheet.  The micro-fiber cloth has the Mya-Moe logo on it, so you know which uke it's supposed to wipe.  The lemon oil is used to maintain the finish on the ukulele.  The spec sheet contains the build specifications and serial number on the uke, so if you ever pass it down to your kids, they know exactly what they're getting.

Anyway, I thought the stuff they included with the ukulele are pretty cool.  I will be spending more time with the Mya-Moe concert and post some random stuff about it from time to time.

Spec Sheet

Lemon Oil