So you want to play the Ukulele, Congratulations! It is a great instrument that is fairly easy to play and buying a quality instrument costs less than other instruments such as piano or a guitar.
This lesson will give you the basics of playing the Ukulele, and soon you will be on your way to playing songs you like!
Posture
The first part of playing any instrument is how to sit and having the correct posture when playing – this will make learning easier and you will avoid physical strain or discomfort as you play. FYI I will assume you are right handed and give instructions based on this.
1. Your right leg needs to be higher than the left
The ukulele sits on the lap similar to the way the guitar does. You place the ukulele on your right thigh, and I like to have this thigh raised slightly – either by crossing my right leg over your left or by raising my leg by extending your ankle upwards. Children can accomplish this by putting their foot on a book, or other similar item to lift the right leg.
2. Hold the Ukulele at a slightly upward angle
The ukulele should not be at a downward angle, or a straight angle. It should be to about a 45 degree angle in relation to your body. This upward angle will help you to see the instrument better and it will help you fret the notes easier.
The String Names
The Ukulele has 4 strings, starting from the highest string they are G , C, E, and A. Get acquainted with these names, they will help you with this lesson and also for tuning the instrument.
How To Fret A Note!
Now that we are hold the Uke correctly it is time to play something! Let’s talk about how to fret a note correctly.
When you play the frets on the Uke you should try to use the tips of your finger – you’ll get the best tone from your fingertips , not the pads. You should fret a note just behind the fret – not on top of the fret. Refer to this picture, I am fretting the 3rd fret on the A string for reference.
How To Read TAB
TAB is a numerical system designed so the you can ‘read’ musical notes on stringed instruments like the Ukulele, Guitar, and Bass just like you would read words in a book. This numerical system is a shortcut to reading and playing the instrument.
The other system is the ‘Standard Notation’ system with a Treble or Bass clef. Standard Notation has a steep learning curve so I use TABs with my students to get them making progress from the start.
TAB for Ukulele has 4 lines on the page, each cooresponding to a specific string. On a line would be numbers corresponding to frets you have to play. Here are some examples of some TABs and a picture of what that would look like on the instrument. The ‘0’s (zeros) mean play an open string
Open Chords
Now that we know some of the basics let’s play some chords! A chords is a collection of notes that creates a harmony. Each of these chords has 3 notes – they are called a triad. Depending on these notes you get either a Major Chord , or a Minor Chord – there are more chord types but these 2 are the most widely used. Think of it like a recipe you would make for dinner – depending on what you put in the pot you’ll get different things to eat.
I start off all my Ukulele students with these basic chord shapes. The easiest ones to start with are the first 4 chords, then they get harder from there. To pluck these chords you can use your thumb to pluck the strings in a downward motion, more on this later.
The Best Fingerings For These Chords
For better understanding here are pictures of me fretting all these chords. Try to use the fingers I use. For easy ones like C Major and A Minor you can be flexible with the fingerings but as you go down the list using the proper fingering will really help get the chords nice and clean. For G Major there are 2 options, one uses 3 different fingers and one uses your first finger to get multiple strings – this is called a barre. Choose whichever one works best for you.
Playing Notes On A Single String
In addition to practicing the first 3 or 4 of the open chords above, I get my students to start working on their single string playing, that is, playing one string at a time.
Playing notes on a single string can be accomplished by plucking the string with your thumb, or index finger. You can also choose to use a pick like on guitar, this will make the sound of the Ukulele louder and brighter in tone. If you do want to use a pick I suggest a thin pick.
The Major Scale
The best way to start playing single notes might be to start working on playing the Major Scale. The Major Scale is the building block of Western Music as a whole and it has a sound that a lot of people are already familiar with.
This is the Do Re Mi scale, “Do a dear, a female deer, Re a drops of golden sun….” As heard in the famous movie “The Sound of Music”
Once you can make it up and down the C Major Scale learning a familiar melody like ‘Brother John’ is a great next step.
This melody is recognizable and is fairly easy to play due to its repeating nature. Sometimes I play this with my students with me playing the first part of every phrase and the student playing the repeat.
Next Steps
This lesson has covered all the basics of how to play Ukulele. We know how to hold it, the string names, got familiar with the TAB notation system, learned a bunch of open chords, learned the C Major Scale and ‘Brother John’ melody.
From here practice the open chords and switching between them, in addition to the single string playing. Once you get more comfortable with these check out my other Ukulele lessons.
Here is a video of me explaining and playing all the example above, thanks for learning with me!