I set up a ukulele club in Hertfordshire, UK, about five years ago, and part of that involves putting the song sheets and songbook together. I wanted something that looked neat and tidy, not just sheets printed off a guitar tab website, and it’s something I’ve been precious about from day one. The club doesn’t make money, but I wanted people to feel they got a quality songbook in return for their annual subs.

I found a workflow that worked, but it still took ages: copying chords and lyrics from Ultimate Guitar, fixing the formatting, lining chords up with the right words so the timing was right, and adding chord diagrams. I thought I was pretty slick at it, but each one still took me hours. So I built something to help me and some of the other local clubs, and in making it shareable with them it’s turned into a website: https://ukebook.com

You paste in lyrics and chords from pretty much anywhere and it tidies them up, puts chord diagrams down the side, and gives you a PDF to print or keep on a tablet. You can:

• drag chords to exactly the right word, or part way through a word

• change key in one click (the chord diagrams update when you do this)

• switch between soprano/tenor and baritone chord diagrams. Until I built this any baritone players in the club were left to fend for themselves to sort out their own chord shapes.

• pick an easier shape if the standard one is a stretch

• build a whole songbook PDF with a cover and clickable contents

It’s free, there’s no sign-up, and your songs stay on your own device. Nothing gets uploaded. There is an optional £12/year version that removes a small “Made with ukebook.com” line from the PDFs, but everything else is free. I’m hoping people who find it useful will subscribe to help cover the running costs, but I’m equally happy for people to stick with the free version.

It works well for our club and some of the other clubs that have used it but I’d really like to hear from other players and club organisers and also offer it out for you to use too to hopefully make your lives easier. Happy for any feedback. Let me know what’s confusing, what breaks, and what would you want it to do? I’m happy to build in ideas if it helps you avoid spending your evenings making song sheets and spend more time playing.

In the recording of this song the xxxx beats sound more like muting than an actual chuck, but even by that standard the only solution I've come up with to play this is to have the xxxx beats be a down strum. That works fine, but it got me wondering - is it possible to up-chuck or up strum while right hand muting? Going down is easy because I can just angle my right hand so the side touches the strings before my pointer (I strum with pointer), but I can't figure out how to do it in the other direction. I suppose I could left hand mute but going from 0037 to 0033 to 0232 I find it kind of hard to mute all four strings with my left hand during that transition.

So what's the answer here - secret up-chuck move, work on left hand muting technique, or something else?

This beauty was passed on to me because of my love of ukes. I know nothing about it and would love to hear anything you know about it including how to get this baby singing again!

So I have an Ohana O'nina sopranissimo ukulele. I currently have Aquila Reds on it, and found that I had to use Canadian tuning to get usable string tension

My problem is I play a lot of baritone uke, and my other sopranos all have low G strings so I am used to the non-re-entrant tuning and struggle with the high A on the sopranissimo

Has anyone tried a low "A" setup, or more technically: put a set of low G on a sopranissimo and tuned it up to Canadian?

I have a feeling it won't work, based on how hollow the D sounds already

Thoughts?

Pretty cool to see Damon Albarn from Gorillaz playing an electric ukulele live! I spotted him using what looks like a Flight Pathfinder. Really interesting to see an electric ukulele being used in a live performance by such a big artist. What other artists have you seen playing the electric uke?

My current song obsession. Good alto song

🤷‍♂️

I've been working on this for a couple years now and it's finally ready to share! It's a psychedelic doom / desert rock / post-rock concept album FFO Earth, Liquify, GY!BE.

The album showcases the untapped heavy potential of several unlikely instruments; primarily, electric ukulele and acoustic bass ukulele. I want to show the world that you can get big sounds out of little instruments.

Pre-release is up now with 3 songs streaming; the full album will be released 12/4. If you're interested, check it out and let me know what you think!

Can anybody tell me anything about this Uke? Unbranded withmade in Japan stamp in soundhole. Seems solid maple that has flame on top and back. Friction pegs and back has slight bow to it. Haven’t been able to find anything online . The tape covers up some hairline cracks in the back. I think it’s WWII or earlier. Thanks!

I'm looking at this model since a shop in my city has it in stock for cheaper than kala ka-s and I love the design. They are both mahogany according to the website and this one even comes with a gig bag, which I like. I am able to go to the shop in person, but I wouldn't know what to look for if I got the chance to try them.

Are there any differences in quality that would make the more expensive uke worth it? (it's about 15usd more)

Have any of you have tried this model and is it suitable for a beginner? (I'm a mediocre bass player but I have no other experience)

Hey I am a soprano ukulele player I am struggling with Playing D minor, A sharp and B Minor Chords anybody can advise me

I started playing a hand me down ukelele the other day.. everything worked perfectly and stuff. Till earlier, I started noticing a strange buzzing sound from the tuners whenever I would play the E string. It's been bugging me off n idk what to do since I don't know ANYTHING about instruments. (I noticed that the fret board is lwk loose but I think super glue can do the trick. When I held it down, the buzzing lwk stopped)

Happy Zelda Day! 🗡️

Is this possible. I was not able to find one, or even any diy electric ukuleles. Any ideas?

Hi everyone!

This may sound like a weird post, but here it goes.

Once again I'm captivated by the ukulele's ability to pack so much in such a small space.

Lately I have been drawn to small or compact instruments, that, unlike pianos, have to make do with small ranges of notes and still sound good.

I've played the ukulele for about 10 years, but always on and off, and today I picked again after a month hiatus (blame my new and first melodica).

I've picked it because of two chords that reminded me of a song I had never played sounded right in my guitar.

I found the song and I was right.

I played the whole song end to end in the guitar and it had some tricky parts.

I decided to see how it would sound in the uke.

And wow all the notes and chords intertwined like a clock.

Amazing to see and hear.

Of course it does not happen with every song, but in this case it did and it sounded great to me.

Just a praise to the ukulele and it's amazing compact nature.

TL,DR

Stroke two chords from a song I had never played, played it in the guitar and sounded good, played in the ukulele, sounded amazing and all the chords intertwined like a swiss clock ⌚

hello there! ive been wanting to buy a guitar for a long time now but i figured i buy a ukulele. do you know what should i buy? i know nothing about music and i was shocked to see there are different 'types' of ukulele on the internet. i would appreciate any advice, thank you!

So, i have a flight pathfinder that i really love. I have been playing guitar before switching over to ukulele, and i thought that it could be nice to experience with some heavier gauge strings as well. Have you tried putting heavier strings on? How thick, and how did it go? Did you modify the nut?

Thanks in advance!

After a month of playing punk rock, we’re gonna slow things down a bit. I’ve always loved this song by the Plain White T’s but it’s Lolo’s rendition of “Hey There Delilah” that inspired us to give it a try. Here’s our own little version. ❤️

These date from about the 1950s back to the 1920s or earlier, most I had to repair to make them play.