Ukulele For Dummies (8 page)

This method of tuning, with the high notes as the two outside strings of the instrument, is known as
re-entrant
tuning. More informally, the uke's tuning is referred to as ‘My Dog Has Fleas'.

When you're indicating re-entrant tuning, use a lower-case ‘g' to make clear that you're using this tuning.

Exploring the most common tuning: gCEA

The gCEA tuning is the most popular ukulele tuning nowadays, and I use it throughout this book. I highly recommend you use this tuning because it makes learning to play the uke much easier.

Finding chord charts and notation for gCEA tuning is easy, and communicating with other ukulele players is convenient because it's so common.

This tuning also makes playing in the key of C very easy, which is useful because C is the most commonly used key. gCEA tuning also means that you can tell this joke:

Q: Where do you find the Aegean Sea?

A: On the first, fourth and third strings.

When you've got a handle on gCEA tuning, you can experiment with less-orthodox tunings, as described in the following section.

Using other tunings

Several other tunings exist in addition to gCEA, and you may find them useful for certain occasions. For example, playing certain songs can be easier in a different tuning and some tunings offer notes and inversions that aren't accessible in gCEA tuning. Also, if you're playing with other ukers, having a different tuning gives you greater variety in the sound, making the music more interesting to listen to.

aDF
B

This tuning was very popular in the 1920s and 1930s. If you find any old sheet music with ukulele chord diagrams, you may well see this tuning, in which each string is tuned two frets higher than gCEA. Therefore, the chord shapes you use for this tuning are the same as gCEA but the chord sounds higher.

An advantage of this tuning is that it is easier to play chords that are common on the guitar – most notably E – allowing you to play along with guitar songs with less hassle. It can also make your ukulele sound brighter.

If you buy a set of strings that says aDF
B on them, don't panic. Very little difference exists (or none at all) between these strings and those used for gCEA, and either type of strings can be used for either tuning.

Low-G tuning

Here, the high, thin g-string is replaced by a low, fat G-string. All the other notes stay the same, so its tuning is GCEA. The result is you have lower to play around with. The chords you play are exactly the same as gCEA (high-G tuning) but give you quite a different sound to the traditional ukulele tuning.

If you want to try this tuning, you need to buy a low-G set of strings. If you try to tune down a standard string, it becomes too floppy to play.

Choosing a Tuning Method

You can use a number of different ways to tune your ukulele, depending on what you have available and who you're playing with. When you play alone, you only have to be in tune with yourself. When you play with other musicians, you need to make sure that you're all in tune with each other.

In this section, I go over a few ways for you to get in tune. I use the gCEA tuning throughout (as described in the earlier section ‘Unravelling Tunings for Your Instrument').

You find the terms
open string
and
fretted string
throughout this book and out in the real world:

Open string:
A string you play without holding the string down.

Fretted string:
A string you play while holding the string down at a certain fret.

Going hi-tech: Tuning with an electronic tuner

Using an electronic tuner is by far the easiest way to tune your ukulele. If you're just starting out with the ukulele, use this method to get started and practise the other ways as you go along.

The best electronic tuner is one that clips onto the end of your ukulele. These work by picking up the vibrations in your ukulele and translating them – possibly by voodoo – into notes. These tuners help you to tune in a noisy environment, such as a ukulele club. If you're planning on playing your ukulele out and about, a tuner is pretty much essential, because it's the only method you can use without being able to hear what you're playing.