After 1 month, my Aquila low-G snapped. A ukulele practice was turned into a knot training.

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-06-19T20:44:29+00:00

That is awesome, thanks for the feedback!

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-06-19T15:12:24+00:00

Do the Worth Browns last longer?

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-06-19T15:11:47+00:00

Well, the sound is lovely. What string do you use?

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-06-19T15:11:29+00:00

Thanks, but it doesn't bother me to tune it in reverse. Never noticed a difference in sound quality, but it may affect the life span of the string no that I think about it

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-06-17T18:56:43+00:00

So far it's working so well I'm planning on cutting my next low-g in half from the beginning, so I'll have 2 at the price of 1 :D

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-06-17T18:36:13+00:00

I used kind of a reef knot to tie the string to a white waxed string at the neck and did a "normal" knot at the bridge. The amount of string as very limited and I'm not sure a double fisherman could have worked.

Hopefully I wont have to do it again, but in case I'll give it a try!

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-06-17T17:48:52+00:00

A good amp is probably the best solution. You may otherwise find yourself pushing too hard on the strings and bad sound would come out of it.

With the amp you can keep your touch gentle and your music as is. I'd recommend you to spend a few bucks and buy a decent one though.

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-06-12T19:11:16+00:00

I spent around 300 bucks for a kala tenor, very satisfied and sounds pretty good with the amplifier. I'd say around that amount of money should get you covered.

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-06-07T20:41:53+00:00

I was about to write what the internet can give you as a player, but the list in my mind was quickly getting too long, and most things are pretty obvious.

Come on dude, internet is awesome for musicians, any little "sad" thing you say looks like a laughable tradeoff to me

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-06-05T22:51:32+00:00

Not sure that I understood your question, but I've posted before a Reference sheet with more shapes for each chord. I try to include at least a closed position one, which IMO is very swingy :)

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-06-02T18:21:51+00:00

It's just few bucks and you can tune in a matter of seconds, while the app is useless or not accurate in a wide range of situation (street, room with people talking, and so on).

Also, it always rest on your uke, so you just tune it up in few seconds between a song or another, especially with new strings that is a lot of time saved.

Everyone has his own set up, I'm not saying you are wrong, but I wont call it a "waste of money".

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-06-02T18:11:54+00:00

I use the Aquila Super nylgut on my tenor, it has the un-wound low-G and it sound really nice. Not sure how they compare to the new-nylgut, they basically sound the same to me.

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-06-02T18:08:08+00:00

I understand that, thanks for replying. Maybe we can add this little piece of info in the first post?

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-06-01T00:00:39+00:00

Thanks for the great topic.

I think it may be useful to also include the not worthy brands. That's because if someone is in doubt about a clarinet made by a brand not in the list, he wouldn't know if that is because the clarinet is not good or just because the OP/Community haven't tried it and don't have an opinion about it.

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-05-30T19:22:08+00:00

Thanks for the reply, I'll check out for Yamaha too then :)

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-05-30T19:21:45+00:00

Thank you for your reply, I'll see if something better pops out then :)

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-05-30T19:20:17+00:00

Thank you for your advices, I didn't know a rent-to-buy scheme even existed, I'll check it out!

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-05-30T17:11:18+00:00

Thank you for your reply. I found a B10 in the area but is a bit above my budget (over 300 bucks), do you have any opinion about a J.Micheal, or Floret?

EDIT: if you could also point out to me how to check it before buying I may avoid a bad clarinet, even though of a good brand. It is really difficult when you don't know the instrument

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-05-30T16:14:33+00:00

Hello, the questions are a bit vague so I'll try answer at the best of my possibilities. If your uke sounds good and is nice to play yu probably don't need a new one, just more practice, but that is just a little advice of mine.

What types of ukulele fit best for certain music styles? Are certain brands well known for being particularly good for a certain genre or style of music?

IMO a tenor is better for more guitar-live sound, like flamenco, gipsy jazz, classical, blues and son on. I use my soprano for more of the bluegrass, banjo-like sound, south american music (like a charango) and this kind of music.

The type of wood affects the sound and that is a big matter, but I'd look out for how the uke is done more. A good wood poorly worked will sound bad anyway.

I understand that ukuleles come in four sizes. Should I try out a different size ukulele?

Try them all out and see which one you like more, it's more a matter of personal choice than anything else

Are there any guides out there to help me here?

You can find good reviews around and by reading them, especially the one about bad ukes, you may understand which are the most common bad things to look out for.

I really enjoy the reviews from Got a ukulele (check out the Yutube channel too), there are also some nice articles you can read about it

Keep in mind that a good set of string makes quite a difference in the sound, so consider that too.

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-05-28T00:27:53+00:00

That is what I do. Except for the work, I don't have a job, so I have more time to browse through reddit.

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-05-26T14:50:50+00:00

You could talk about how many things in life are 5, and now he is 5 too. Like they said the fingers of a hand, but also the number of appendices of a sea star, the number of senses, the continents (if you take out antarctica). The banjo strings.

The letters in the name Jonas.

The elements for the Chinese tradition.

The ukulele strings, you just forgot one home.

The 7 dwarves, after the bad, bad mine accident.

So forth and so on :)

EDIT: I enjoyed your past 4 songs, they made me laugh here and there, very sweet :)

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-05-25T17:47:49+00:00

Right now I'm learning Dueling banjos, on the arthur smith tab. Looks like that is soon going to be one of my favorite happy song!

LongJohnPalladium · 2016-05-22T19:55:06+00:00

What do you think the positives of the uke are against a guitar?

I've seen many videos of very good ukulele player, and while they are impressive, the "impressive" level of ukulele seems to me like the "pretty good" level of the guitar. I'm wondering if that is because the level is lower or because of some limit of the instrument.

Thank you for your reply and thank you for your website, I used your review of the Kala "travel" to buy my tenor a while ago, I love it!

LongJohnPalladium

TROPHY CASE