The ukulele has gained in popularity in the last several years. Not only is it featured in several popular songs (“Hey Soul Sister” by Train, “I’m Yours” by Jason Mraz, “I Do” by Colbie Caillat, and of course anything by the amazingly talented beyond her years Grace Vanderwaal of America’s Got Talent fame), it’s also affordable, light, and very portable.
When we think of the ukulele we think of Hawaiian waters and light cheery music. However, the ukulele has and continues to evolve. Much like there are both acoustic and electric guitars, there are acoustic and electric ukuleles. If you’re considering taking up the electric tenor ukulele, read on to learn how to play this instrument to get the best sound and style.
An Electric Ukulele?!
An electric ukulele, you say? Yes! Patented in 2014 by Edmund A. Rafalko, Jr., the electric ukulele comes in the same four sizes as the traditional ukulele: soprano, concert, tenor, and baritone. In this blog, we’ll be looking at reasons to play the electric tenor ukulele.
The tenor ukulele gives you the most space on the neck using the traditional tuning “G C E A.” The tenor ukulele has the option of having the G tuned an octave down, giving the chords and notes a deeper sound than the standard tuning.
The tenor ukulele also gives you the most space on the neck to play individual notes and licks. You can also get a tenor ukulele with steel rather than nylon strings. Playing with steel strings can give the ukulele a similar sound and feel to an electric guitar. This makes it a great instrument for those who are wanting to transition to the guitar eventually. Or, you may find that you can shred very well on the ukulele and stick with that!
To play an electric tenor ukulele with a solid body, you will need an amplifier so that the sound can be heard from more than a few feet away. Sometimes, the silence of an un-amped instrument can be useful. It means you won’t disturb others around you while you are practicing. You can also plug the ukulele into the amplifier and then connect it to headphones while practicing.
How to Play the A Minor Pentatonic (An Essential Skill for Jamming)
To play an electric ukulele, you are going to want to know how to play scales on the instrument. Probably the best scale to learn first is A minor pentatonic.
A minor is the relative minor to C major, which means there are no sharps and no flats. This makes it one of the easiest scales to learn. Also, learning the A minor pentatonic scale will ensure that you are able to solo over any song that is in the key of C major or A minor. Additionally, since the ukulele is an instrument of shapes, when you know the scale position for one key, you can move that shape all around the neck based on the the root note of the key.
So, Just How Do You Play That Scale?
There are five different scale shapes that you can play around the neck. We are only going to be using the top three strings- C, E, and A.
Position one starts on the C string. In order, you play:
OPEN C string, then fret TWO, then OPEN E string, fret THREE, then open A string, fret THREE. Position two starts again on the C string but this time, you begin with fretting the second fret. So, up the neck it goes, C string: TWO, FOUR, E string: THREE, FIVE, A string: THREE, FIVE. Position three starts back on the C string at on the fourth fret, and heading up the neck goes, C string: FOUR, SEVEN, E string: FIVE, EIGHT, A string: FIVE, SEVEN. Position four again repeats and starts on the C string. C string: SEVEN, NINE. E string: EIGHT, TEN, A string: SEVEN, TEN. The fifth position is C string: NINE, TWELVE, E string: TEN, TWELVE, and A string: TEN, TWELVE.
Playing an electric tenor ukulele is going to give you the most space on the fret board to really rock out! If you memorize these chord shapes, you can transpose them into any key as long as you know where the root note is in each shape. So, for example, in the A minor chord shape in the first position, the open A string is the root note. So, if we wanted to jam in Bm, we would find the B note on the A string, and transpose everything up, The trick is keeping the same distance between the notes.
The B note is the second fret on the A string: we know from there that we want to play 3 frets up, so we would play TWO, FIVE on the A string, Then TWO, FIVE on the E string, then TWO, FOUR on the C string. You would repeat this pattern for all five shapes all the way up the neck.
Have you ever thought about playing an electric ukulele? Leave your comments below!
Stephanie Avienu