Customer Reviews

Mel Bay Ukulele Method

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I really like the way this book is arranged; it's easy to read and easy to reference. The highlights are the song intros and endings for each key, written by the Wizard of the Strings himself, the great Roy Smeck. Plenty of basic stuff for the beginner and a few challenging little things for the intermediate player.

Spartan is the word for this book. More diagrams than words. Recommended for serious adults. Your kids may find this a bit difficult to follow.

The first part of this book is about basic techniques and 8 songs. The techniques are described in a simple, precise manner. Songs come with simple chord diagrams (e.g. for singing-along) above the score, while more sophisticated chordal solo diagrams are presented below the score. No words from the author on each of the songs, apart from this: "Practice these diagrams just as given and you will find that you shall indeed be playing the melody of the song in a chordal structure right on the uke."

The second part is about chord, chord, chord. First you practice popular chord changes in every key. Then there comes some interesting "opening and ending" patterns, which is quite useful. And finally the chord fingerings for standard chords in every imaginable inversion within an extent of uke fingerboard.

All of these in only 48 pages. I've never seen such a condensed material for uke.

This book has more packed into its pages than other books 3 times as long. It accomplishes this by using diagrams and charts to teach the basics of ukulele playing. Even thoughI am a word oriented person, I was able to browse through the first pages of the book to learn about tuning, strumming, note location, and picking. The songs show both the finger picking and the chords for each, depending on you preference.

The songs are the old and well known, Little Brown Jug, Bicycle Built for two, etc., but it does have Aloha Oe.

Great beginners book!

This book begins by saying, "Start strumming with the index finger of the righthand. That means the finger after the thumb." It eventually goes into teaching some traditional household tunes:

Little Brown Jug,
Down in the Valley,
Sidewalks of New York by C. Lawor and J. Blake,
Bicycle Bulit For Two by H. Dacre,
In The Good Old Summer Time by R. Shields and G. Evans,
Oh! Susanna by S. C. Foster,
Aloha Oe, and
Tom Dooley.

The second part of the book(let), which begins right at the middle of the double-staple book bind, lists bunch of Major and Minor "Chord Families" followed by some Intro and Ending chord combos, and the last few pages are stuffed with chord positions. I am an absolute beginner in the string instruents, and was looking for a book to walk me through and usher me toward the right direction of learning the instrument. I found the book to be sparse and lacking in this regard and feel it is best served as a conscise refrence book to somebody who, for example, is already familiar with the guitar.

One impressive thing is that the book writes out the songs and the Chord Families in not just TAB format but also normal music notations (clefts and "tadpole" notes).

Other reviewers here are right about the first half of this book being so simplistic that it's nearly not worth reading. [Thanks, Mr. Smeck, for pointing out where my index finger is.] But what makes this book golden are parts two and three. The chord family arrangements are truly an education in themselves, not that the author gets into any detail at all about the nature of the relationships or even what you're looking at. In fact, it took me a while to realize that the major and minor chord families that appear on each page are, in reality, pretty much everything you need to compose a decent song in any key. Once that dawned on me, I was off and running. If you learn these, and learn them well, you've got a basic education in chord theory and progression without the verbiage. So forget the goofball instructions -- they're so bad, they're nearly insulting -- in the first half of the book (unless you really want to learn 'professional novelty strokes' such as the amazin' figure-eight and zig-zag stroking methods), and concentrate on the book's latter half.

Roy Smeck is one of the greatest uke players of all time. I played the uke in the 1920s and still do. My only objection is that this book is written for A D F# B tuning whereas the standard today is G C E A. I rewrote the book by lowering each notation by one whole note. Otherwise it is great.

This book has a couple of useful pages for a beginner but the main problem with this book is that it uses D tuning (A/D/F#/B) tuning rather than the much more common C tuning (G/C/E/A) - so if you're using C tuning (G/C/E/A) then don't buy this book as it'll be no use at all. Wish I'd known this before buying it.

The book is excellent in the Mel Bay tradition. Please note that this is for a Ukulele that is tuned in the key of D not the key of C which is the more traditional tuning method. Contains many helpful tips and numerous finger positions and some easy to play songs. Excellent choice for those just begining the soprano ukulele.

I'm a beginner and I bought this book looking for some sound advice on strumming, picking, some chord progressions, and maybe a few songs. This book was a huge letdown. it doesn't cover picking at all, strumming is covered on one page that is devoid of any useful information, and all the songs are hopelessly outdated. Who knows how 'little brown jug' is supposed to sound? For a while I thought that I just didn't understand the hidden genius of the book, but then I got the Hal Leonard Ukulele Method and realized that this first book was just terrible. The Hal Leonard book has actual practice exercises that get progressively harder and I learned a lot from. This Mel Bay book is just terrible.

I have been strumming my ukulele for about a year now - I get maybe 30 minutes a day to play on a lunch break at work. I have reached a plateau where I can play plenty of songs from tabs. I didn't get this book with any illusions that it would help all that much, but I thought maybe I'd pick up some tips or tricks. I haven't really gotten anything from the book at all. That, and the book is in "D" tuning, which doesn't help me with my tenor and baritone ukes. :)

I think anything you would get from this book you could get just as easily from the web for free.