Best books about ukuleles according to redditors

Sadly, "The Day That Never Comes" is not included. :(

Check this one out : https://www.amazon.com/Lute-Uke-Ukulele-Package-Songbook/dp/1458406512

Definitely worth the purchase! (incidentally I found out about it when someone asked this exact same question on this exact same subreddit)

Love this arrangement! It’s included in his duets for one book just FYI.

I'm currently working my way through a method book called Ukulele Acrobatics: For All Levels From Beginner to Advanced

I'm currently working on week 6. As someone who's been classically trained in music (9 years on the clarinet, 2 years on the cello), I found this book as an excellent resource in learning how to play the ukulele using traditional music theory and methods.

This particular method book breaks the exercises up by days and weeks, which allows you to take your time in digesting each exercise. I especially enjoy how the author breaks down music theory, particularly establishing how to properly strum rhythm, scales, arpeggios, harmonics, etc.

I also recommend using a metronome and tapping your foot to the beat as you practice. This will help you keep a nice and steady rhythm which is so important in playing music as you could imagine.

I can see how this method book can be frustrating for those who have never studied music theory, especially for those who primarily rely on tabs and chords. But if you're truly serious about learning to play ukulele using sheet music, it is vital to have an understanding of music theory and how to properly apply techniques and this book addresses those concerns. You just need to be patient with yourself and take the time to really practice with a metronome.

Good luck!

https://www.amazon.com/Ukulele-Aerobics-Levels-Beginner-Advanced/dp/147681306X

This is pretty cool. It gets complex pretty fast though.

this and most things by jake should be amazing for it. Also not to be that guy but try to arrange popular songs into instrumentals by ear. it will help you grow as a musician and help understand the progression of music firsthand.

Better uke setup, still cheap:

• Lanikai 21-T. This is a tenor uke, around $120. I love mine. The strings that come on it shouldn't, so next...
  
  
• Worth brown strings. These really helped my fingerpicking. $12.80, but the strings are cut long enough for two full sets. Crappy or dead strings will not help you develop your ear correctly. Being out of tune will also prevent your development, so next...
  
  
• Snark SN-2 tuner. About $12.00. Finally, you need something to play...
  
  
• The Daily Ukulele is great, and can be used to practice your rhythm playing or to develop fingerpicked versions of classics (lots of Beatles in here, and an easy uke arrangement of California Dreamin'). At a more advanced level, try Learn to Play Fingerstyle Ukulele Solos. If you have not really gotten into fingerpicking, starting this book will be a big revelation: you suck, because you can't play freaking Twinkle Twinkle Little Star the way the author arranged it (anyway, that's where I started). Learning these will be a long process, and you will probably want to make many detours, through scales practice, finger exercises, and music theory, but your playing (even for strummy things) will start improving enormously.
  
  I'll also assume that, since you are a Redditor and know what's up, that you don't need to be told to get a metronome like the Korg MA-30.
  
  So borrow a couple of textbooks instead of buying and set that money aside; that should be about enough to get all of this. Or save money some other way... A friend of mine had a serious Starbuck's habit. I don't think he even realized it, but he was dropping $5-$10 every day at Starbuck's and whining about how he had no money. Coffee at home and two months later, his first uke.
  
  Last, strumming... practice the living crap out of your strums. Count out loud. Use a metronome. Write down the patterns. Speaking and writing the strum patterns is important, drumming them out with your hand (off the uke) is also important. You need to think of the strum as a rhythm that's independent of your uke, like this magical, ideal, Platonic rhythm, and you with your poor wooden uke and your sad meat fingers have to try to mimic it; anything you can do to understand the rhythm better -- whether or not you do that thing on your uke -- will help improve your strum.
  

Ha, I charted this out a couple weeks ago! I'll post later tonight.

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Edit: hot 'za for delivery https://flat.io/score/5c5a4bc07d828f3e48d140b5-saintlike-jakey

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I give it a B+ for effort. It's a pretty simple few bars, but it's not exactly right as I can't reproduce the organ patch in the video to make sure the notes are identical. You can add more notes for colour, if you're playing it on piano just jam on the black keys and you'll be ok.

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Wouldn't mind if somebody could double-check those chords, especially the last one. The video in question starts out with a chorus-heavy full-open jazz organ of sorts, the closest I could find on my Juno-DS is patch `Ky:040 Smoky Organ`. Later in the song it becomes a bit more subdued, and you can replicate this by low-passing the patch so it's mostly bass.

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His organ sounds really cool though with a pitch-up attack, wouldn't be surprised if they're using one of those kickass Nords. Later edit: saw the other comment, it's not a keyboard, they sampled it directly from Chrono Trigger. Super cool.

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Edit 2: Crap, I didn't realize you wanted ukulele chords! Sit tight, I have a book and a wife that can advise

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Edit 3: Ukulele chords for delivery, tested and they sound alright.

Abm7 Bbm7 Ebm7
A |-3----|1-----|---4--|
E |-2----|1-----|-1----|
C |--4---|1-----|--3---|
G |1-----|1-----|--2---|

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Theses chords come from The Daily Ukulele: To Go! and are printed like this. I tried to lay them out like some sites do but they might not be perfect. Give it a shot, I'd love to hear you play it!

I just bought a book called From Lute to Uke that has a lot of the medieval and renaissance kind of stuff you're looking for. Here's my favorite song from the book so far, Pastime with Good Company, composed by King Henry VIII himself. Note: I'm not the guy in the video.

It's in the tab book that he recently released.

I took a free ukulele class at the local Guitar Center that they have once a month. It was just me and one other guy. In just an hour, the teacher had tuning the ukulele, playing a few simple songs, understanding how to read ukulele music from a page, and pointing us to tons of other resources for learning. If you can find anything like that, it'll save you a ton of time. The teacher answered a hundred questions and helped me pick an instrument to buy. I also bought a clip-on Snark tuner which essentially do what many ukulele phone apps also do. I bought a few beginner books, including this Hal Leonard Ukulele Method Book 1, which was helpful, and a 4-chord songbook to practice with.

Don't miss the "Related Links" at the right side of this page.

A few pieces of advice.

1. If you don't play a stringed instrument, your left-hand finger-tips are going to hurt like hell for about a week. Keep playing. That pain all goes away.
   
   
2. Some chords that seem very difficult to get at first will definitely become easier over time. Practice...
   
   
3. When you learn something one way, it's very hard to unlearn it and do it a different way. I got into playing quickly, learning on my own. By the time I started working with a teacher, 3 months in, he had to tell me that the way I had learned to finger some of the chords, was OK, but not the best way to do it. There's no one-way to do some things, but certain ways will make things harder for you later on. I'm stuck now feeling that some ways to hold a chord feel natural, while the recommended ways can feel less comfortable.
   
   
4. Have fun!

One by Metallica

Try your local library. Depending on where you live they might be able to order home some books you can use.

Found this

• http://flamencoukulele.com/simplified-ebook
  
• https://www.amazon.com/dp/B071W72YXP
  
• http://forum.ukuleleunderground.com/showthread.php?33233-practicing-Sevillanas-(span.-dance)
  
• http://flamencoukulele.com/
  
  don't know if it's any help.

I'm still very new, but I have been enjoying Jake Shimabukuro Teaches Ukulele Lessons. It comes with a code that includes instructional videos with each lesson. The lessons build on each other and cover things like strumming, chords, chord progressions, picking, and has music and play-along songs.

I can't recommend any advanced books because I am not there yet, but there may be more in this series.

Link

I posted this recommendation quite recently, but this book (includes tab) by the late John King is fantastic when it comes to classical ukulele. Here's a video of John performing one of the arrangements (the Prelude from Bach's cello suite no. 1), it sounds incredible.

https://www.amazon.com/Best-Metallica-Ukulele-Vocal-Tab/dp/1603789618

The Daily Ukelele has a section full of kid's songs. Provided that you are still new to the uke (as am I), I would generally recommend the book as well. A wonderfully put-together fakebook. Good luck.

This book by Jim Beloff talks about this in depth.

Indeed

I love these two books:

From Lute to Uke - https://amzn.com/1458406512

The Baroque Ukulele - https://amzn.com/1476815208

I really liked 21 Songs in 6 Days as a starter book. It builds up from the most basic chords, uses familiar children's songs and folk songs, and has a companion website with videos. It's pretty cheap to boot.

You need this.

Get a ukulele method book to learn to read music.

http://www.amazon.com/Hal-Leonard-Ukulele-Method-Book/dp/B000RQA1EW/ref=sr_1_8?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1459110437&sr=1-8&keywords=ukulele+method

Look up anything by Aaron Keim. He has a few small books on various techniques that go with his YouTube channel.

Another highly recommended book is Ukulele Fretboard Roadmaps. It is not specifically fingerstyle related but it really helped me understand the ukulele more.

Hello player!

I bought some Ukulele books myself not long ago. Please note that I'm a total beginner so you might not find them as useful as I found them. The books are:

• Ukulele Aerobics. This is a 40-week book. Each week is split into different practices.
  
  
• [20 Easy Fingerstyle Studies For Ukulele] (http://www.amazon.com/Easy-Fingerstyle-Studies-Ukulele-Book/dp/078668397X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1427050523&sr=8-1).
  
  
• Fingerstyle Ukulele
  
  I also got an Ukulele Chord Dictionary, very handy and small. I keep it with me.
  
  I recently bought James Hill's book series (The Ukulele way) but haven't received them yet! If you want to check more books by James hill: Empiremusic website have them
  
  I hope that gives you a starting point. The only reason I don't own every single Ukulele book is because I pay twice their price due to shipping costs ;(.

http://www.amazon.com/Hal-Leonard-Ukulele-Method-Book/dp/0634079867

I liked this book to help teach me to the picking notes on the ukulele, if you are interested.

1. Best of Metalliica for Ukulele Songbook
   
   
   
2. Master of Puppets (Ukulele Cover)

For books, I have this Ukulele Chord Melody Solos
book that you might be interested in. The first few songs are pretty easy, and then there are some trickier ones near the end. It has some explanatory text in there too that walks you through each arrangement and gives you tips for writing your own arrangements of songs someday. But there are lots of excellent online resources too of course that people can point you to.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0634079794/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o07_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Here is the amazon link. http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/1458413772

Here is the desktop version of your link

I would add Ukulele Fretboard Roadmaps.

Gotta know your chords.

I highly recommend Lyle Ritz's books:

Jumpin' Jim's Ukulele Masters: Lyle Ritz Solos: 15 Chord Solos Arranged by the Ukulele Jazz Master (this book is tough)

and

Jumpin Jim's Ukulele Masters (not as tough as the book above and it introduces a lot of jazz chords)

Buy a copy of The Daily Ukulele and start working on the songs in it. http://www.amazon.com/Daily-Ukulele-Fakebook-Jumpin-Songbooks/dp/1423477758/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1330824569&sr=8-1 Also, try to find a local Uke group and meet up and play with them. In the Atlanta area, we have the Southeast Ukers who get together twice a month. I attended for the first time in February, and spent three of the most fun hours I can remember. Everyone there had their copy of The Daily Ukulele, and people would call out songs from that.

I can't recommend Hal Leonard's Ukulele Aerobics enough, as far as stretching the fingers and finger placement. It starts out really easy and unassuming, but has you on four-finger chords by week 3 and goes on from there. It's been a super great resource for someone like me who tends to lack direction when self-teaching. The exercises are all challenging at first, that's the point! But by the time I was on week 8, for example, I realized I could go back to week 5 and do those exercises with ease. In general, that's how practice works, but this made it quite tangible for me.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/0825637546/

6 Used from $6.94

I think the term you're looking for is fingerpicking. If you search for that, you should find stuff. However, some books that I either own or have seen people mention:

• https://www.amazon.com/Jumpin-Jims-Ukulele-Masters-James/dp/1540003043 (or anything else by James Hill)
  
• https://www.amazon.com/Ukulele-Aerobics-Levels-Beginner-Advanced/dp/147681306X (I own this one, it's a little simplistic but isn't a bad starting point)
  
  And plenty more are around. I think James Hill and rockclass101 are the only full systems I'm aware of, although I've never used either of them. But James Hill even does a teacher certification course, and is quite well respected.
  
  You can also come up with your own, it's not too difficult. You can base it off of a book for a classical instrument for example. It's a great exercise to do that, since you already have a basis for music theory from the violin.

I bought this book, it has a cd you can play along with.

and here it is: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1603789618

Your voice is great, absolutely fantastic, but I wasn't a huge fan of the arrangment. The song has a lot of really interesting things going on and a high quality version of it would be so cool to hear. This book, which is for intermediate/advanced ukers, has a version that sounds incredible. It'll make you learn all sorts of weird things about interesting inversions of chords (It uses 3 entirely different fingerings of Dm7). But it's really quite difficult. Unfortunately I can't track down a recording of it online, I might have it lying around my room if you're interested.

The Hal Leonard book is pretty good.

It looks like a used copy is less than $2.

Here are all the local Amazon links I could find:


amazon.co.uk

amazon.ca

amazon.com.au

amazon.in

amazon.com.mx

amazon.de

amazon.it

amazon.es

amazon.com.br

amazon.nl

amazon.co.jp

amazon.fr

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"In the Pines" arranged by Alistair Wood is my favorite picking/strumming combo song:
tabs here. It was covered by Nirvana, though it's an old folk song.

If you really enjoy picking and don't mind not singing, my favorite picking "licks" are in this Barry Sholder book. Every one from that book I've enjoyed.

I also have Ukulele Exercises for Dummies, but havent opened that one yet. Another book I am looking to purchase after these two are done is Fretboard Roadmaps

Mario Kart Love Song by Sam Hart. My fiancee and I discovered this in our early days of dating and find that it really is a good representation of us. I also love playing Mario Kart with her, so that's an added bonus.

I love harmonizing to this song with her in the car!

Best of Metallica Ukelele

The tab song book is available on Amazon. As are AC/DC and Black Sabbath

This Land Is Your Land

Crazy

Danny Boy

These were the first three songs I learned and they were quite easy.

This book (and the Leap Year book) is great for starting out - so many songs and you can learn more and more complex ones as you go.