You have gone thru the basics of playing a Ukulele, and with practice, practice, practice and should become a great player if not even a virtuoso!
I am going to leave you with my top 10 list of beginner's tips for the ukulele:
- Buy a good Ukulele and NOT A TOY! I feel this is as important as anything because if buy a piece of junk you will play junk.
- Refer to the figures on how to correctly hold your Ukulele standing or sitting.
- It is of utmost importance to have fun on this journey. This small instrument is a blast to play as I constantly amaze myself what can be played on it. I regularly will rearrange a song I hear on guitar or piano for my Ukulele. The sky is truly the limit.
- Ensure you have the basics covered in this book. I know you want to go from 0 to 100 in two seconds but do not try or you will become disheartened. You had to crawl before you walked, right?
- Proper strumming influences your sound more than you know when beginning. Besides strumming you can palm mute and then slap the strings to get down and funky.
- Starting as a beginner play slowly. This will also assist with chord changes. Practice this with lots of chord changes. Your goal is accuracy and not speed as the speed will naturally come and will not the other way around.
- Try playing along with songs or better yet with other players. Your ability will climb exponentially when you play with others. It's called competition and it works with the Ukulele just as with any sport.
- Do exercises and practice fingering. This will make you more accurate and you guessed it, faster.
At the end of the day, this is supposed to be a fun-filled journey. Playing the ukulele should bring you peace and joy. Do not make it into a job where you feel like you have to practice every day. Music is all about staying true to yourself and staying in love with the practice of it. I wish you well, and I hope that you found everything that you needed in these pages. I have made sure that you have all of the necessary material to get started and a few great diagrams to give you a clearer picture.
Good luck, and have fun!