Mastering Chords for the Ukulele: Mastering Chords and Chord Progressions for the Ukulele: 1

This book is ideal for ANY ukulele player who wants to learn chords in a musical context and develop their musicality. For a beginner who has grasped the basics and a handful of chords used in simple songs, this is an excellent answer to the question 'Where Next?' and 'What will be most useful?' There are a lot of really great ukulele beginners books out there but when it comes to chords and chord progression books those ones tend to vary from extremes either 'How to play anything with just 4 chords' to 'How to play every chord there is! And More!' Another area lacking, even in my extensive search of the internet are chord progressions presented in a useable format for ukulele. However, all my wishes were answered in this unique and wonderfully useful book by Brad Benefield.Why learn chords this way? Based on my humble experience (from playing guitar) and as stated by Brad it makes learning chords easier to grasp when they are played in the context of a chord progression. For instance, the first song you learned on the ukulele probably taught you more about the chords you were trying to master than when you started out trying to learn each of those chords individually. A song is based on a chord progression and using chords in context helps you develop all those little tricks that make learning and playing chords easier e.g. guide fingers, switching fingering, whether to use the thumb at the back of the neck etc… I also find it takes the stress out of those difficult tricky chords since you don't feel compelled to concentrate on those to the exclusion of everything else; as if you may have to play this one chord for the entirety of a song! And since in a chord progression the aim is to keep everything flowing, quite often solutions to those tricky chords present themselves through their connections with other chords or at least can be managed until the muscles of the hand, finger position memory, tricks/shortcuts/solutions (miracles!) develop… And on that last point, chord progressions are a great tool to use as exercises to develop the hand muscles strength and stamina in a sustainable way with an efficiency of effort (i.e. safely and comfortably) as well as the rhythm side of playing i.e. strumming! It should also be mentioned especially given the way that Brad has presented chord progressions in this book that learning chords in this context will develop your 'musicality' - there are such a vast range of possibilities here: playing in different Keys to suit others, picking out the chords/chord progression of a song you want to learn (ear training), song writing/composing,… to name a few…The book itself presents material in a simple, concise and straightforward format; though there is an attention to detail which makes it so very usable. For instance, no matter where you are in the book the chord progressions always have chord box diagrams above them; so you always know what the chord looks like and don't have to look up less memorisable shapes in another book. Each progression is short and concise, presented in rhythmic bars with just enough to work on and develop musicality at the same time. In this way each exercise can take you through a series of progressions of a particular type in every key using most of the chords being learned. Each progression for each key flows nicely to the next within an exercise, which is a very satisfying feeling when you finish each exercise. The pacing for each exercise is spot on, based on concise progressions; some books introduce chord progressions almost in the format of a full song which can make them long winded and tedious to complete; not so in this book and in addition to brevity Brad has notated different rhythmic patterns for exercises to keep it all interesting.An important premise of the book is to enable the player to tackle every Key of a song. And this is where the less is more approach has been really applied to the book. Instead of an overwhelming amount of chords to learn there are just 36! (12 majors, 12 minors and 12 dominant 7ths in each key) What's also really great is that Brad has carefully selected useable open chord forms - which give a full sound and can be added to in future studies (e.g. embellishments, chord melodies…) Also notable is attention to guide fingering and really helpful suggestions are indicated within many progressions. It should also be noted that recorded demonstrations of each exercise are free to download from the Spotted Belly book website - which is in itself excellent; there are resources and other interactive content accompanying other books by the publisher.And so to using the book, I have only being playing ukulele a few months and must confess I came to the ukulele wanting to play notes and read music! (On a side note, Lil Rev's 'Hal Leonard Ukulele Method' is absolutely perfect for such an aspiration - you don't get introduced to chords until halfway through that book!) However, once you pick up a ukulele you soon realise 'I want to STRUM this!' 'I want to play chords too!' 'I want to play songs! The Blues, fingerstyle, classical… you name it!' It just so happened that the first song I learnt to play on the ukulele was one I transcribed myself ('Neither Old Nor Young' Kandace Spring) I could not find chords for this song on the internet BUT it just so happened that the handful of chords I had learned worked! I had a sense of the chord progression much to my surprise and satisfaction. So now I want to learn a useful range of chords and how chords work in progressions and different keys. As mentioned because of the concise (but nevertheless comprehensive!) presentation of progressions in each exercise I really feel that the book is satisfying both those needs (today I found myself keenly listening for the 'tension' created by dominant 7th chords and comparing this to subdominant chords in progressions… sometimes it's just those simple things in life… if only…)The first chapter of the book has been very enjoyable and doable for a beginner like me: the basic forms of the progressions are presented in the most commonly used chords. A lot of ground is covered here and you realise that when you get to Chapter 2 and make a start on those 36 chords in their entirety, that actually you have learned a great many of them; which helped soften the look of some of those new trickier chords! On the latter and following the advice Brad gives, it is easier tackling the less familiar chords in the context of a chord progression. Having tackled the first exercise in Chapter 2 with chords in all keys, I feel there is 'a light on in the distance' with those trickier chords. But what really helps too is knowing that once the current exercise comes together, I'll be using the same chords in the next exercises throughout the chapter.Sometimes all I feel up to, like so many of us at times, is something not too taxing on my concentration skills… a good strum on the ukulele and maintainable practice time, little but often. Nevertheless, I want that to be in some ways still useful time spent with the ukulele as I am still a learner/beginner and keen to keep the momentum going. That's what is really useful about the book at present: I can go through the exercises that have become more familiar and pay attention to other details e.g. switching between chords smoothly, clear sounding chords, trying a fingerstyle pattern…. Like doing a physical exercise e.g. sit-ups (which I should try!..), something you do not really have to think too deeply about but you know is good for you (or your musicality in the case of the book). Indeed, the way the book is presented would make these great warm up exercises (aerobics) for the ukulele! As suggested by Brad, using a metronome with the exercises is a great way to learn. I have been using a great Android App called 'Strumming Partner Pro' which simultaneously gives voiced strum directions, metronome clicks, and voice count and is fully programmable. I have inputted some of the rhythmic patterns and suggestions so that I can use them to vary playing progressions across the book.This book is among those on continuous rotation on my music stand. I can't wait for the proposed volume 2. One last thing, it should be noted that this book is such good value for money, currently as I write less than £5 on Amazon.

If you're starting ukulele, and you've never played any instruments before...Buy it.