Comparison of ukulele sounds

20 Nov 2011

Comparison of ukulele sounds

It struck me that I have quite a few ukuleles, and I do get asked often whether a certain cheap uke sounds good or whether its worth paying top money for a high end instrument.


So I thought I would do a video showing the sound of all my acoustic instruments.

They are all set up as well as possible and are using either Worth or Aquila strings throughout.  I've tried to play the same sequences as well - a bit of strumming, a bit of picking to make for a fair comparison.

Let your own ears tell you what you think!



The obvious bad ones to my ears are the Vintage and the Mahalo. The Mahalo in particular is pretty much un fixable economically - when it arrived, not only is the bridge not set accurately, but a couple of the frets are misplaced too.  Before I get flamed, that isn't to say ALL Mahalo ukes are bad - but it does highlight that when buying cheap you really need to try to play the instrument you are buying first (or get a shop to look over it, set it up, and if appropriate, fit better strings)

Love to hear your comments!

4 comments :

  1. Nice work Barry.... can you maybe post the chords / tab so we can video respond with our own ukes?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Julesd - the chord strumming is just the intro to this tune

    http://ukulelehunt.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/08/sisterkate.pdf

    Haven't tabbed the picking but will try to get to work on that

    ReplyDelete
  3. and big phat thanks you to you mr bazmaz. can't believe how good they all sound together, especially the dolphin and the flukes. i've played enough flukes and fleas to know they are sweet, but the extended demonstration was well worth it.

    ReplyDelete

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