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Ever Wondered How To Sing And Play Ukulele At The Same Time?
Learning to play an instrument is tough enough, but what about attempting to sing and play the ukulele at the same time? It’s really not as hard as it sounds!
Ever questioned how you can sing and play the ukulele at the same time?
Learning to sing and play the ukulele at the same time takes some practice, however, you’ll discover that once you learn, it’s very rewarding and fulfilling!
Sing while playing is an entirely other experience to express yourself.
Do you know that the ukulele descended from an instrument known as the machete delivered to Hawaii by Portuguese sailors? The last queen of Hawaii, “Liliuokalani,” translated the ukulele as, “Gift from afar”.
This gift is enjoyable to play, however, singing while playing it makes it a much more enjoyable and exciting experience!
The ukulele is definitely no exception. Learning how you can sing and play the uke simultaneously is quite a bit like learning how you can pat your stomach and rub your head at the same time. Or is it pat your head and rub your stomach? I don’t know, however, you get the idea it may be exhausting!
Prepare To Use Your Metronome While Practicing
Before you get began with the steps you need to get your metronome out and ready to go.
Each good ukulele teacher will inform you that if you wish to learn good timing and rhythm with the uke, you need to practice using a metronome. To make the most effective use of one, you may begin the song out at a slower tempo, which is very useful for songs that have a faster rhythm. You’ll often begin at a tempo of 65-70 beats per minute and continue to boost the speed from there as you get comfier.
The benefit of a metronome is that it’ll maintain your timing in check. You’ll know immediately if you’re strumming is on time or not.
Once you begin practicing with a metronome, you need to know that the longer you play with it, the more you start to respect how it improves your playing over time.
The more you use it, not only will your timing improve, but you’ll quickly be capable to tell where your strengths are and identifying areas that may use more work.
The excellent news is that this sets your timing and tempo at a significantly better level. One other beauty of the metronome is the way it provides the beginner with a sense of progress as they play, which is extremely necessary for motivation.
To make the perfect use of the metronome, in this case, take one specific part of the song and practice it as much as the correct tempo.
So hopefully you’ve your metronome prepared. Learning to maintain time while singing on the ukulele is among the most essential habits of an excellent uke player.
How to Sing and Play Ukulele at the Same Time
1. Practice Singing The Whole Song With One Chord And A Simple Strumming Pattern
To start with, your left brain controls your right hand. So in case you are right-handed like most individuals and are approaching the uke, you’ll handle strumming pretty well.
However, if you begin forming ukulele chords with the left hand, your right brain kicks in, and suddenly you’re plunged right into a chaotic world of trying to maintain up while both sides of your mind are firing off stimuli and building synapses.
And you then wish to try to sing. What part of the brain controls that, the middle part? Suddenly, playing the uke turns into more like juggling than a simple strum pattern and playing.
To make this process less complicated, break it down into bite-sized chunks. All you need to do is hold down your first chord and sing along while strumming the primary strum pattern of the song. You see little children doing this on a regular basis. They get an instrument and strum away, singing whatever song their little heart desires. This actually is the first step to learning the way to play and sing. It’s so easy that almost anybody can do it.
Let’s take a look at a really simple song that will help you get the image. Under are the lyrics and chords for “Froggie Went A-Courtin’.” I’d recommend you take a look at Bob Dylan’s version of the song. It’s a quite simple tune with just three-chord changes. This song is in the key of D. Attempt playing through the song and simply playing the D chord.
Froggie Went a-Courtin
2. Practice Singing The Entire Song With Two Chords And A Simple Strumming Pattern
The second step to mastering playing an instrument and singing at the same time is to add the second most popular chord within the song. In case you are playing a song in G, and D is the second most popular chord, then the one chord change you have to worry about at this point goes from the G to the D chord. Observe the change several times till you feel comfortable with it, and then go for singing the song.
If you play through the song this way, you give little thought to the strumming pattern or the G chord since you already practiced it (and you don’t really suppose a lot about the singing either because you practiced that too).
You’ll find that lyrics you’re unfamiliar with would possibly throw you off a little, but the more you sing the song, the simpler it’ll be to memorize the lyrics. If you have to take a moment and read the lyrics, it should assist you when you sing. Now the only thing to worry about is changing chords from the G to the D.
When you study the essential ukulele chords, you’ll be set to handle most songs. In the above song, the following chord that’s popular is the A7 chord. Play through the song and add the change to the A7.
3. Practice Singing The Whole Song With Three Chords And A Simple Strumming Pattern
Now that you’ve mastered going from the first chord to the second chord, including the third chord shouldn’t be too much of a struggle. Whether it is, simply keep at it and go slowly over the parts which are hard for you.
Repeat them several times till you’ve it down. Before you realize it, you’ll be singing and playing most of the song with ease. I like to recommend learning various strum patterns, with that method you’re equipped for learning more songs.
In “Froggie,” the last chord is a G chord. Practice through the song once more and add the G chord while you sing and play.
4. If There Are Other Playing Techniques, Follow The Above Practice Routine
Last but not least, there are sometimes other elements of a song that might be tricky.
Does the song switch rhythm for a certain portion, perhaps the bridge or the chorus? Does the song require some difficult finger-picking patterns on a certain part of it? Are there different more complicated chords that provide you with some grief?
Don’t worry, we all experience these things in our studying process. The key is to simply maintain working at the hard parts, including one part at a time till you’ve mastered each playing the track and singing it.
In the last run-through of the track, try adding all the chords and maybe add some finger-picking to provide yourself with an additional exercise!
So there you’ve got four simple steps that can assist you to play your uke (or any instrument, actually) and sing at the same time. I hope you find this useful.
What will really assist you is having a qualified teacher walk you through how to break down the tougher portions into smaller bite-sized chunks, and TakeLessons is the proper place to get a teacher who can assist you become the best ukulele player you could be!
Once you have it down, attempt to sing and play some pirate songs on the ukulele!
Take it a Step Further – Play with Other People
You’d be shocked at how a lot of enjoyable it can have a jam session with a couple of buddies. Playing the ukulele with others can encourage you to continue learning the different techniques of the uke.
Let’s say you need to learn how to play the favored ukulele track, “Someplace over the Rainbow” by Israel IZ, which is a piece of reasonably simple music you could study in two days with the appropriate tutorial.
With buddies, you may all bounce ideas off one another about the way to play it better, which will additionally inspire the group to continue learning how to play.
What’s the easiest way to learn it? Learning to play with others additionally teaches you great group-building skills. You never know, you may even decide to form a band. Additionally, this exposes you to totally different songs, and you’ll play with people of various skills.
Outside these benefits, playing with different people could make you feel good. Playing music releases endorphins, which assist with higher pain tolerance and even assist you to experience a mild opiate high. The truth is, researchers from Oxford University conducted research that discovered this. Robin Dunbar, a psychology professor, measured endorphin release via pain tolerance.
In a single group test, he selected individuals who had returned from a church service with plenty of clapping and communal singing. He found that the people from the more lively musical session usually had a lot higher pain tolerance than those that may have attended a calmer Anglican church meeting.
Conclusion
In case you wish to become better at playing and singing at the same time, one of the best things you can do is continue to practice with your strum pattern and work on your rhythm. The more comfy and consistent you’re along with your strumming, the less you need to give it some thought, which implies you can direct more attention to your singing.
