In general, many people use their ukulele to play the chords of the songs. But did you know that you can also play melodies? Read on and I’ll show you how you can make your own melodies!
A ukulele can be used to play chords in songs but also to play melodies. Now I will show you a way to compose your own melodies and also improve your songwriting skills!
The C tuning
I assume your ukulele is in tune and in this lesson I will base my article and note names on C tuning. This means your highest pitched first string is tuned to A, second string to E, third string to C and the fourth string is G. Some people tune their ukulele to D, which means the strings are one step higher. .
Learn the notes of the third string.
We will start by learning the note C of the third string. You can play this note by pulling on the string without pressing down on a fret. The next note you need to learn is the D note. To play this note, you need to press down on the second fret of the third string. You can play the strings with the thumb of your right hand.
time to compose
Now that you have two notes at your disposal, you can start practicing your composition. You may think that two notes is very little material to compose, but it’s a great exercise to start getting the most out of two notes. You can vary the rhythms and the number of times you play a note.
more notes
Well, if you’ve tried using these two notes to create melodies and rhythms, you now have three more notes that you can use. They are on the second string. E is on the second open string, F is on the first fret, and on the third fret you’ll find G. Now you have a total of five notes to use to create your own melodies.
I suggest that you try to learn the names of the notes while playing in preparation for the song that you will soon learn to play. A tip is also to use the index finger of the left hand to play the notes at the first fret, the middle finger for the second fret and so on.
Learn Mary had a little lamb
This melody can be played with the notes you have learned. Here is the melody:
EDCDEEEDDDEGG
EDCDEEEEDDEDC
Try to figure out for yourself how long individual notes should be.
The C major scale
On the first string you will have the note A on the open string, B on the second string and C on the third string. You can now play a C major scale from the open third string to the third fret of the first string. Here are the notes that start with C on the third string:
CDEFGABC
This means that you will have enough notes to compose many types of melodies and also play popular songs!
You can find many inspiring ukulele examples on the internet. Many uke players have clips on YouTube, for example. By trying to compose your own melodies on your ukulele, you will be practicing your fingers, your brain and your heart!
