Here are some links to sites we recommend:
Alligator Boogaloo Ukulele Pages
This site has chord charts, tabs and some sound files.
http://www.alligatorboogaloo.com/Aloha Y’All
Uke player, teacher, song writer, hula dancer in San Antonio has a page of uke clubs in various locations. The photos pages are fun – particularly starting at page 5.
http://www.alohayall.net
B.C. Ukulele.org
This site has links to the Langley Ukulele Ensemble, Island Ukuleles (Victoria), Pacific Ukes (Campbell River), James Hill’s website, and info about the annual BC Ukulele Workshop in Victoria.
http://www.bcukulele.org/
Beginners encouragement pages
I just got to three important rules on this Japanese site: Change difficult chord to easy one. Any you can’t play skip that part. Sing loudly.
http://www.st.rim.or.jp/~kunisige/eukulele_f.html
Bernadette Teaches Music
Bernadette Mata hosted her first Canadian meetup — Strum in the True North — in May 2024 here in Vancouver. You can check out her instructional videos for beginner ukulele players at https://www.youtube.com/@BernadetteTeachesMusic, including her 30 Day Uke Challenge.
Catfish’s Closet
This site features great photos of ukuleles and uke players. Be sure to check out Jack Hall’s Matchstick Uke and the Cigar Box ukes page.
http://www.catfish1952.com/
Chordie.com
This site has a ton of music, and you can set up songs so that they show chords for a C tuned Uke, and you can create your own songbooks. There is a function to transpose chords if they are too hard or if the pitch is too high for your voice. You get to these functions once you click on a particular song.
http://www.chordie.com
Classes near Vancouver, BC
Classes are now listed on our Classes page.
Clubs and Jams near Vancouver, BC
Clubs in Vancouver and other places are now listed on our Around Town page.
Coustii.com
Well-written and well-laid-out beginner’s guide to playing the ukulele. Colleen Kinsey describes herself as Editor in Chief of Coustii, not sure if she does the writing.
https://coustii.com/ukulele/
Fleamarket Music – Jim Beloff’s site
Jim Beloff does lots to foster a strong community of uke enthusiasts, and his site has a variety of interactive areas for visitors to enjoy. You can add yourself to the Player Directory and find other players in your area or create player groups. Join in a conversation at the Bulletin Board and post messages about any topic. Sell your uke wares or make a purchase in the Marketplace. Get an expert’s answer as Chuck “Frets” Fayne answers your questions regarding vintage ukes on the Collector’s Uke Yak.
http://www.fleamarketmusic.com/
George Formby Society
The George Formby Society home page
http://www.georgeformby.co.uk/
Got a Ukulele
This site is run by Barry Maz in Great Britain. It has a world-wide list of uke clubs and a lot of information, including a page with reviews of a lot of ukuleles and ukulele accessories.
http://www.gotaukulele.com/
Guido Heistek’s Music Lessons Vancouver
A member of our Vancouver Ukulele Circle, Guido has “set up shop” teaching ukulele. He teaches guitar and harmonica as well.
http://www.ukuleleinthedark.com
Hawaii Music Supply online instruction
This YouTube site has short videos on a comparison of the different ukulele sizes and on chords and strumming.
http://www.youtube.com/user/HawaiiMusicSupply
Hawaii Ukulele Guide – Bounty Music
Links to instrument sites, how to play sites, musicians’ sites – LOTS of links
http://www.ukes.com/ukulele-links/
Halifax Ukulele Gang
These folks have some songbooks.
https://halifaxukulelegang.wordpress.com/hug-songbook/
James Hill – Canada’s Ukulele Virtuoso
This wonderful uke player is practically local, if you consider Langley local and if you ignore the fact that he now lives in the backwoods of Nova Scotia. This is the official website of Canada’s `ukulele virtuoso’ James Hill. Here you’ll find news updates, audio samples and videos, CD purchasing, an online press kit and contact information.
James Hill (jameshillmusic.com)
You can also learn ukulele from James on his https://www.uketropolis.com/ page.
Langley Ukulele Ensemble
The renowned Langley Ukulele Ensemble, where James Hill grew up, has developed a reputation in Canada and abroad for musical excellence. You can read about the group, check out their calendar, recordings and photos, and get info about their annual September ukulele conference.
http://www.langleyukes.com/
Live ‘Ukulele.com
This site by Brad Bordessa has tabs, reviews and interviews; of particular interest is the page on Constructing Ukulele Chords.
http://liveukulele.com/
Nicole Alosinac Luthiery
Instrument repair and construction. If your uke needs repair or needs to be tuned up to get better sound out, this person comes highly recommended. By appointment only.
http://www.nicolealosinacluthiery.com
Majesty Ukuleles – Yusuke Kawakami’s site
Yusuke, a member of our uke group, makes beautiful ukuleles here in North Vancouver.
Y. Kawakami Guitars (ykawakami.com)
Mel Bay Publications
They have songbooks for ukulele.
https://www.melbay.com/Products/CategoryCenter/U01/Ukulele.aspx
The songbook that Cynthia showed us:
http://www.melbay.com/AdvancedSearch/Default.aspx?SearchTerm=20250BCD
musictheory.net
This site has apparently never heard of the ukulele, but it could be of interest if you’re eager to learn more about music in general. It has interactive tutorials and lessons and charts to explain and coach all aspects of music theory. You can print off custom staff paper. It also has a neat ‘pop-up’ piano keyboard flash player, handy for transposing a song into a different key. You can even download it for offline viewing on either a Windows or Mac OS.
http://www.musictheory.net
Notecannons
Vanukes member Colin McCubbin’s non-commercial website offers a graphic pictorial history of the National brand name instruments.
http://www.notecannons.com
Ralph Shaw – King of the Ukulele
Ralph Shaw’s home page. Ralph is our Vancouver Ukulele Circle’s fearless leader and founder, and he’s a well-known performer around town. As well as having lots of fans among the CBC radio crowd, Ralph is also a big name in the teaching and festival circuit. He has performance info and his CDs and DVDs for sale on the site. Ralph has a weekly newsletter called The Ukulele Entertainer: Powerful Pointers to Perk up your Playing. You can subscribe at http://www.ralphshaw.ca/Free_Newsletter .
http://www.ralphshaw.ca
Reddit Ukulele Forum
A social networking forum on ukuleles. It’s not clear who runs it. There’s a FAQ for new players, and over 5000 readers.
http://www.reddit.com/r/ukulele/
Ruby’s Ukes
Ruby’s Ukes, in Vancouver, BC, is on pause as of the end of the spring, 2024 term.
www.rubysukes.ca
Seattle Ukulele Players Association (SUPA)
Seattle Ukulele Players Association (SUPA) was founded in 2003 to promote fellowship, entertainment, performance and education among ukulele enthusiasts in the Puget Sound region. They already have way more members than we do and they’re a great group and we’re jealous. If you’re going to be in Seattle, check out their site for song circle locations and special events.
http://www.seattleukulele.org
Sheep Entertainment Ukulele Chords with sound and Lyrics
Totally cool Uke Chord Finder – note you have to first select the size and tuning of your uke. And note too that they show dots up off the end of the fretboard for open strings.
http://www.sheep-entertainment.nl/ukulele/chordfinder.html
Southern Ukulele Store (England)
This is a ukulele store in Bournemouth, England. Wouldn’t it be great to have a store like this in Vancouver? http://www.southernukulelestore.co.uk/
TaroPatch.net forums
Discussion boards related to the ukulele have gone dormant. Among other forums on this site are ones on slack key & Hawaiian music, and sale items.
Taropatch.net
“The Return of the Jumping Fleas“, SF Gate Article
This San Francisco Chronicle’s November 25, 2007 article on the resurgence of the ukulele, featuring the Berkeley Ukulele Club, uke maker and club founder Michael DaSilva, and quite a bit of world ukulele history, is educational as well as entertaining and well-written.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/11/25/CMEQT4UH0.DTL
Thomas Edison’s Attic
Old radio programs with Roy Smeck
http://wfmu.org/playlists/shows/8210
Tiki King
Tiki King’s Ukulele School has everything you wanted to know about Ukuleles, but were afraid to ask! Fun facts, songs, tips, charts, a lesson, and more! He says he’ll have you up and playing in minutes.
http://www.tikiking.com/uke_stuff.html
Uke Can Do It
Comox’s Ruth Rae has created a series of instructional videos for beginner uke players, available from youtube at https://youtu.be/iog65YR9RrE.
Uketube
A blog-style site that claims to feature the best ukulele videos. Every day, the UkeToob video of the day is published and available for your favorite podcast-catching-software.
http://www.uketoob.com/
Ukulele Hall of Fame Museum
Lots of CDs, videos, books etc available from the museum shop. This non-profit org. was set up to document, preserve and promote the history of the ukulele, its players and makers as well as to inspire and engage people everywhere in the perpetuation of the ukulele and ukulele music.
http://www.ukulele.org/
Ukulele Mike – Mike Lynch: MusicTeacher2010 on YouTube
A musician, composer, and music educator in the Seattle, Ukulele Mike has posted several tunes in a very effective lesson format: he gives the key, shows tricky chords or strums, then plays the tune with the words and chords appearing over the video of him playing. He also has some lessons on strumming and finger-picking styles.
http://www.youtube.com/user/MusicTeacher2010
Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain
The Ukulele Orchestra, really in Great Britain, is a group of all-singing, all-strumming Ukulele players, who use instruments bought with loose change, and who believe that all genres of music are available for reinterpretation, as long as they are played on the Ukulele. They have two videos and many sound clips to give you an idea of what they’re like.
http://www.ukuleleorchestra.com/
Ukulele Tabs
This site is useful for making song sheets. Their song library is pretty large, and there are often multiple user-submitted versions of the same song, so if you’re not totally happy with the chords somebody came up with for a song, you can see if some other user did a better job of it. Users can give star ratings to each submission, so you can see if the 5-star one really is better than the 4-star one you might be currently viewing. There are chord charts and a several tools, including a tuner. There is a page with a lot of ukulele clubs world-wide, mostly their Facebook sites, at https://www.ukulele-tabs.com/clubs.html. It is an ad-supported site, and the ads are very prominent.
Ukulele Tabs and Chords: Songs on Your Uke (ukulele-tabs.com)
Ukulele Tricks – Ukulele tuner
This site has lessons, chords, an explanation of scales (in the blog) and more, and it offers a ukulele tuner. You select which size instrument in which tuning and then turn on the string you want to tune.
http://www.ukuleletricks.com/ukulele-tuner/
Ukulele Underground
Song library and video tutorials, available on a monthly or yearly subscription, with some videos available for no charge, including some visual playalongs, with notations on a fretboard showing the notes being played.
http://ukuleleunderground.com/
Ukulelia
Ukulele potpourri – Calls itself the World’s Greatest Ukulele Weblog. Mentions events of interest even locally, and has tons of links to uke makers, dealers, people.
http://www.ukulelia.com/
UkuWorld / UkeTabs
This was recommended by one of our members, who wrote of the Ukutabs section: “I really enjoy this site and it’s features like auto scroll, being able to adjust the font size and being able to save songs to a favorite’s list.” It also has chord charts, a tuner, a note finder, lots of stuff.
http://ukuworld.com/ or http://ukutabs.com
