Home Cyber Layman Photo and Video Galleries ,,,,, You are already wondering: what does a ukulele have in the pages of Macitynet? If you stop at the fact that it is a musical instrument like many others, absolutely nothing. And if we want to trivialize it, after all it is nothing more than a piece of wood with four strings and few mechanical parts: it does not have Bluetooth and not even an electrical system to connect it to an iPhone or an iPad with some accessories like IK's iRig. Multimedia.
Remaining on this line of thought we could talk about iRig Acoustic but in that case it would be a test on this accessory and not on the ukulele, the musical instrument that we have received as a test from Andoer in recent weeks and that we have learned to play. … thanks to some applications available on iPhone and iPad.
Why Andoer's ukulele is a good training ship
The writer has a past partly immersed in the world of music, between the discontinuous study of the guitar and a more concentrated and intense study of the piano (with some sporadic study on the harmonica), which then resulted in a few years of occasional concerts in central Italy. . There is therefore sufficient experience behind us to be able to evaluate the ukulele under test with the right weights and measures, which we believe is more than enough to get closer to the instrument and subsequently understand if it may be worth investing in the future on a professional quality one (and in this case you will have to shift your attention to a specialist shop) or make it enough to spend a few carefree moments alone or in company.
After all, it costs € 45.99 and in this price range it is among the best of its kind for a number of reasons that we will list later.
As did
There are at least five different versions of ukulele (sopranino, soprano, concert, tenor and baritone) which differ in keyboard length and body size. The one under test is the most common 21 '' four-string soprano : the body is made of wood, the manufacturer writes mahogany but we are not able to check it out. In any case, what you perceive when handling it is that the case is very light but well finished, starting from the painting that recalls the natural color of the wood and its veins. It is smooth and pleasant to touch.
Apparently more robust is the neck whose fingerboard, like the bridge, is made of rosewood, according to the manufacturer. One of the things to look out for when buying a guitar or a similar instrument in general is precisely the linearity of the neck: even a slightly curved neck or one that has some slight dents will negatively affect the sound of the instrument, especially when the strings are pressed into the frets. close to the curvature. In the case of our sample, the neck is perfect from this point of view, while we have noticed a work that is perhaps a little approximate in the polishing of the frets: cleanly cut, some on the upper edge protrude very little, less than half a millimeter, but just enough to feeling your finger “scratch” when you touch them.
The tuners are very good and manage to hold the tuning quite well. In this sense, the strings make the difference, which certainly sound good but by replacing them with new ones, the leap in quality should be perceptible. However for our rehearsals we limited ourselves to playing the ukulele as it comes home and we can confirm that some strings lose their tuning slightly within 24 hours. We are talking about a slight loss, in the order of half a tone in the most desperate cases, and which can be corrected by ear (for those who are capable) or with a tuner (also via smartphone app) in a few seconds for each string.
How it sounds
It is clear that whoever is aiming for a future as a concert performer at “La Scala” in Milan must look elsewhere. This ukulele, we reiterate it, is an instrument that is worth what it costs and is more suitable for spending a joking evening with friends or for bringing a child closer to music. However, it sounds very good, even with the strings it comes home with: the sound box amplifies the sound well, whether it is a chord or the single plucking of a string. Only the last two keys want to nitpick, especially the last one, that is the one closest to the speaker hole, that is not perfect: the sound is slightly “dirty” and its amplification is subdued compared to to the rest.
Anyone can learn
The ukulele is among the simplest stringed instruments to play. It has only four strings and the frets are very close to each other, even a child would not find it difficult to play it, getting good results after a few days at most. To make a comparison with the guitar, it takes a lot less force to crush the strings and get a clean sound, moreover most of the most common chords are obtained through much simpler combinations. Returning to the comparison with the guitar, for example C major in the most common position, which is obtained by plucking the strings and pressing three of them in three different frets, in the ukulele it is obtained by plucking the four strings and pressing only one, in a position between the 'other much easier.
The ingredients of the winning recipe: commitment, a few weeks and a few apps
It would have been too easy to say that we were able to play it in just a few hours. Those who already know how to play the guitar, even only the most common chords, have a clear advantage. For this reason we have put the ukulele in the hand of one of our tenants who has never touched a musical instrument: in short, music has always been limited to listening to it.
If it is true that playing the ukulele is very easy it is equally important to say that without commitment and good will you do not go anywhere: especially at the beginning it is easy to get discouraged but if you train consistently, even a few tens of minutes a day. , the results will be seen after a few days.
How to tune it
The most popular tuning for soprano ukulele is GCEA (4Sol, 3Do, 2Mi, 1La, where the numbers correspond to the string). Those who want to do it by ear can help themselves with an app like MiniPiano, which allows you to play the single notes on a virtual piano.
The simplest way is to install Ukulele Tuner + which uses the iPhone and iPad microphone to listen to the pitch of the string and help you step by step in the correct tuning. In this perspective, generic applications such as GuitarTuna can also work, which offers a guided system for the tuning of guitar, bass and ukulele.
Learning with apps and the Internet, today you can
Years ago it was unthinkable, but today it is completely possible: learning to play a musical instrument without putting your nose out of the house is within everyone's reach thanks to the Internet and the applications that we find on the stores. But also in this sense, the discourse is similar to that of the choice of the instrument: if it is true that for an excellent instrument the amount to invest is much higher than that of the ukulele under test and it is equally important to rely on the advice of experts when buying perhaps in specialized shops, even to learn an instrument, no application can ever replace the teaching of a master.
First of all because it can point out any errors that, if not corrected immediately, we will carry with us for a very long time (and will also be more difficult to correct in the future), moreover the experience that a musician has behind him is transmitted lesson after lesson, even in little things, especially when topics and lessons are advanced.
However, to start and lay the foundations, especially with a much more intuitive instrument like the ukulele, there are excellent applications that can put us on the right path to be able to complete even an entire song in the space of two weeks, as demonstrated by the results obtained by our tenant we were talking about earlier.
One of the best is iUke which not only shows the finger position of all the instruments, but explains step by step how to play some of the best known songs. There are also even more targeted applications, such as Yousician which, through weekly, monthly or annual subscriptions, makes thousands of lessons available, also partially correcting any errors thanks to the possibility of listening to what we are playing through the microphone of the iPhone and iPad.
Also very good Learn & Practice Ukulele Music Lessons Exercises, which offers exercises of increasing difficulty to learn how to play the ukulele in a short time.
However, it's not just the apps that put us on the right track. A simple Google search can work wonders, without forgetting YouTube, where you can find tutorials for all difficulties: through videos the approach is even better as it is like having a teacher always available that we can stop when we want to be repeated. the same speech even hundreds of times.
Conclusions and price
But ease aside, Andoer's ukulele we've been testing over the last few weeks has lived up to expectations. It is well built, plays very well and is a great compromise to try the instrument and approach the world of music with the ukulele without spending a fortune. At the same price it is not difficult to come across tools with a much more approximate construction and even poor materials (it is not difficult to come across plywood cases), which give all the impression of giving in at the slightest fall. In short, Andoer's 21 '' soprano ukulele is more than enough for a few carefree evenings in the company of your favorite artist in headphones. If interested, it is available on Amazon and costs 45.99 euros. The only drawback? a carrying case is missing, so don't throw the box away.
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