Would You Like to Play Almost Any Rhythm With Only ONE Strumming Pattern? 🤔
Learn the Motions That Create Groove in This Ebook
Most people make strumming the ukulele way more difficult than it needs to be.
It’s simple really.
You know why? Because there is only one foundational strum that is used to play the majority of popular music. And you already know it!
Imagine this:
You hear a song on the radio and decide you want to figure out how to strum it on your ukulele. You listen to the song for a moment to feel the beat and then start moving your hand to the timing of the music. Intuitively you know which rhythms to incorporate into your strumming motion and, just like magic, you’re playing the song.
Sound too good to be true? It’s not.
I have seen this movement system help students strum better time and time again.
And it must be good because almost every single pro uke player uses some variation on this same exact motion to play world class music.
So what is this simple motion?
Down, Up
That’s it! With a simple down, up strum you can play along with almost any music.
And while it’s probably not the big secret you were expecting, the good news is that this system is accessible to any level ukulele player!
Even though it’s simple, strumming this way takes some know-how to implement. I want to help you supercharge your strumming with these techniques in my ebook and accompanying video lessons, Groove Ukulele.
The Best Way to Learn Strumming on the Ukulele
When I first learned to strum, I did it the way most people do: I moved my hand in the directions that the strum pattern showed. But without any reference for when I was supposed to strum, my rhythm sounded robotic.
There was no groove. My focus was on the strum directions and not the music.
That all changed as I improved and began to feel the timing of the music. With my hand locked to the rhythm, regardless of the strumming pattern, I knew I’d be on beat.
It wasn’t until years later when I began teaching strumming this way that I realized that I was one of the lucky few to figure this out.
Many casual players – even longtime students of the ukulele – struggle to consistently match their hand to what I call the timing “grid” since very few people teach it.
Without this foundation, people struggle to lock in and are left asking “teach me a strumming pattern!” They think that they must be missing the right ukulele strumming pattern when instead what they really need is the grid.
In Groove Ukulele, I focus on the underlying concept of getting on track with the rhythm. This is the key to everything. And anyone can do it!
What You’ll Learn
Despite seeming like a simple trick, the grid is the foundation for so many facets of strumming that I’ve managed to fill over 70 pages with instruction, diagrams, and how-to photos. There are also videos that demonstrate each concept.
You’ll start by getting up to speed with timing. This is a simple look at how to count and understand rhythm divisions using a ruler as a visual.
Then you’ll learn the fundamentals of strumming technique and how to lock your down, up motion to a steady eighth note pattern which is a basis for the rest of the book. You’ll learn to separate actually sounding the strings from a constant hand motion.
Once you can keep a steady motion and emphasis each beat confidently you’ll dive into arguably the most exciting part of the book: how to figure out the strumming pattern of a song.
In this section I’ve gotten permission from some of my awesome ukulele friends to showcase the strumming patterns from a handful of their songs, including:
- “Heart Shaped Tatoo” by James Hill
- “Sea Swing” by Neal Chin
- “Sunny Day” by Herb Ohta, Jr.
- “Summertime” by Victoria Vox
- “She’s My Girl” by Kris Fuchigami
- “Little Lucky” by Kelly Hyde
You’ll have a chance to use your newly found skills to figure out the strum yourself before looking at the provided pattern diagram.
To take things to the next level, you’ll get a handful of strum decorations like the chuck/chunk and fan strum/rasqueado, along with how to apply them to any strum pattern.
Finally, you can test your rhythmic feel with some advanced strum timings by dropping 16th notes and triplets into the grid along with how to manage odd time signatures like 3/4 and 6/8.
All in all, Groove Ukulele is intended to make you the strong, intuitive strummer you’ve always wanted to be.
What You Get
Groove Ukulele’s main component is a 70+ page PDF ebook. This instant download includes easy-to-follow written direction, strum diagrams, and images to illustrate the movements you need to make.
Low-res sample page
To supplement the written direction, I’ve created lesson videos to demonstrate most of the main concepts. You can also refer to them to hear how most of the strum examples should sound as well as play along in various exercises.
A Q&A comments section is provided so you can get your own questions answered by me and learn from what others have asked.
All in all, Groove Ukulele is a system that will help you learn how to strum and create your own rhythm. Why learn one strumming pattern when you can learn to make your own, suitable for any music?