Ukulele and a Burning Ring of Fire

This evening I have spent hours watching Youtube videos of people play Johnny Cash's Burning Ring of Fire. You name it I seen it, of course in all incidents they had a ukulele and the odd guitar rendition. The song is simple and short, the chords used are few and the strumming isn't overly difficult but to combine the whole lot and singing is a little harder. I also spent nearly two hours strumming away on Harvey and singing along. But I must admit it is hard to hear yourself when you have headphones on and are listening to someone else play the same song. Not to mention trying to keep in time with them as well. I saw, men, women, groups and one woman and her dog sing along to it.  I added a few viewings of the real thing in as well as Johnny sang it on different occasions during his music career.  There was one old man who liked to play a version of melody ukulele and it was amazing how his fingers fluttered over the strings he must of been an expert is all I can say. There are different three if not four things which all have to be synchronised together. Singing and preferably in some kind of tune, I also find it helps to wear a hat and kind of look the part so have an old cow-boy looking straw-like sun hat. It sort of helped on one try anyway.  The chords are simple, just G, C and D it is however a matter of playing them in the right order and to the right tempo, i.e. up, up, down, down, up strum. Checking out the videos kind of helped give me a better idea of timing, although I don't know why but I like to sing it slow. It's odd practising because you just can't help but listen to the strum, try and sing the rhyme and then get the chord changes right at the right time.  Watching the videos it's good to see people get it wrong as well, it means they are only human. However as for timing some did it a lot faster than others. Even watching Johnny play he seemed to play the song fast, it comes in just over two minutes long. Which is about half the time of a normal song.

This is two nights in a row I've been hitting the strings. I laughed again a couple of times and it is like a chemical release in my brain, I think the ukulele is a drug. The thing is drug users don't know it. Perhaps every NHS rehab clinic should give users a ukulele they'd learn how good a natural high can be, either that or I'm suffering from some manic disorder which only happens when I got my hands on Harvey. That sounds a bit odd saying it like that, Harvey the Uke I mean, nothing else. 

I think another couple of practice sessions and I'll of learnt the words off by heart, which will be a first. Come along Harvey, Ok, 1, 2, a 1, 2, 3, 4.