Fact, it takes more than 30 days to learn the Ukulele

There are web sites and tutorials claiming it is possible to learn the ukulele in 30 days, of course proving participants are naive enough to believe this and then fish deep into their pockets for the cost of these on line lessons.  Here is a fact, unless you have prior experience with another string instrument, it is not possible to learn at an accelerated pace how to place the ukulele in 30 days.  Just as a little man I met in Gdansk said to me. It is generally agreed in music terms you only start to get any good once you have dedicated 10,000 hours of doing something.  The little fella I'm speak about is a professional opera singer and a musician, and Sparkling thinks he looks like Johnny Depp and insisted on calling him Johnny Depp as well. He didn't seem to mind at all. I must admit he appeared a little eccentric, but he also seemed to be a nice enough man. 

I began teaching myself, with the help of Youtube how to play the ukulele on the 25.12.12., it was this Christmas Day when Sparkling finally got me the instrument after a lot of pretty heavy hints.  I'd wanted to play it for months and months prior.  There have been days when I have failed to pick it up, but those days are pretty few. My passion for playing and learning the ukulele just continues without fail.  It is therefore 14 months of playing.  Yet every time I pick it up and look at a video I will learn something new, just as I am still learning the chords because it really does take a lot of practice to switch from one chord to the next. At the moment I'm in a phase of learning and transitioning from various different chords to the E chord.  It's a barre chord and requires a bit of finger gymnastics to get right.  The fact I am still learning and I will continue to learn to play this instrument and continue to learn more and more about music as I go along doesn't perturb me, it is exciting.  I don't want to learn to play the ukulele in 30 days, I know it will take years to be what I'd think is proficient but I don't care. However, if there are people out there thinking they can just pick up this beautiful little instrument and learn it in a few days then they are completely mistaken.  It doesn't just take a little bit of talent, it takes a whole lot of practice. Especially if you are coming from a place of zero music background other than listening to songs through the media.

However, all this said, of all the instruments in the world, if you want to pick one up and be able to play a tune in a short period of time then the ukulele is your instrument.  You'll feel immediately good because there will be something you will recognise, something which does actually sound like the music you wanted to mimic. Be aware though, this is mostly a method of rote learning it will not mean you'll know how to read music. It will not mean you actually understand what 4/4 time is or 3/4 times is either. To be truthful these things only come with practice.  It is possible to play a tune within an extremely short period of time when you have this little instrument in your hands, but it doesn't mean you can do much else with it.

So if someone hasn't said it before, give the little jumping flea a little respect and don't kid yourself you're Elvis Presley after 30 days because the King will come back and give you an arse whipping for sure.