Ukulele Aerobics for All Levels Beginner to Advanced | 40-Week Practice Program with Online Audio | Hal Leonard Ukulele Book for Technique Fingerstyle Strumming and More

I teach the ukulele to folks, on an amateur basis, purely for fun. I would highly recommend this book after first going through one of the very basic ukulele books; not as a student's first book. I would also suggest a good basic song book, such as the the Daily Ukulele. As I went through the book, I found myself learning and re-learning quite a lot. And, I have been playing string instruments a long time- about 50 years. Due to arthritis in my very small hands, the guitars, and other instruments, have long been retired. Pros- This book is really terrific for skills building. It has a unique incremental skills-based approach and one progresses through daily tasks and practice. It's set up into 40 weeks, with a short lesson for each day of each week. It is well organized, thoughtful, and quite frankly an amazing amount of fun. Some daily tasks will take less than the suggested 20 minutes of daily practice, while others will take longer to master. If you do the exercises, and are disciplined and diligent, it will improve your playing skills and musical knowledge tremendously. This is true for players who are quite experienced, as well as those that are relatively new to the ukulele. The audio tracks are easy to access, and are just right for giving the student the correct sounds. Cons- This book would, in my opinion, be very difficult for the truly rank beginner. The book does not show how to properly hold the uke, place or use the fretting hand, work the tuners, and much other basic information a student should know about ukuleles. Things like the different sizes of ukes, the parts of the instrument, and the like. As an aside, I never recommend a uke with friction tuners to beginners. For children and adults with very small hands I recommend a soprano size, for most others I recommend starting with a concert size. For someone with very large hands a tenor might be best. Overall- This book is a keeper and I will surely be recommending it to all my students, as part of their learning. Before going through this book, I was teaching folks by giving them a few easy songs and chords to begin with; then progressing into more difficult chords and songs, and adding some finger picking songs. As they could handle it, I would add a few more complicated skills into the mix. I have found most folks who want to learn the ukulele, do not much like scales, or much in the way of music theory, and are happiest when they can just play a song and sing along. The ukulele is a fun, easy to learn instrument, but like any instrument, not easy to master. Ukulele Aerobics provides a different and much needed approach and I applaud Mr. Johnson's efforts in producing such a fine book.

I’m really happy I bought this book. I’m a beginner ukulele player and started taking classes at the beginning of the summer. I played the clarinet in middle school so I have a basic knowledge of music, but not a real big grasp of music theory. This book has a nice mix of weekly chords, strumming skills, scales, fingerstyle skills and licks & riffs to work on for a suggested 20 minutes a day over a course of 40 weeks. Even though I’ve been taking lessons all summer, the single most helpful “trick” I learned from this book was how to play the scale in Week 1’s lessons. I’ve learned where various notes can be played on the finger board, but have been struggling. My teacher wanted to know what happened that I suddenly “got it.” Putting the notes in ORDER on a scale was my “ah-ha” moment. I’m afraid my uke teacher is getting dumped—at least for a while—this book seems to think more like I do, and I like the mix of skills each week rather than focusing solely on a set of new chords. There was no CD included with the book I bought (purchased in July 2016), but there is audio access through the Hal Leonoard website. You can download the tracks or you can play them on the website. I’m able to play the weekly lessons on my iPad with no problems, but I like the various capabilities the online audio player has from my PC better (I can loop a scale or riff for continuous practice or speed up/slow down the tempo). Each week’s audio accompaniment is than 5 minutes total. The audio isn’t necessary, but it’s nice to have it and try to keep up (which is how I know I’ve perfected the lesson). TAB notation is also included in most of the exercises. My instructor thinks TAB is cheating. I don’t mind it at all, and I know there are some ukulele songbooks out there that are printed with strictly TAB notation, and I’d like to know how to “read” it so I’m glad it’s included (even though I notice I don’t really use it unless I can’t figure out where in the world to put my fingers). So far so good. I haven’t come across anything I simply can’t do. I’m not so great at memorizing chords and I’m slow on chord changes sometimes, but the more exposure I have to chords, the better I’ll get at remembering them and where to put my fingers. Learning to play is something I want to do so I’m happy to spend 20 minutes a day (or longer) working on the exercises the author, Chad Johnson, has put together.

If you are truly a beginner, and have never touched a ukulele then this book might be a bit intimidating to start with. That said, there is so much information readily available on the internet that rank beginner questions and answers are easy to find and then to incorporate into this books lessons. It's true, the author doesn't cover the four basic sizes of ukuleles, he doesn't cover re-entrant and linear tuning, and he doesn't tell you how to read tablature or where to find the notes on the sheet music on the ukulele fretboard. But this info is easy, easy, easy to find. Once you understand these basics then Ukulele Aerobics offers a well organized and balanced series of lessons that will definitely make you a better player. But here's an important caveat, learning any musical instrument isn't easy. If all you want to do is strum chords and do sing-alongs then download a songbook for free from one of the zillions of ukulele clubs worldwide. You'll be happy, you'll have fun and you won't be a really good player. But if you want to do it right...learn some music theory, plenty of chords, finger picking and advanced strumming techniques then this book is an excellent gateway into the world of ukulele playing. One final word...take your time! Use the author's timeline as a personal guideline. Go at your own pace. You don't have to do a lesson every day, but if you can develop the discipline and habit, play every day. Go at your own pace because it takes effort to learn something well. Patience and practice are your friends. If you play every day, in 30 days you will be amazed at how good (and knowledgeable) of a player you've become.

My review of Ukulele Aerobics by Chad Johnson. I easily downloaded the audio tracks from the Hal Leonard web site using the code on the first page of the book. The tracks were easy to play from both files on my computer and to play directly from audio links Hal Leonard web site. The download (download all or individual tracks) created a separate file for each lesson on my computer with the lesson # in the filename. I wanted a technique book to improve my Uke skills and I think this book is great. I feel it is similar to what the Pumping Nylon book by Scott Tennant does for guitar. I like the way Chad’s book adds variety to the lessons by presenting a different technique on each day of the week. The book provides fingering for the right hand and gives TAB with string & fret #s for the left hand and fingering for the right hand but avoids giving fingering for the left-hand chords, probably because there is often more than one way to finger a chord with the LH and the best LH fingering usually depends on the previous and the next chord that will be played in a song/chord progression. This book is focused on Uke skills and not specific songs. It does have some chord progression exercises but it does not have any full Uke songs. Playing songs while strumming a Uke can be very rewarding in and of itself, but if you are looking for ways to improve your Uke technique, then I think this book will serve you well.

Here is my experience with the book: I got it 2 years ago and have been using it to learn the ukulele. I have played the piano for 25 years, but I'm brand new to the ukulele. I am still only on week 7 in this book, but I feel like I have learned a lot from it. I started with the first week's lessons and once I felt like I had those down or if I got bored and wanted more material, I would move on to the next week. I also found songs on the internet that I already knew that I could change chords to fit the chords I already learned. It has been a really fun way of learning and I feel like this book has helped me to learn techniques and methods that have helped my playing to advance more quickly than I would have without it. As I said, I'm not far in the book, but I love what I've learned and I like taking my time learning to do things correctly. Also, as a side note, I got the book and ukulele a few months before having my third kid, so someone in a different situation could likely devote more time to the ukulele, but I spend a lot of my ukulele time wrestling a small child away from it 😅

Some folks have said this isn't a book for beginners, and maybe it isn't if you "just" unboxed your new ukulele. But this will be your go to book in short order. Order it now and in a week you'll be ready to get started. The audio tracks that are available with this book are brilliant. You can loop them, speed them up. slow them down, listen to them a thousand times, it doesn't matter. They're better than a CD. You can quickly and easily find exactly what you're looking for. This is my favorite book - teaching tool of all. It's great. Some stuff isn't easy, but hey, do you want to get better or just strum the C chord all day for the next ten years? Put in twenty minutes a day and you'll be amazed at what you can - will learn! And nope, I don't have a clue who the authors, editors or publishers are, but they should know, they put out a good book. Well done. Thanks, Tedd in KS

I got the kindle version of this book and have been using it on my iPad... What a great experience! It is so easy to read a bit, then play the little exercises on the iPad (or whatever tablet you have, I am sure) then practice them yourself, and repeat the process over and over as you need to. The instructions are very clear and the exercises are effective. The only thing I don't like is that painful-looking picture on the cover! But since I got the Kindle version, who cares? I don't have to look at the cover, and the content is terrific.

i've ben playing the ukulele for about 2 years. At first the book was fun, but as I got farther along it became more of a chore. I got to week 16 and gave up on the diminished chords. I guess the book is ok if you just want to learn a bunch of chords, but for me it works better to learn them in the context of a song. Also, there are no chord fingering diagrams, so you end up looking them up elsewhere. The instructions for legato and licks and riffs also could use more explanation.

Manual muy completo y con una secuenciación de los contenidos muy correcta. Se divide en 40 semanas. Cada día dedicado a un ejercicio concreto: acordes, rasgueo, punteo, escalas, legato, riffs y varios. Está en inglés. El vocabulario no es difícil, pero ayuda estar familiarizado con conceptos musicales. No creo que sea un manual apropiado para alguien que no sabe nada de música ya que la lectura de las partituras puede resultar difícil , y algunos conceptos que explica son complicados de entender sin una base teórica previa. Personalmente creo que es muy apropiado para alguien que viene de tocar ya otro instrumento y se inicia ahora en el ukelele. Los ejercicios se presentan en partitura y tablatura. Son progresivos pero la dificultad aumenta rápidamente. Así que aunque al principio parece fácil, lo cierto es que dominarlos totalmente sí llevaría la temporalización programada en el manual.

Hi, I download the book in Android OS and I cannot listen to the audios. Do someone know a solution?

Le meilleur livre pour progresser au ukulélé! J’en ai acheté plein, sans intérêt, celui-ci est une pépite. Interessant et motivant, progressif, pour une fausse débutante comme moi. Je n’en conseille aucun autre. (Attention c’est en anglais)

Cons: Did not come with CD as claimed. Pros: Exercises are very systematic and progressive. 3 weeks in, I have definitely seen improvement in finger strength. The book introduced a lot of useful techniques, although some techniques and terminology I had to look up on youtube to understand the proper way of doing them. I also like that this books comes with musical notation instead of just tabs, so you know what you are doing.

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