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

by Chad Johnson

(Ukulele). A 40-week, one-lick-per-day workout program for developing, improving, and maintaining ukulele technique. This package provides practice material for every day of the week and includes an online audio access code for all the workouts in the book. Follow this program and you'll see increased speed, improved dexterity, better accuracy, heightened coordination and more in your playing. Musical styles include pop, rock, folk, old-time, blues, jazz, reggae and more! Techniques covered strumming, fingerstyle, legato and staccato, hammer-ons and pull-offs, slides, bending, damping, vibrato, tremolo and more.

Genres: Music, Nonfiction, Reference

88 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2014

Reviews

[Nicole · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have not actually finished this book yet but I don’t want to keep updating every week, and I want to write a review.

I’m 7 weeks in to this book now. More than anything else, other books, YouTube videos, this book has really helped me improve my playing. I highly recommend it IF:
- you already know how to read music
- you already have a basic command of music theory

Basically, if you’ve played an instrument before, this book is a great course to help improve your technique on the ukulele. It is more of an advanced beginner/maintenance book that will give you excellent bite sized exercises that build off one another to help you improve and maintain technique and strength. I find the pacing of this book to be ideal for my particular mindset and place in my musical growth. If you need comparison, I spent a couple years as a music major (woodwind player) 20 years ago and then switched majors and haven’t really played since, but I still remember how to read music and most of the terminology. This book is an ideal difficulty for me in terms of helping me wrap my head (hands) around how to practice effectively on a stringed instrument.

I don’t usually go strictly by day, but rather by ease of exercise. I typically spend multiple days on the ones that are more difficult and kind of breeze through the ones that are easier for me, or use those ones as warmups. The organization of the book into a different focus each day is useful because even if you don’t follow the schedule exactly, you can use the thematic organization to structure your own practice. For example the author has new chords on Monday, followed by strum patterns Tuesday, a fingerpicking exercise Wednesday, etc. I usually glom Monday and Tuesday together as I find the chords less challenging and then take a couple days to focus on the fingerpicking exercises.

If you can only afford one ukulele instruction book this is definitely the one to have once you’ve got the basics of music down. This is actually one of the best music instruction books I’ve ever owned.

[Ruijie · Rating 5 out of 5]

A well structured course in a book! Am self-learning the ukulele, and I find this very useful. Love that the exercises come in nibbles, and any time I have a few minutes, I get to learn something new. There are useful licks and riffs already from week 1. The instructions are easy to follow, and the use of music notation was great for visualising what I’m playing. I finally get to see progression on my learning journey.

[Candice · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m in the think of it, y’all. This is HARD. Sometimes I have to put it away for a month because I’m out of my depth but I dream of one day laying down some fat nasty solos.

[Ira Mandell · Rating 1 out of 5]

Don't waste money here.

The supposed audio is less than useless, don't waste your money, the only thing you will learn is that audio part of the package is trash.

[Pam · Rating 2 out of 5]

Impossible to sync the audio with the book. They need a better technology to make this possible. Very frustrating!

[Eileen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I used this book as part of a ukulele course. I had tried working with it on my own earlier, but only got up to week 6 of the 40 weeks. I liked the book. It is probably too advanced for beginners if they are trying to learn on their own, but the exercises were useful and didn't take up much time. I found it a good review to work on all the Monday exercises (chords), for instance - or all the licks and riffs for another review. There is a lot to learn from this book of ukulele exercises. I did not quite get through the whole book - maybe up to week 26, as the lessons stopped at that point, when the exercises were getting more complicated. I thought I might carry on by myself, but it has been several months and I have moved on to other sources. I will, however, continue to use the book for occasional reviews.

[KAdelaide · Rating 5 out of 5]

Only up to Week6 but already my fingers feel "nimbler" on the keyboard, which was my goal. Totally recommend. I tend to play a whole weeks lessons over the course of a week. Been playing 8 years and consider myself at the advanced intermediate level. I wanted to improve my quickness and flow around fretboard and this book has helped me achieve this. I look forward to getting to the end! I would not recommend book for beginners or players whom dont know fingerpicking (as the book so far is 90% fingerpicking)

[Sebastian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good technical excercises, but definitely not for beginners. You should at least know the basic chords, some strumming patterns and be able to pick a note. The excercises become quite difficult pretty soon. Also, while I like the idea of an unique excercise per day in a program of several weeks - forget it. You won't master a lot of these excercises in one day. Recommended to intermediate and advanced players for a great collection of interesting and challenging excercises.

[Victoria · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm so beginner I don't even know how to read music. It has good daily exercises but some of the technical language bogged my brain a bit. I will need a little more practice before I'm ready for this book.

[Sal Coraccio · Rating 4 out of 5]

glossed over it. Not ready for this thing in earnest yet.

[Travis McHugh · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hard to get through without a plan - very dry training.