KAME Chord task Week 6 S2 2020 : 26/9/20 – Revisiting my chord chart – from a list of many isolated things to a practical system that actually fits neatly into my brain

This week has been a rather simple one for the ukulele. My goal was to revisit my personally made ukulele chord chart and revise the shapes I have been using. Although I have made some progress using the current shapes I know, I decided to developed a “barre chord” system just for myself. Our assessment task has stated it requires us to learn major, minor and dominant 7th chords for C through to all the non accidental root notes except for B flat as an exception.

Below is my new system; it has a clear repetitive system of moving a chord shape in a parallel manner up the fretboard just as a rock/pop/country guitar player is often taught to do. This method has been in the back of my mind for some time, although I have been conscious of the difference in sound between resonant open chords and the potential limitations of barring frets higher up the neck, making the vibrating portion of string length shorter. However, after spending the time to experiment with these differences, I do believe it is only a very small sacrifice in exchange for the easy to remember barre system.

The only exceptions to the barre patterns present are G# major and dominant 7th. Barring on the eighth fret seemed to be just too much of a sacrifice in tone of the strings, leaving too little length on the strings to vibrate. The seventh fret seemed to be the last place on the fretboard which left enough tone in the strings. Most significantly, this system has presented me with the ability to find a major, minor or dominant 7th chord on the ukulele for any of the twelve root notes. This means it will immediately translate to a classroom setting should I ever wish to employ the ukulele for accompanying student performances.