Buy a Ukulele Tuner — It’s easy to play in tune!

Ukuleles are notorious for being hard to tune and hard to keep in tune.

But in this wonderful age we live in, there are cheap, decent, accurate electronic ukulele tuners that make it dead simple to keep your uke in tune.

My very strong recommendation is to buy a ukulele tuner that CLIPS onto the uke itself.

This style of tuner picks up the vibration of the plucked string, and can thus be used to tune in a noisy room. The other type of uke tuner “listens” for the string (as opposed to “feeling” the vibration), and you need to be in a quiet spot to avoid confusing the poor little guy.

Take my simple advice–when I have to buy a ukulele tuner (and I buy a lot of ’em for classes), I always USED go with these Snark tuners.

I’ve used these for years, and found them absolutely reliable and a great bargain–usually less than $15.00.

Since the good old days, there are now many, many brands of uke tuners available. We’re lucky there’s enough demand now to keep the manufacturers manufacturing!

My new favorite ukulele tuner:

After using and loving the Snark tuners, I’ve completely switched over to this D’addario tuner.

The tuning capabilities seem equal to the Snark, but look at that low, low profile. The Snark feels big and conspicuous compared to this tiny thing.

With the D’addario, I clip it on and leave it on. No extra weight to speak of, and nothing poking up and looking ungainly

You can do what I do and clip it on the BACK of the headstock so it really is practically invisible. And the tuner even has a setting to reverse the screen read-out. So when the tuner is upside-down (on the back of the uke), the screen can still read right-side-up — love it!

The Mystery Tuner!

As much as I love the tiny tuner from D’addario, I recently espied one even less conspicuous. A uke friend had it attached to the headstock, and it was so little I almost didn’t notice it.

I didn’t catch the brand but it was cylindrical, or barrel shaped. The name of the note being tuned to showed up at the tiny, round end, sort of like the Bat Signal being shone into the Gotham night sky.

(If you like the Batman references, here’s my Spiderman post, too!)

I didn’t find out what brand it was, so if you happen to know — let me know…

How to use a clip-on electronic ukulele tuner

It’s so easy to ctually use the D’addario tuner. At the risk of sounding like a used car salesman, this tuner is so easy, it’s almost like magic! Here’s a quick video to walk you through:

Let me know if any of these tricks help you out!

Personally, I use “Star Wars” and “Modern Major General” all the time :)

The Best Ukulele Tuner Is… the One You Already Have

I stole that line from the commonplace axiom about the “best camera” being the one you have with you. It’s the same for tuning up your uke.

You may not have an electronic clip-on tuner, but I betcha anything you’ve got your phone! Am I right? Ladies? Ladies? Is thing on???

We live in wonderful times, and there are 20-zillion or so ukulele tuner apps for iPhones (and Android phones). I still swear by the clip-on tuners for reliability, but you gotta use what you got. Am I right? Ladies? Ladies?

Most of the popular tuning apps do a good job.

• n-Track Tuner App for iOS, Android devices and Windows phone – Very popular and easy to use. Just open the app, pluck a string, and go. It’s free (with ads) and accurate enough for everyday playing. Unlike the clip-on tuners which can pick up the vibration (and thus work in a noisy room), a tuner app like this “listens” for the sound and gives you a tricorder-like reading. It works great as long as your in a quiet spot.

There are mony phone app tuners to choose from but N-track is the one I’ve had experience with and like.

So —

If you’re in a quiet room and don’t mind your phone listening in, a free tuning app will do just fine. But if you’re tuning up in a room full of rowdy uke players, stick with a clip-on.

Am I right?

Ladies?

Focused on the fun,