How To Tune A Ukulele

HOW TO TUNE A UKULELE

Tuning a Ukulele can be a difficult task, especially for beginners, but there are several ways to go about it depending on what you have at your disposal.

  Tuning Using a Piano

This is probably the easiest way for beginners as you only need to play open strings on the Ukulele. Playing an open string means to pluck it without holding it at any point on the fret-board. This leaves you with a free hand to turn the tuning pegs whilst the piano is still resonating.

As the picture above shows, each string on the ukulele is the same note as that on the piano. Start with the 'middle C' of the piano and tune the Ukulele's C string. This will stop you from tuning your Ukulele an octave too low or too high. You can then tune the rest of the Ukulele's strings using the equivalent keys on the piano in whichever order you like.

Tuning From a Reference Note

This is a more difficult way of tuning your ukulele as it means that you have to get one of your strings in tune so that you can tune the others using this as a reference point. The preferred string to tune for this is the G string. You could use a tuning fork or an electrical tuner (which you can purchase from any musical instrument stockists). There are also a number of sites on the internet that have online tuners that you can use.

If you don't have access to any of these things then you will have to tune one of your strings by ear, and then tune the rest of the ukulele to this reference string. This will mean that the ukulele will be in tune with itself but may need adjusting if you are playing with other instruments.

Providing you've tuned the G string as your reference string you will now need to do the following -

• Hold the 4th string (G string) at the 5th Fret, pluck it, and whilst the note is resonating, pluck the open 3rd string (C string). The two strings need to match each others pitch. If they are out of tune with each other then you need to turn the tuning knobs for the 3rd string until it matches the 4th string.
• Once the 3rd string is in tune with the 4th, you can tune the 2nd String (E string). Hold the 3rd string at the 4th fret, pluck it and then pluck the open 2nd string. As before, you need to adjust the tuning knob for the 2nd string until the two strings sound then same.
• Finally, to tune the 1st String (A String) you need to hold the 2nd string at the 5th fret, pluck it and then pluck the open 1st string, before adjusting the tuning knob until the two strings match each other. 

Your ukulele should now be in tune!