Direct Download the DVD Lesson for $19.95

The ukulele has never been more popular, and Fred Sokolow's relaxed, user-friendly teaching style makes it easy to learn.

In this Advanced Lesson you'll learn more moveable and first-position chords, diminished chords and many more jazz chord shapes. There are more chord/melody solos that'll get you playing up and down the neck, more blues licks, and a bluegrassy fingerpicking solo. Tunes include Crazy,Matchbox, Rosetta, Fly Me To the Moon, Mister Sandman, Anytime, Wreck of Old 97 and When You Wish Upon a Star.

Fred slows all the tunes down and breaks them down so they're easy to learn. You'll also enjoy his “uke lore,” stories about the the songs and the players. All the songs are written out in tab and music, with chord grids as well. Whether you're a novice or a uke player wanting more repertoire and technique, there's plenty here for you. It's a great way to expand your horizons on this wonderful instrument.

88 minutes • Level 3 • Detailed tab/music PDF file on the DVD

Review: Coming to the ukuleles emotional rescue is Fred Sokolow, erasing misconceptions that the sawed-off four string is a novelty toy, exorcising its painful past with Tiny Tim. Now filling that space is the restored reputation of a pint-sized workhorse ready for anything that blues, country, rock, bluegrass or pop can dish at its puny frame. As scrapper (“Nobody Knows When You're Down And Out”), romancer (“Aura Lee,” melodically aka “Love Me Tender”), charmer (“When You Wish Upon A Star”), cowpoke (“Ghost Riders In The Sky”) and rocker (“House Of The Rising Sun”), the uke proves to be a mighty little beast. And Sokolow's three individually available DVD courses teach you how to drive one. Progressively advancing from Beginner to Intermediate through Advanced skills, each ninety-minute lesson ramps up the complexity of technique: accumulating tunings, strumming patterns and chords; rolling in fingerpicking skills; incorporating chord-melody soloing. All of that while also building a repertoire as fantastically diverse as Hank Williams' (“Jambalaya”) and Johnny Cash's (“Folsom Prison Blues”, the Beach Boys' (“Sloop John B”) and Buddy Holly's (“Not Fade Away”), Frank Sinatra's (“Fly Me To The Moon”) and Irving Berlin's (“A Pretty Girl Is Like A Melody”). Importantly, Sokolow also reinstates the uke's mini mojo. Anthems as great as “Sitting On Top Of The World” and “Matchbox Blues” help teach the art of playing 12-bar blues in any key, even right down to, of course, bending those stunted strings. The diminutive darling of the 1920's has become the darling of today, adored by organizations and festivals devoted to it, ruling airwaves through the phenomenon of Iz's transcendent “Somewhere Over The Rainbow/ What A Wonderful World” cover and a whole disc of Ukulele Songs from normally Pearl Jam'ing Eddie Vedder. Meet (and learn to master) the new compact cool. – Dennis Rozanski/Blues Rag