Take your ukulele playing to the next level - fast! - with hundreds of fun exercises, drills and practice tunes

You have a ukulele, you know just enough to be dangerous, and now you're ready to do something with it. You're in luck: Ukulele Exercises For Dummies helps you become a better player. This practice-based book focuses on the skills that entry-level players often find challenging and provides tips, tricks and plenty of cool exercises that will have you creating music in no time that include:

• Creating rock-steady strumming patterns and rhythms
• Becoming a better fingerpicker with patterns, arpeggio exercises, and solo fingerpicking pieces
• Expanding your fretboard knowledge and crafting your own rock, blues and jazz riffs and solos
• Playing actual songs on the ukulele - everything from the classic ukulele tunes to the 12 bar blues!
• Downloadable audio files of the exercises found in the book, providing you with a self-contained practice package

No matter if you're a beginning ukulele player or you're wanting to stretch and improve your chops, Ukulele Exercises For Dummies puts you on your way to becoming a ukulele extraordinaire!

Brett McQueen is a musician, songwriter and the founder of ukuleletricks.com, one of the most popular ukulele sites in the world, where he provides audio, video, and written instructional material (along with personalised feedback) to freshly minted ukulele fans everywhere. Alistair Wood is the man (the myth and the legend) behind ukulelehunt.com and the author of Ukulele For Dummies.

Introduction 1

Part I: Getting Started with Ukulele Exercises 7

Chapter 1: Preparing to Practise9

Chapter 2: Warming Up for Practice 15

Part II: Becoming a Better Strummer 23

Chapter 3: Foundations For Strumming 25

Chapter 4: Building a Repertoire of Strumming Patterns 33

Chapter 5: Taking Strumming Patterns to a Higher Level 55

Chapter 6: Refining Advanced Strumming Techniques 73

Part III: Becoming a Better Fingerpicker 89

Chapter 7: Examining Fingerpicking Technique 91

Chapter 8: Developing Rhythmic Fingerpicking Patterns 97

Chapter 9: Improving Your Solo Fingerpicking Skills 117

Chapter 10: Taking a Deeper Look at Single-Note Fingerpicking Techniques 135

Part IV: Mastering the Ukulele Fretboard 151

Chapter 11: Learning the Fretboard with Major Scales 153

Chapter 12: Taking On Three Minor Scales 177

Chapter 13: Commanding the Fretboard with Chords 197

Chapter 14: Using Scales to Solo and Improvise 213

Part V: The Part of Tens 229

Chapter 15: Ten Ways to Improve Your Practice Times 231

Chapter 16: Ten Tips for Every Performing Ukulele Player 235