Making Your Own Ukulele Song Sheets
I have a dream.
I dream of an Internet with a vast, deep song database.
- Each song includes a melody line in both notes and tablature.
- Each song include chord names and changes.
- Each includes picture chord diagrams, adjustable for any instrument.
- Customized chords can be defined and used.
- The key of the song can be changed at the touch of a button.
- The songs can be sorted and searched by writer, artist, year, genre, mood, etc.
- Any user can add to a song corrections and improvements.
Just a dream, you say.
Perhaps.
And yet, we’re so close.
First of all, we have the Internet. So that part is accomplished. Yea, team.
And, there are many programs that do many of these things–but I have yet to find one that does all.
If you ever need to put together a song sheet, here are some of the options I’ve found:
- The Ukulizer – This site is a mess. An absolute mess. I know from talking with the guy that it’s no longer being developed, and the mess is there to stay. That said, it’s whiz-bang easy to use–type in your lyrics and chords, and it spits out a formatted song sheet. Think of it like your child’s bedroom–disgusting, but with a sweet little thing deep inside.
- Chordie – This site does a LOT of what I wish for above, with the serious drawback that you can’t add your own songs. Still, if you’re looking for a fairly common song, it’s worth checking Chordie.
- Go Chords — Very user friendly–basically drag and drop chords into position and you’re done! Creates attractive pages, but I’ve never been quite satisfied with the system.
- Uke Geeks – Something tells me, this is the building block of the future, the answer to my dream–but it’s not there yet. Clearly there’s a mad genius who is also a ukulele player behind it, so let’s keep our fingers crossed.
Most of these use a very simple text layout called chordpro, which I will touch in more detail soon.
I suppose I can lament that we don’t have a perfect ukulele chord / sheet music organization system, or I can rejoice that we have these existing usable systems at all.
Heck, I’m a ukulele player. I’ll rejoice.
Thanks, Danno , for the informative email.
Just doing my job, sir!
Hi Danno – I may have some good leads on abc notation packages that can be adapted for uke (possibly by Frank) – will try to post more info tomorrow –betsey
Hi everyone -
As promised here is my contribution to the frustrating search for uke song sheet software support. Unlike my findings a couple of years ago, I have some interesting results this time:
As a software geek with a music background but relatively new to ukulele, I have also been on a quest for the perfect uke lead sheet package with requirements similar to those you’ve listed, Danno. Right from the beginning I have wanted to write lead sheets or adapt existing ones for the uke on the computer and have previously had very limited success – until now.
About 10 years ago I was an active member of the ‘Trad’ (Irish Traditional) community and was introduced to ABC notation. ABC notation has a standard and a lot of software packages have already been developed for it, mostly as shareware. Vast databases of tunes written in ABC notation (i.e. hundreds and hundreds of tunes) are available on the web. As I recall, the ABC standard addresses all or most of the issues in Danno’s wish list, in addition to actually playing the tune as well as displaying and printing it. However, the ABC standard, most of the tune databases and software packages cater to (and were probably developed by) people who were and are possibly are still active in the Trad community and therefore are Irish or Irish-like in origin and cater to instruments used in Trad music. So, this does not include the Ukulele. In addition the ABC standard does not address the issues of tablature or fret diagrams, although it supports chords and a lot of other sophisticated formatting. However this does not mean that the ukulele or the uke community is precluded from using this great notation or the software and adapting it for our use. There have already been several discussions about adding uke related features to the standard. I have found several packages that can be adapted and Frank (my better half, who unlike me, is familiar with software development on current platforms) has contacted the author of Tunebook, which is available both for iPad, and iPhone as well as the Mac platform. Frank wanted a copy of the most recent code so that he can add support for ukulele chord fret diagrams and tablature. I think that this is all that the program needs to be a useful tool for developing and sharing a ukulele tune database. The author of Tunebook has replied to Frank and has offered to help if he runs into problems. Now all Frank needs is a little time 8-).
ABC notation is very easy to use and to learn. There are several more sophisticated music software programs that import songs written ABC format. One of these programs is MusicEase. In addition to importing tunes written in ABC format, it has its own proprietary file format and its own form of entering music notation – very easy but not all that well documented. I downloaded the trial version of MusicEase yesterday. I was able to import ABC tunes and enter my own tune using their notation. It does not support uke chord fret diagrams or uke tablature, however I got ambitious and added a custom tablature for uke and Frank added a chord fret diagram library. This is way cool. Here is the list of things that I’ve messed with. With my copy of MusicEase which includes the uke support I’ve added I can now do the following:
- Import a tune
- Directly enter a tune
- Import (i.e. from ABC) or directly enter the chord names over the notes where they should be played
- Automatically generate uke chord fret diagrams under the chord names
- Automatically generate uke tablature
- Automatically transpose to any key
- Play the tune as written in a variety of instrument sounds
- Adjust the tempo, i.e. for the ‘play’ feature (great for practice)
- Enter lyrics under the corresponding notes
- Print the tune
- Convert to .pdf
It can probably do more, but I haven’t tried everything out yet.
I am going to contact the authors of this program to see if they will incorporate the enhancements that Frank and I have added for ukulele support into their standard offering. If they are not interested or I get no reply, and people in the group are interested, I will make them available to anyone who wants them and teach you how to install on your system.
I can load up my portable Mac with all this and give a demo after class on the 21st. Can’t do it tomorrow as we have to leave right after class.
In the meantime, here are some links of interest:
ABC Notation Overview
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ABC_notation
An ABC Primer
http://trillian.mit.edu/~jc/doc/doc/ABCprimer.html
Tunebook for Mac
http://www.jhlabs.com/tunebook/mac/
Tunebook for iPad/iPhone
http://www.jhlabs.com/tunebook/
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/tunebook-for-ipad/id368413919?mt=8
TablEdit – this looks like a very good candidate (it supports tablature and standard notation) but I have not tried it out yet and don’t know which instruments it supports:
http://www.tabledit.com
MusicEase – this is the program that Frank and I have modified for uke support
http://www.musicease.com
Watch this space for updates
–Betsey
Betsy, this is an awesome overview of a whole system I didn’t know about–thanks for taking the time to write this up. It sounds like you are pushing into the frontier on behalf of uke players everywhere!
My original post was focussed on on-line resources, since I feel that the sharing component seems to suggest that on-line is a requirement. But there are many other off-line programs I’ve fooled around with, which are good too. I’ll put up a list of the ones I’m familiar with soon. Now I need to try out ABC and MusicEase.
I wonder if Evernote http://evernote.com/premium/ is part of a solution. I use it for almost everything in my personal filing.
It allows multiple tags (say, artist, year, etc) for easy searching and sorting.
It’s available online and folders and files can be shared.
And I just read that the premium version (paid) allows multiple authors.
But, now I’ve learned, what it does not allow is searching or sorting by tags when you’re using the web interface. That’s a big negative.
I am not a computer geek and so cannot help with that aspect but rather am a uke player who is constantly trying to find some program as Dano outlined above. I will watch and hope for your progress.
please add me to your list
thanks
Hi, pippin,
I have a utility for both Mac and Windows for creating chord sheets. It’s called Chordette. It is used with Word or other word processor. You will need to install the included fonts. It’s at:
http://www.ukefarm.com/chordette/
John, do you find it easy to use? I had a look and it seems the process of changing fonts and then tracking down the right key combo to input the chord is a (relative) lot of work. Still, gor bless ‘em for a providing a solution, and for free no less.