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Yay!! So happy that we reached that goal and even surpassed it!! So lovely! 🥰
Many congrats, @mysticrick, for such a special win! It’s kind of like @leb397 won by proxy because she gets to hear you play it in person! 😉 So neat, can’t wait to see it in future challenges! 🥰🎁🎄
@Katazumiri, yay, I look forward to listening to that later! That sounds beautifully eccentric!! 😀
@dianna, haha, apparently you do! It looks very beautiful! I only have a little tree for myself, but I had zero time to set it up or anything, so I just admire others’ trees! 😉 Thank you so much for that! I’m starting to see this is how I love to play ukulele – Take a simple(ish) arrangement and play it in the way I feel most comfortable and in a kind of style that I love to play, which is very flowy (technical term). It’s very lovely how encouraging Andrew and Matt have been about my enjoyment of playing that way and that’s really helped me develop that skill even more. 🙂 Ha, away in the Manager, who knows what that means, lol! For some reason, the picture of the Bible is out of focus in the video; the picture by itself is perfectly in focus. I’m the worst; I feel like I should know the Leonard Cohen reference. :S I hope you enjoy your holidays, too, friend! 🙂 ❤️
@janaq1, very beautiful playing! 😉 ❤️Oh my word, now I have 49 subscribers!! It’s both hilarious and sad how excited I am for that! 50 subs, here we come!! Thank you to whoever did that (or perhaps it was someone outside RC101, but still)! Thanks, LOL! 😉
@grannieannie, awwwwwwwwww, thank you SO much for that!! That seriously is so nice that you did that. I had a goal of reaching 50 subscribers by the end of the year (that I made maybe a month ago, lol), but it’s okay if it doesn’t happen. The main reason I have that channel is it’s a good incentive to create more polished versions of the arrangements I try to make and to practice the things that make me most anxious – talking, playing in front of others, and having people look at me, lol. But it’s also good practice for creating videos, even though that’s seemingly perpetually a WIP for me. Anyway, thank you so much! 🙂 🥰
Loved reading your goals! Those are some really good ones. I’m so jealous that you get to go to that festival in Vancouver and see Matt. One day I hope to be able to get to a uke festival, preferably one he’s at to meet him! He’s just been such an inspiration and help to me in my ukulele journey. I really hope you enjoy that! 🙂
Also, when you get to learn Contemplations by Marianne, you should definitely share it here! Would love to hear it, and I’m sure she would too! And Andrew, too! That one’s so beautiful. 🙂
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So, I picked Away in the Manger this month (I always almost write “manager” for some reason, lol) and I managed to struggle with it a bit. Well, I was modifying it for high g, but then I tried to make it fancy, so all of that is on me. A beautiful arr. by Andrew though, the “meat” of the tune is lovely. 🙂
I got to listen through a few of the entries – all very lovely! @dianna, a very beautiful take on that tune, but I have one question for you: Is that tree real? If so, WOW, your Christmas tree game is on point, lol. @katazumiri, a very lovely take on that tune, too, and always love the layers you create! A nice walk through your city, too. 🙂 @brettboy, that was really magical!! Loved the duet!! @nat-uke, your take on that tune was so beautiful and your video is nice ‘n’ polished! 🙂 So yes, that’s all I’ll comment on for now, but just want to say this community is still so special to me. I look forward to having more time coming up after the holidays to just chill and play ukulele more. Boy do I miss that! As of now, I’m 6 batches of Christmas cookies deep because I’m in charge of making all the dough for some reason, lol. And everything else. We all know how this time of year goes. 😉
I did donate to the Ukulele Kids Club!! 🥰
Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to this beautiful ukulele family!! 🥰
Oh the image in the video is a random picture of a Bible I took a long time ago in an old church. Just thought it looked kinda neat! 😉
Also, please enjoy the random accidental pseudo-harmonic I did and the sound of my phone buzzing near the end of the tune. Man, am I incredible at recording! 😉
@marianne, that was really lovely, really great idea to do a medley like that! Everyone else’s entries were so lovely, too. 🥰
I also wanted to say thank you so much to everyone who left me lovely feedback last month on my entry. That really meant a lot to me, but I still seem to be struggling to get out of “survival mode” – but getting there (plus, even more busy with all the Christmas stuff happening). 😂
I may also try to do more than one of these tunes. I have one almost ready. I look forward to recording / sharing / donating to this lovely charity that brings a lot of joy to these kiddos – the joy of playing ukulele, which we all know is a true joy in this world. 🥰
Also really looking forward to hearing more performances! 😊🥰🎄
Yay, love this topic every year! It’s good to have “hashtag” goals!
I’m wondering if this will be in the same format as your live lesson on your Patreon, Matt: Play, Progress, Push? I’m going to format my goals in that way, anyway. 😅
Here are my goals for 2026:
1. Play: Continue creating arrangements in the random, noodle-y way that I love to do.
2. Progress: Continue to work on writing down my arrangements, strumming, learning Rock Class 101 tunes, and all the things that challenge me.
3. Push: Create 1 YouTube video per month of my own cute lil’ arrangements with written tabs. Extra push: Go live on that channel once in front of my 47 subscribers. 😅
Okay, that’s it! Thank you for another amazing year! Hearts to you all! 🙂
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Hello dear ukulele friends! 😊
Well, unsurprisingly, I waited until the last second to practice / record / share my take on Morning Dew, but it looks like a bunch of other people are last second, too! Looking forward to going back and listening to a bunch of the entries. 😊
I knew this tune would be trickier for me because it’s written for Low G and in a very different style from what I play, and therefore is the opposite of intuitive for me, since all I play is High G uke. Also, all the hammer-ons and pull-offs – Those things still can be hard for me sometimes. So, it took about 100% of my CPU to go against my instincts / habits while playing this. 😂 Nonetheless, this was a really fun one to learn! And a very beautiful tune!
Also, I have a “bonus edition” of the tune I tried to recreate in a familiar style for me, but it was really nice trying to clawhammer-ify a tune again! I didn’t get super far with it, the last bit is pretty rough (because I only played through that part once as clawhammer), but I think it has high potential for that style! 😊
I hope everyone’s T-gives was lovely for all who celebrate! And that everyone is doing well. Thank you, @Andrew, for these amazing challenges and for all that you do with your team! 🥰
@deadbuggy, very beautifully played and beautiful arrangement by Christopher! I didn’t realize that was the song he arranged for you, so neat and special! Thank you for sharing this!! 🙂 <3
I finally got a chance to reply to some things here! 😊
@nat-uke, thank you so much for your kind words and encouragement! I’m pretty sure at this point – after this year that I’ve had – that not only has my gas tank been siphoned, but also I’m pretty sure the car has been stripped for parts (sometimes literally). 😂 You are really right though. Sometimes you can’t push yourself as hard when life is already so challenging – a challenge in itself. I also looked at Morning Dew and it’s trickier than I thought, which is perfect, it isn’t “too” easy. I also want to try something different with it. Thank you, your entry with Moondance was so good! I also have been practicing singing almost every day. I’ve talked with some really good singers about this and they say that confidence is almost as important as skill with singing. I really think that’s true. Anyway, thank you again, and look forward to your performance, too! 😊
@gi_gi_ it’s really lovely to see you appear, friend! We need to catch up soon. It’s been a while with life being so crazy. 😊 La Gitanita sounds so cool, it does seem like a good chance to work on that one! I have multiple RC101 tunes like that where I started then got distracted from learning them. 😂 Miss you, Double G! Glad you’re back! 🥰
@grannieannie, thank you so much for that!! I was really surprised that I was able to learn the first section so quickly, but knew I would struggle with the strumming parts. That skill just does not come naturally to me whatsoever for some reason. I think it’s because I have a really poor sense of rhythm and get really flustered (in a Guitar Hero-esque sense) with the pressure to hit the notes at the right time. That’s why I’m also really bad at those games and actually all video games, even though I do like them.😂 Uhhh, anyway, I really enjoyed your performance of Iron Man, that would also looked so hard and you did a lovely job with it!! 😊
@marianne, good gravy, that was exquisite! I think @Andrew described your performance as breathtaking – so true. So much incredible feeling and beauty behind your playing. It’s truly inspiring and moving. It makes me want to try that one, but I don’t have a low G or baritone uke. So sorry to hear of the loss of your work colleague. Praying for strength for everyone near to them and sorry that you’re going through that. 🥰
@misterbones, really amazing performance! You capture the feeling of so many different styles and utilize so many different techniques so well. I don’t really know that song. Were there tapped harmonics in your playing? It sounded really good, I didn’t notice anything off about it! Such a great performance! 😊
@bolognakid, really, really great performance!! Sounded perfect, honestly. Such a fun song, too. Also, just want to say, my name is also Rachael, spelled -ael! I haven’t personally met many fellow -ael’s in my life, maybe two or three, so it’s nice to meet another! 😊😂
@morrieuke1, so lovely, such a great feel to your performance! I really enjoyed it! 😊
@darktoto, very beautiful playing!! It sounded perfect to me. 😊Really looking forward to hearing more this month and hoping to get my performance done NOT the last day of the challenge! 😂
Sorry for the extremely delayed reaction, but thank you so much @otzepeng for your kind words about my performance of Aerials! Your take on that was so stinkin’ good. Everyone who tried that one (and all of the tunes) in October did so amazingly well with such difficult tunes!! I feel like Andrew and friends are dialing up the difficulty to keep us all challenged (not that I need it, eesh, lol). 😉 But that’s actually really great – it makes for some amazing music. 🙂
Also, @leb397, I’ve definitely done things like that so many times. Also, with spelling certain people’s names on here – I have to check every single time, like Shmu’s name for some reason and Otzepeng (oh my word, when spelling it just now I messed it up again, then fixed it, lol), I switch the letters around or add letters that are not there. I always try to be careful with that though because my name, my real name, gets misspelled all the time and it means a lot when people spell it right. 🙂
I really like this topic, man! Slides are one of my favorite techniques on the ukulele. 🙂
After pondering for a bit, I remembered some silly (but genuinely curious) questions I’ve always had about slides on the ukulele. Here they are:
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1. Is it physically possible to do a slide starting from “0” (an open string) on the ukulele, or do you already need to be fretting a note to do a slide?
If yes, it’s possible, then that would be like jumping onto a playground slide before sitting down to maximize the speed and force. As an adult, you would not recover from such a maneuver (I’m cry laughing, but I seriously do wonder if that’s possible – on ukulele).
2. Do you think there’s a limit of distance with a slide on the ukulele? So, could you start at fret 1, then slide to fret 12 (or higher)? Is there any reason you would do this?
3. How much of a difference is there between sliding between two notes versus doing a hammer-on/pull-off between the same two notes? For example, sliding from A2 to A3 versus hammering on between those notes? Also, I probably wrote that wrong, sorry.
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Thank you for these amazing lessons and still tolerating me after all this time and not blocking me!
@nat-uke, ha, yeah, waiting until the last minute, not ideal whatsoever! That was probably the longest I’ve ever waited to finish learning a song, literally the last day of the challenge. Do not recommend. Success: Maybe 25%. Stress: 75%. 😂😂
I wanted to do Etude 28, too, but it’s for Low G. I may be weak this month and go for Morning Dew, if it isn’t too-too easy. I don’t think I’ve done that one before… Oh wait, I just had an idea about that. Okay, now I know exactly what I’m going to do… 🤪
Edit: I just realized that may have come off the wrong way. It doesn’t make anyone “weak” to learn the beginner level songs; not at all. That one may even be harder than I realize (though I haven’t looked at it yet). I just mean I don’t always find beginner level songs as challenging anymore for me now, usually – but sometimes they still are, even being a bit more experienced. Okay, just wanted to mention that. 😂 All of RC101’s songs are challenging, but that’s part of what makes them beautiful.
Thank you so much for the encouragement, Andrew! Your feedback is so helpful and you notice everything. It’s still one of my favorite parts of these challenges, reading all your feedback (not just to me, but to everyone) because it’s so insightful and fun to read through. I’ll keep working on this one. 😊
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Oh, dear… so I sorely underestimated the difficulty of this tune, Aerials, whilst also sorely overestimating my ability to learn it quickly. Only having a couple of hours before a party tonight, this is the best I could do with the limited time that remains. I think portions of the performance are actually pretty okay except for the strumming sections which are a complete train wreck, yet… personal best…? For me, I would have to memorize every single up and down stroke and each chord change and take it one “1 e and a” at a time like 4SB suggested in the lesson. I definitely am going to go back and do that because this tune is really, really cool, but this is what it is for now. So sorry for anyone who witnesses my struggle, especially to you Andrew. Thank you for this amazing challenge and amazing tunes – and everyone’s amazing performances! 🥰
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Oh my word, so, after I wrote that and was about to post my first take, I realize I forgot more than one section of the song and had to re-recorded. In my panic (running out of time to get ready, too), I feel like this take is even worse than the first one, but everything is there-ish. I’m so sorry; it’s so bad. 😂😂
Okay, watching it back, it isn’t *as* bad as I thought. You can tell the processing power of my brain is maxed out with the strumming sections though, but even those are not *as* bad as I thought. Gah, sorry, okay, here it is:
