You can play single notes so that you can pick out melodies, and you can play chords, so your ear starts to understand harmony. “It has nylon strings, which are very easy on your fingertips. “First of all, you can take it with you anywhere,” he says. And he still feels that it’s one of the best starter instruments around - for kids and adults. Shimabukuro began playing the ukulele when he was 4, learning all of the typical traditional Hawaiian music that’s played throughout the islands. But then I looked at Bill Cosby, and his expressions and delivery. I had thought that I needed a band with me, a drummer and a bass player, that just the ukulele wasn’t enough. “I realized that if someone can do that with no instrument - just talk, and keep all of these people so engaged - I thought, man, I’d better be able to at least hold an audience’s attention with an instrument. “I saw his video called ‘Bill Cosby: Himself’ which is about two hours long, and for the entire time, Bill Cosby sits on a chair, in front of thousands of people, with a microphone, telling stories, and keeping everyone at the edge of their seats. “Bill Cosby was actually the guy who inspired me to become a solo ukulele player,” says Shimabukuro. If a rock guitarist wasn’t enough of a mentor, there was also some motivation - unbeknownst to him - from a renowned standup comic. “In the beginning I didn’t like the way it sounded without the pick, but I kept working at it and working at it, and slowly I found a way to get a sound I was more comfortable with.” So that’s when I decided to throw those picks away and I started working on my hands, and that’s when my tone really started to develop.
He just brushes the strings with the palm of his hand, or he’ll use the side of his fingers. But then about seven years ago I heard Jeff Beck play, and I couldn’t believe he was making all of these sounds. The reason I liked the pick was I could get a lot more speed, real staccato. “I always used to use a pick - first flat picks, then thumb picks. “That’s because of Jeff Beck,” he says of the pick-less British guitar god. He doesn’t even use a pick it’s all fingers and hands. Shimabukuro can be appreciated for the sounds he coaxes out of his axe, but seeing him in concert, and watching the way he does it has been known to cause mouths to hang agape. You can hear, you can feel, that passion while listening to what he does on his tenor uke on tunes such as his intricate covers of “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” and “Somewhere Over the Rainbow,” or on his strum-crazy original “Let’s Dance” and his lovely, lyrical “Breathe.” Shimabukuro has done nothing less than reinvent what one can do on the ukulele. For me, I truly believe in the instrument. King could probably wail out something on the ukulele because he’s got the chops, the technique. “Anyone can play a blues riff on an ukulele (he pronounces it “ookelaylee”). “I think it has a lot to do with just doing what you do with conviction, and really believing in what you’re doing,” he says. He’s done his share of trying to change our perception of the tiny, four-stringed instrument. 2, is a very serious musician, with a charming manner. Shimabukuro, who performs solo at the Regattabar in Cambridge, Mass., on Saturday, Aug. People have looked at it as not something a serious musician would play.” “I’ve been paying it since I was a kid, and it’s always been an instrument that’s been a novelty. “It surprises me that people are so enthusiastic about the ukulele,” says Shimabukuro, 31, from his home in Honolulu. Joking aside, he would have been the best even if both singers were still around, since they used the uke more as a prop than a proper instrument. With Arthur Godfrey and Tiny Tim gone, Jake Shimabukuro might just be the best ukulele player on the planet.
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