Chords for 12th Street Rag Ukulele Tutorial - Unlocking the Rhythm / Part One

_ _ [E] _ _ [G] _ _ _ _
_ [A] _ _ [D] _ _ While back I made a video about how to play Pearl Street Rag.
This is the simplest version I could think of and I had a lot of requests for a follow-up
on it to see if we could shed a little more light on it.
Some people were like, oh, can you do a tab for it?
And I think I got a little kind of overwhelmed by the idea of everything that needed to go
into this song to make it teachable.
Teachable.
There's a lot of things going on and it's one of those kind of songs that if it's not
somewhat apparent about what's going on, you're probably not quite ready to play it yet.
But if you're pretty close, I think I'm going to be able to unlock some of that stuff for you.
_ Tabs really aren't going to cut it because they really only show what's going on with
your left hand.
They don't show what's going on with your right hand.
This song is really, really all about the right hand.
What's going on over here with the left is really pretty easy.
[F] It's a C chord and G chord and a few other things thrown in there.
What's going on with this hand though is a little more complex and I'm trying to unlock
that for you.
This is probably going to take a couple of videos to get through because there's just
a lot to unpack about what makes this song work.
So when you're hearing the first part of it, [C] it's going like this.
_ _ _ _ _ _ [Dm] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [N] What's happening with this hand is you are accenting beats, kind of in a triplet pattern.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ [A] _ _ _ _
[Bb] _ _ _ _ I'm playing the straight up and down.
Sometimes my downs are loud, sometimes my ups are loud, but you're going to get this
kind of a thing.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
[N] _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Hear that?
You're trying to replicate that with this hand.
So you're getting_
_ _ _ _ _ Practice that super slow until it's really clear and really automatic and you're not
having to struggle thinking about where to put that beat so you're able to get the sound
that _ [Bb] _
you _ _ _ want. _
_ _ _ You _ [D] notice I'm always keeping this motion going.
The down beat is always going down, the up beat is always going up, but sometimes the
up is louder and sometimes the down is louder.
You want to work on that until you can start building the speed up.
[Bb] _ _ _ _ _
[N] _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [F] _ _
_ _ _ _ So after you've got that figured out, and that's going to take a while, then you're
going to start adding [B] what's going on in this hand.
And like I said, it's super simple.
You're playing a C chord.
And you're going to be walking down.
_ _ _ _ _ [Am] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [C] _ _
_ _ [Am] _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ So work on [C] that until you get that sound.
[F] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _
There's a couple different variations [B] you've heard there.
One time is just going down all the [Am] way through the whole phrase.
_ _ _ _ _ _ One [C] variation is to kind of reverse it a little [Am] bit.
_ _ [C] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [Am] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [Gb] These are just different things you can add [E] to sort of spice this up.
Then you switch [Eb] to a G7 chord.
This is where it gets a little bit trickier if you have a weak little finger because you're
using the pinky and the ring [D] finger to do that walk down.
[Dm] _ _ _ _ _ You don't [E] have to go quite as far because there's just [F] two repeats of that.
_ _ [Dm] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [C] So start from the C.
_ _ [Am] _ _ _ _ [B] _
[A] G7.
_ _ _ [Dm] _ _ _ _
_ _ _ [F] _ _ _ _ _
_ [Am] _ _ _ You notice that time I just stayed playing with the pinky, going down, [Eb] pinky and ring
finger because my hand was already there.
A lot of times I'll use this as an exercise to [C] build agility in this hand.
I'll go like this.
_ With those two fingers and then these two [Am] fingers.
_ And then these two.
_ And then these two.
And I'll do this. _ _ _ _
_ _ _ [Fm] That is tricky, my friends.
If you can do that, you're coming a long way toward getting the left hand to do what you want.
[Gbm] Anyway, let's go through that first phrase [C] again slowly. _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ [Dm] _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ [Am] _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ [Dm] _ _ _ _
_ _ And that's all up until the part where you [D] go D.
_ _ _ _ _ _ [B]
G7.
[Bb] _ _ [G] _ _ _ _ [C] _
_ [F] And that's probably good for today.
Work on that and we'll come back for the next round ASAP.
I promise I won't take so long this time.
I think I've got this figured out about what we need to get across.
So work on that.
Hang in there.
See you soon.
Thanks. _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [N] _ _