if you would like to learn how to tune your ukulele then stick around because this tutorial is just for you hey guys are still in late today I'm going to be teaching you how to tune your ukulele if you are interested in growing as a musician or a songwriter make sure you subscribe I post tons of tutorials for guitar piano ukulele and song writing as well as covers and original songs before we get started I've made you an excellent cheat sheet to go along with this video it will have all of the information that I cover typed out so that you can print it out and have it right in front of you I'll put a link to the cheat sheet in the description box down below before we tune the ukulele it's very helpful to memorize the string pitches another way to say this is to memorize the letters that are assigned to each of the four strings as you can see there are four strings and there's a string closest to the floor and a string closest to your face the string closest to your face is string number four and we call it the g string the next string is string number three which we call the C string next we have string number two which we call the e string and last the string closest to the floor string number one we call the a string even though we call each of these strings by a different letter there are times when the string itself will actually sound like a different letter or pitch if we're playing the g string we want it to sound like a g string and not an a string or an E string however is sometimes because our ukuleles are not perfect it will have a different sound than the letter it's given for example if I play the g string it's currently in tune which means that you are hearing the G pitch but sometimes if this gets turned that's no longer a G pitch so even though we would still call this a g-string it doesn't actually sound like the G pitch and that's why we need to know how to tune our ukuleles we want each string to sound like the pitch that it's called if you look at the very top of your ukulele you'll see this section which is called the headstock on the headstock you'll see these four knobs which connect to these pegs and these are called the tuning pegs if you turn these tuning pegs you can either loosen the string or tighten the string that's wound around the peg so for example take any of these strings put your finger on the string and follow it all the way up to the tuning peg notice that it's wrapped around the peg and then that peg is attached to this knob so whenever you turn this you're turning this which is tightening or loosening the string that's wound around it because not all ukuleles are the same I can't tell you for sure which direction will tighten it and which one will loosen it because it's different on some ukuleles because of this you will need to do a little bit of experimenting to see which way you need to turn your ukulele tuning pegs in order to tighten or loosen the strings now whether you're tightening or loosening the strings you want to be very careful that you don't do it too fast if you tighten them too fast they could break I've learned from experience now that you have a basic idea of how tuning works let's talk about the steps needed in order to tune your ukulele step number one is to have some sort of device that will help you to know which pitch your string is and whether or not the pitch is in tune or out of tune well there are several devices that you can use in this tutorial I'm going to show you guys what I use which is an app called guitar tuna side note this is not sponsored I'm not being paid guitar tuner doesn't even know who I am I just genuinely like this app and it's what I use if you don't have a phone or an iPad where you can download apps another device you can use is a clip-on tuner which is a little thing that you clip on it will have a square that tells you what picture plane and it will also show you if you are going below that pitch or above that pitch I'll post a link to my favorite clip on tuner and the description box down below step number two is to use your right hand to play an open g string if you're not familiar with the term open it means that nothing will be pressed down on the fretboard with your left hand take your right hand and play the open g string you can play it multiple times as you watch the tuner in some cases whenever you're playing the g string or any other string it might display that you're playing a G but it might show you that the G is sharp or flat for example you see that that little red dot is moving to the left of the middle line whenever it moves to the left that means that my string is flat so I'm going to tighten it and once I hear the Dean it means that my string is in tune in most simple terms if your string is flat it means that the pitch is too low and that you need to tighten the string in order to get it where it needs to be on the other hand if your string is sharp it means that the pitch is too high and that you need to loosen the string in order to get it where it needs to be for example on guitar tuna you'll see that the little circle goes to the left of the middle line whenever it's flat and it goes to the right of the middle line whenever it's sharp if my G is sharp which means that the string is too tight and I start to loosen the string you'll notice that the circle moves closer and closer to that middle line until you hear a kink the fourth and final step is to apply steps 1 through 3 to the C E and a strings once each string is in tune then play an easy chord to make sure that everything is sounding great and that's it you're all tuned up if you're interested and growing as a ukulele player or guitar piano player or a songwriter then make sure you subscribe because those are the things that I teach here on this channel again if you would like to download the cheat sheet for this video I'll post a link to that in the description box down below until next time remember to play write and spread the light