Can we include projects with no intention to finish or support long term or frankly even share to an audience other than myself until now for some reason?
If so, I made this little app to help me quickly learn ukulele song chords nearly a decade ago: https://ukey.vercel.app/
The idea was to translate generic guitar tabs into visual chord diagrams for ukulele simply by copy-pasting note notation. Technically it could be adapted for other fretted instruments with a few lines, because it actually generates the chords mathematically with the help of the excellent Teoria library.
This sometimes leads to questionable finger positions, but you can tap any chord diagram to see if there are alternative fingerings, which makes it easy to find the most comfortable way to transition between chords.
On a similar note, you can transpose the song until you find a key that avoids the most difficult chords.
At one point I considered automating this process by creating a simple heuristic to determine the “difficulty” of a chord fingering, but I decided this was too subjective and varies a lot depending on the adjacent chords and frequency of switching finger positions.
Needless to say, I never really learned to play ukulele…
Great work! I've made a few jank theory practice apps for guitar and pedal-steel guitar, and know exactly what you mean when there's that impulse to start to automate things that are really just too subjective.
> Needless to say, I never really learned to play ukulele…
Funny you say that, I actually do think making the tools made me better at the instruments. Being forced to sit and seriously consider things like the most optimal way to change chords is the kind of music theory that I always struggled to think of in the moment on the instrument.
Yeah I was mostly being tongue in cheek; I probably learned more and played more songs than if I hadn’t made the app. I just don’t have the sort of patience or discipline required to really advance beyond a few basic tunes. I learned about ukulele and fretted instruments in general for sure though. I still have my ukuleles and can probably play a few tunes from memory, but my poor cat absolutely hates the sound so I don’t torture her. Nothing like an honest critic.
If so, I made this little app to help me quickly learn ukulele song chords nearly a decade ago: https://ukey.vercel.app/
Code: https://github.com/namuol/ukey
The idea was to translate generic guitar tabs into visual chord diagrams for ukulele simply by copy-pasting note notation. Technically it could be adapted for other fretted instruments with a few lines, because it actually generates the chords mathematically with the help of the excellent Teoria library.
This sometimes leads to questionable finger positions, but you can tap any chord diagram to see if there are alternative fingerings, which makes it easy to find the most comfortable way to transition between chords.
On a similar note, you can transpose the song until you find a key that avoids the most difficult chords.
At one point I considered automating this process by creating a simple heuristic to determine the “difficulty” of a chord fingering, but I decided this was too subjective and varies a lot depending on the adjacent chords and frequency of switching finger positions.
Needless to say, I never really learned to play ukulele…