A couple of weeks ago, I released my very own set of standard GCEA and baritone DGBE ukulele chord sheets. I did so partially to make a set of charts that fit my own requirements, but also as a trial run for the software I’d written to generate arbitrary chord diagrams.
To be honest though, my real goal wasn’t to create yet another set of standard charts- what I really wanted was a set of charts for slack-key, or open tuned, ukulele. See, I’ve wanted to try my hand at slack-key ukulele for some time now, but search as I might, I haven’t been able to find a single chord chart online for GCEG, or taropatch tuning. I figured somebody must have done it by now, but all anyone says is “look at slack-key guitar, ignore two strings and transpose” or “just move your 1st string fingering up two frets”.
I turned to books, and bought Mark Kailana Nelson’s “The Uke Buke… Learn to Play Slack Key Style ‘Ukulele”. Not a bad book, but it didn’t even have any chord charts! I bought David Heaukulani’s “Ukulele Slack Key”, which had quite a set of chords in the back, but unfortunately they’re really hard to read- they look like they were photocopied, resized and run through the washing machine. I bought Ondrej Sarek’s “Open Tunings for Ukulele”, which finally had legible GCEG diagrams, but so very few of them.
So I bit the bullet and using the books along with the wonderful ChordFind, I created a new set of diagrams for both ukes tuned GCEG (GCEA with the A string slacked) and DGBD (DGBE with the E string slacked):
Ukulele Chord Chart (Slack Key GCEG) [459k PDF]
Ukulele Chord Chart (Baritone Slack Key DGBD) [459k PDF]
Mini Slack Key Ukulele Chord Charts [1.1M PDF]
Like my previous charts, the first two are each a single letter-sized page (8.5″ x 11″) and contain 120 chords each. The third has both sets of chords, each tuning on half of a single letter-sized page, designed to be folded or cut in half.
And again, like my earlier charts, these are all under licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License. Of course, the package wouldn’t be complete without giving away the individual chord images I generated, for you to do with as you will:
GCEG Slack Key Ukulele Chords PNG [317k ZIP]
DGBD Baritone Slack Key Ukulele Chords PNG [317k ZIP]
Enjoy and happy (slack) strumming!
/jon
P.S. The hardest part of making these charts was my lack of slack-key experience- all I had to work with was chord theory, my own ear and some online tools. I’m sure there are many playing style factors like common shortcuts and chord substitutions that I didn’t take into consideration. (Part of the problem I had with David’s book was that he went ahead and made a lot of the substitutions for you without telling- many of the chords were inaccurate or incomplete flavors of what they’d been labeled as.)
So in making these charts, I altered my previous design rules slightly. First, I went for accuracy over keeping close to the nut, which means more barres and working higher up the fret board. Also, since the outer strings are both the same note, you can swap the fingerings for each and still have the same chord. For these charts I chose the chord shape that was easiest for me to play strumming. However, in slack-key style, which is fingerpicking heavy, the two strings are usually an octave apart, which is something to keep in mind if the music isn’t sounding right.
Finally, like I said before, there are a bunch of substitutions that I don’t know, especially as they relate to fingerpicking patterns, so when looking at tabs or sheet music for actual slack-key arrangements, don’t be surprised if the chords don’t match up exactly. Trust the arrangement, and if you’re a stickler for accuracy (like me), use my charts to look up the actual chord you were playing.
P.P.S. I’ve released the program I wrote to create the images. Download Chordious today!
P.P.P.S. All of my free ukulele chord charts can be found here.
Jon Thysell 
Mahalo nui loa! I have all the uke slack key books/resources you mentioned above but haven’t really tackled them with any diligence. I think having these chord charts will really help me as I noodle around with slack key ukulele.
Hope it helps! My plan is first to get the chords down, so I can keep playing what I know but in GCEG. Then I can worry about picking up slack-key style playing techniques.
i learned slack key uke from mr pang ching on the big island.. chords used are banjo chords .. when tuned taro patch gceg….hope this helps…
Do you know if he’s available for short/one-time lessons? I’m going to the big island in February next year for a week and would love to learn something hands-on instead of from books.
You can find these chord patterns for 5 string banjos; just ignore the 5th string. I played 5 string banjos for years, so when I switched to ukulele it was my tuning of choice. There are all kinds of inversions, and many more chord patterns you can use.
So far the open G tuning has been working good for me. I am trying to learn to play scales now, so I can do leads and fill. There really isn’t much out there on playing in open tunings, so I have to figure stuff out for myself; like you have done.
Thank you for creating these chords!
You’re welcome!
FYI, slack key on bari ukulele is the same as standard 5-string banjo tuning! That’s actually how I came to trying out DGBD on my bari uke. And so banjo chord charts will work for bari — and also for other ukes if you transpose the key accordingly (open G on banjo/bari = open C on other ukes).
Yeah, I didn’t learn that until after making these charts. Now on my phone I use the banjo tuning to find dgbd chords since the app I use won’t let me add custom tunings.
Now I’ve begun scouring banjo books for chord and scale diagrams I can use on the uke. I’m actually considering making a bunch of DGBD uke “cheat sheets” with chords and scales to practice.
Thank,s so much for the slack key chords.I was looking for barre chords
to play bottleneck slide, starting with the standard 1 4 5. C F G.
on my G C E G tuned Tenor Guitar.
Even though you dont show the barre chords for the F & G on the
5th & 7th. The chords will be a great help. Thank,s again….
I’m glad you’ve found the charts useful – haven’t heard of anyone playing open C on tenor guitar before.
Jon, if you revise, I’d strongly suggest adding the F and G barre chords. They make playing use tunes in C or D both easy and great fun, with or without a bottleneck.
Thank you so much for your hard work and generosity in sharing.
Allan
You’re welcome!
Hi Jon. This is the best. It’s like no one else gets it. Thanks for figuring it out and sharing.
I want to share this uku scale generator tool. It fits with what you’ve done.
1) Click on Quick Tuning DGBE
2) Then tap on the tuning peg for E and change it to D.
3) Scroll down and pick a root note and the type of scale, like pentatonic, or blues or an ethnic scale.
It’s your slacker tuning that makes me finally sound like i might be able to keep up with a song.
:-).
https://ukuscales.com/#DGBE
Hi Shelly,
Unfortunately Ukuscales doesn’t have that feature any more. I have an app – Ukulele Chords Chart – that at least gives me 3 options for ukulele – gCEA, slack and D tuning but only DGBE for the baritone.