Whether to wear a strap or not is totally a personal question you’ll need to answer based on your needs, preferences and desire for bragging rights. As I’ve mentioned before, there are some who are very proud that they do not wear a strap, while others are big advocates for straps (like me). I’d like to address some of the advantages and disadvantages of being strapped or strapless (in regards to your ukulele), at least as I see it.

Wearing a Strap

• Advantage: You don’t have to worry about juggling your instrument and making sure it doesn’t fall out of your hands. This is especially handy for beginners, who have enough to worry about with fretting, strumming, fingerpicking, learning to read music/tablature and often trying to sing at the same time. The juggling aspect of going strapless really ups the difficulty of all these other things.
• Advantage: You’ll never worry about dropping your uke. This is especially handy for me as a teacher, because it means I don’t have to set my uke down every time I need to adjust a student’s hand position or write on the whiteboard. It doesn’t just apply to teachers though … I’ve seen ukes dropped on many an occasion; it’s painful to watch.
• Advantage: You can position the ukulele on your body in a lot of different ways. This allows you to get a better position for your wrist health and/or body type. Most woman who are not flat-chested are particularly glad for the ability to find a comfortable position for their ukulele that doesn’t require some kind of Twelfth Night wrapping up of their chest.
• Advantage: Standing or sitting, the strap keeps your ukulele in the same position. It’s amazing how a change in ukulele position can all of a sudden make your familiar instrument feel unfamiliar.
• Disadvantage: You may have to endure the almost self-righteous determination of strapless ukulele players to convince you you’re doing it wrong.
• Disadvantage: It has been argued that strapping your ukulele to your body may dampen the instrument’s natural acoustics and muffle its sound. This can be a valid point. The ukulele is already notoriously quiet. However … I think with time and experience you can learn to offset this if you find it to be a problem.
• Disadvantage: You may have to drill into your ukulele to install strap buttons if that is the kind of strap you are going to use. Though there are straps that do not require buttons to hold your uke, I have never noticed a change in acoustics in the instrument when installing strap buttons … they are my preferred way to go.

Going Strapless

• Advantage: Bragging rights that you are doing it the ‘traditional’ way. You can then lord your superiority over other ukulele players and alienate yourself from them.
• Advantage: No drilling required. For some people that have invested in an expensive ukulele, this is a real issue. Once again though, as long as you’ve got a wood block at the base of your lower bout (check with a flashlight inside the sound hole), you should have no problem installing a strap button. The difference is only cosmetic.
• Advantage: You may experience a boost in acoustics (tone and projection), but this depends largely on how well you hold your ukulele. If you really want to get the absolute most sound out of your instrument though, you should consider playing seated with your ukulele resting on your leg a little tiny way away from your body, as classical guitarists do. I find this impractical for performance though (see my last post).

In Favor of Straps – Famous Players that Use Them

I’m not going to make an exhaustive list, but here are a few that spring to mind:

• Jake Shimabukuro – the most famous ukulele player in the world uses a strap
• Taimane Gardner – who also demonstrates that you can hang your ukulele much lower if you want to use flamenco techniques in your playing
• Sarah Maisel – one half of the ukulele world’s sweetheart couple, and a fantastic jazz player, uses one

Now I have to mention the BIG exceptions here … James Hill is a huge proponent of going strapless as are most of the traditional Hawaiian artists (its part of the culture).

So? Should you use a strap or not? That’s a decision for you to make, but I hope I’ve given you some things that might better inform your decision.

Next time I’ll address the different kinds of ukulele straps out there. Meanwhile … Happy strumming! 🙂

Post filed under All UkulelePlay! Blog Posts.