Explore The Family Tree of the Ukulele, from the Taro Patch to the Guitalele
TEXT AND PHOTOS BY SANDOR NAGYSZALANCZY | FROM THE FALL 2024 ISSUE OF UKULELE
If you’ve read anything at all about the origins of the ukulele, you already know that this instrument evolved from two traditional Portuguese instruments: the machete and rajão. Both of these were brought to the Hawaiian Islands by Portuguese expats who sailed from their home island of Madeira to seek prosperity, initially by working in Hawaii’s then burgeoning sugarcane industry.
If this pair of diminutive instruments can be thought of as the ukulele’s parents, what about the uke’s other relations? There are quite a few traditional South American stringed instruments, such as the Andean charango, the Venezuelan cuatro, and the Brazilian cavaquinho, that bear some resemblance to the uke, as they are all small acoustic stringed instruments. However, none of these instruments—even those with four strings—are directly related to the ukulele, as they originated in different countries at different times.
But there are a few small stringed instruments which have origins directly connected to the uke. These relatives include instruments that evolved from the design and/or properties of the uke itself or were created as a result of its popularity. These include the taro patch, Tahitian ukulele, tiple, and guitalele, as well as the ukelin, an instrument that’s not really a ukulele at all.
TARO PATCH
The ukulele’s closest cousin is undoubtedly the taro patch. First produced in the Hawaiian Islands in the late 19th century, the earliest taro patches were fashioned from five-string Madeiran rajãos with their bottom string removed. This allowed the instrument to be tuned and played like a regular four-string ukulele, albeit one with a larger body. At the time, it was common for rajãos to be referred to as taro patches or taro patch fiddles. The instrument allegedly got its name from being played by native Hawaiians in the taro fields they cultivated; scholars suggest that the term was more likely a derogatory slur coined by haoles (white Islanders).
By the early 1900s, a new form of taro patch was being made and played in Hawaii: one with eight strings set in four courses of paired strings, with each pair tuned in unison to the then-standard A–D–F#–B ukulele tuning. The resulting instruments were a bit louder than regular soprano ukes due to their doubled strings and larger bodies, akin to concert ukes. The doubled strings also offered a more sonorous sound.
Prominent among the early Hawaiian luthiers who built taro patch ukes was Manuel Nunes, one of the pioneers of the modern ukulele. His company, M. Nunes & Sons, began building taro patches even before it was formally founded in 1910. Their instruments were often labeled “M. Nunes, Inventor of the Ukulele and Taro Patch Fiddles in Honolulu in 1879.” While his claim of invention is highly questionable, Nunes continued building taro patches well into the late 1920s. Nunes passed his lutherie knowledge on to his apprentices, including his son Leonardo and Samuel Kamaka, both of whom founded companies that built taro patches along with regular ukuleles.
On the American mainland, legendary guitar maker C.F. Martin & Co. began making and selling taro patches in August of 1916, mere months after the introduction of its first line of soprano ukuleles. Three all-mahogany models were initially offered: Style 1, Style 2 and Style 3, plain to fancy. The Style 1 taro patch featured a 15-inch scale, a concert uke–sized body, a rosewood fretboard, and violin-style friction tuning pegs made of ebonized bulletwood, a dense tropical hardwood. In 1924 the line expanded to include koa taro patches in styles 1K, 2K, and 3K.
Unfortunately, taro patches never gained the popularity of regular ukuleles and they remained the least popular of Martin’s entire ukulele line. This was likely because they cost about 25 percent more than regular ukes and took twice as long to tune. Martin stopped making taro patches in 1935, but they’re still being manufactured today by companies including Kala, Mele, Ohana, and Lanikai. Almost all models are tenor-sized and are called eight-string ukuleles.
TAHITIAN UKULELE
The Tahitian ukulele, also known as the uku or ukarere, is a fretted eight-string instrument that was likely inspired by the Hawaiian taro patch. It first arrived in the islands of Tahiti in the very early 20th century and quickly became an integral part of the local culture, particularly in French Polynesia, as well as the Marquesas Islands and Cook Islands.
Like the taro patch, the Tahitian ukulele has eight strings. However, it is outfitted with strings made from thin-gauge monofilament fishing line. Its four doubled courses of strings are tuned to standard my-dog-has-fleas intervals, with two middle courses—the C and E strings—tuned an octave higher than on a taro patch. This tuning, coupled with the fast-strumming style used in Tahitian playing, gives these instruments a very bright, jangly sound.
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Unlike regular ukuleles, which are assembled from thin wood parts, Tahitian ukuleles have a solid body and neck that are carved, typically from rosewood, mahogany, or lychee wood. The body/neck may be carved from a single piece of wood, or consist of three pieces glued together, with sides that contrast in color from the central piece, for a decorative effect. Rather than having the Spanish figure-of-eight body shape of regular ukuleles, Tahitian uke bodies range widely in shape. They may be symmetrical or asymmetrical, plain or elaborately carved, sometimes adorned with carved decorations based on Polynesian motifs.
The construction of a Tahitian uke also differs from other ukuleles because it does not have a hollow soundbox. Instead, its solid wood body has holes bored through the middle, which is topped by a thin piece of wood that the bridge rests on, much the same way a banjo’s bridge rests atop a tensioned skin head. This is likely the reason that these instruments are sometimes called Tahitian banjos.
TIPLE
The instrument contemporarily known as the tiple (pronounced TEE-play) is the Colombian adaptation of a 12-stringed Spanish instrument, the vihuela, that was brought to the Americas by 16th-century conquistadors. By the late 1800s, the Colombian tiple had evolved into a guitar-like instrument with 12 metal strings laid out in four courses of three strings each, typically tuned C–E–A–D, from lowest course to highest.
The story of the American tiple began in December 1918, when a New York Hawaiian musical instrument dealer named William J. Smith placed an order with the Martin Guitar Company (which had only started producing ukuleles four years earlier) for six tiple guitars. Following the specs that Smith provided, these instruments were only one-quarter the size of a regular guitar and had ten steel strings, arranged in four courses: two outer courses with two strings each and two inner with three strings each. The courses were tuned D–G–B–E, and each course included a single wound string tuned an octave lower.
The tiple that Martin produced was close in length to a tenor ukulele, but had a deeper body. When strummed, the multiple steel strings produced lots of volume and complex harmonics that gave the instrument a unique voice. Between 1923 and 1926, Martin introduced three different tiple models: the all-mahogany T-17, the mahogany-bodied, spruce topped T-18, and the T-28, which had a rosewood body, spruce top, and fancy ivoroid bindings.
By the early 1920s, ten-string tiples were sometimes called guitar-ukuleles or ukaluas, although these names did not stick. They were considered to be part of the ukulele family of instruments, likely because of their diminutive size. Tiples continued to increase in popularity during the mid-1920s and were manufactured by several companies other than Martin, including Regal, Lyon & Healy, and Leonardo Nunes. However, they never sold in the same numbers as regular ukuleles. For example, in 1929, Martin only produced 50 tiples, while the same year the company produced 2,377 soprano ukes.
Despite the tiple’s waning popularity in the late 1940s, Martin continued building them into the 1980s, though production numbers in the later years were undoubtedly low.
Guitalele
If you play the guitar as well as the uke, then you’ll likely be interested in the guitalele. This six-string instrument is—you guessed it!—a cross between a regular guitar and a tenor or baritone ukulele, thus combining the compact, travel-friendly aspect of a ukulele with the potential for more complex chords thanks to its six strings. Alternately known as a guitarlele, guilele, ukitar, or kiku, the guitalele is essentially a modern iteration of the Latin American requinto.
Of all the uke’s relatives presented in this article, the guitalele is the youngest: The Yamaha Corporation produced the first one, the model GL-1, in 1978, describing it as a guitar-ukulele hybrid that combines the size of a tenor ukulele with the wider fretboard and six nylon strings of a classical guitar. Since then, a number of other musical instrument companies have issued their own versions of the guitalele, often marketing them as mini or travel-sized guitars.
Depending on the model and maker, guitaleles come strung with either nylon or steel strings. Baritone guitaleles are tuned E to E, just like a full-size guitar, while tenor guitaleles are tuned like a regular guitar that’s capoed at the fifth fret: A–D–G–C–E–A. The only catch is, playing a tenor guitalele requires you to transpose regular guitar chords up a fourth, for example E = A, A = D, etc. Most guitaleles have traditional Spanish shaped bodies, one exception being Romero Creations’ line of guitaleles (called guileles), which have tapered pineapple shapes similar to the ones used for its Tiny Tenor series ukes.
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UKELIN
Now we come to the ukulele’s strangest cousin: The Ukelin (which might best be characterized as a third cousin twice removed). Besides having strings, a soundhole, and the word uke in its name, this instrument actually has nothing at all to do with the ukulele. Ukelin (pronounced “u-ke-lin”) is the trade name of an instrument that’s a hybrid of the zither and bowed psaltery.
It’s part of a small family of patented novelty instruments that includes the violin uke and Hawaiian art violin, two instruments that are basically identical but manufactured by different companies. It’s very likely that the names of all three instruments were concocted to take advantage of America’s fascination with ukuleles and all things Hawaiian in the early 20th century.
Ukelins and violin ukes each have 16 melody strings as well as 16 bass strings divided into four groups of four, each tuned to a different chord. With the instrument set on a table or stand, the melody strings are played with a short violin-like bow, while the bass strings are plucked or strummed with the fingers.
The Ukelin and violin uke both came to life around the mid-1920s. The Marx Colony Music Company of New Troy, Michigan was one of the first to manufacture the instruments, which they branded as violin ukes. Instead of the usual practice of offering cheaply made instruments though music shops, they sold them directly to the public using traveling door-to-door salesmen, who often preyed on poor rural families. This is how the scam worked: The salesmen began by skillfully playing a tune or two on the instrument, then claiming that it was perfect for a beginner, as one could learn to play it in just a day. Those who fell for the pitch and bought an instrument quickly discovered that even simple tunes were difficult play, as one had to follow a complex numbered string/chord system outlined in the booklets that came with them. Not only that, but keeping those 32 strings in tune was especially difficult, as these instruments didn’t even come with tuning keys!
Despite the sales trickery, Ukelins and violin ukes continued to be peddled door to door all the way up to the mid-1960s. In 1964, Oscar Schmidt owner Glen Peterson discontinued making Ukelins after learning of his salesman’s shady business practices.
