Sunday, April 24, 2011

The Rajão

The Madeiran rajão is one of several ancestral instruments to the ukulele. While the machete gave the ukulele its form and scale, it was the rajão that contributed the re-entrant (or my dog has fleas) tuning. The machete is tuned to Open G while the five-stringed rajão is tuned DGCEA. Lose the fifth (D) string and you've got the C uke tuning.

Here is an article (in Portuguese) on the Cordofones Tradicionais Madeirenses blog. (A Google-translated version of the page is here, but it's dodgy.) Enjoy this video of Vitor Sardinha playing Arrivederci Roma (and be sure to stay for the surprising reveal at the end). Link

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Where can i get a chords chart of ukulele??

Anonymous said...

when was this instrument created?

Almiro Jorge said...

This instrument was created in Portugal many centuaries ago in the region of Braga.....is the reason why it is also called Braquinha (small Braga)..........the bigger one, a 5 string normal guitar is called Braguesa (from Braga). In Portugal were also created the 6 string guitars like Campaniça and Açorean type of guitar.

Unknown said...
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