A Music Witch’s Most Useful Magickal Tool

As witches, many of us use magickal tools of some sort. From the practical everyday tools of a kitchen witch, to the arcane and complicated tools of high magick, there are a wide variety of tools available to help support a witch’s magickal workings.

There is one tool that, in my mind, stands out from the rest of the items in the pagan magickal arsenal. I am, of course, talking about the ukulele.

I love, love, love, love, love, LOVE my ukulele. I actually have a collection now—practically one for every season. As a musical witch, this really is one of my most useful magickal tools. I bring it to more rituals than my athame. But then again, we’re Crow Women.

Since my coven will not allow me to go door to door recruiting people to paganism (apparently people have been burned with that approach), I can at least try to convert other pagans to the Tribe of the Uke.

There are many reasons to love a uke, possibly one of the biggest being its portability. A ukulele is super easy to throw in the car or onto the back of a broom and cart out to a ritual site or festival. I remember when I was growing in public school bands and I switched from the bassoon (honking huge) to the oboe (petite as a flute). At that point, I decided never again would I be the musician hauling an instrument as big as I am. Then I married a drummer… another story.

The uke is also relatively easy. It has four strings, unlike the six-stringed guitar, and particularly for those of us with smallish hands there is far less contorting. (Most of the time—there’s a good reason you don’t see many uke songs in E major!)

A ukulele makes keeping your group (or even just yourself) in tune for pagan chants a simple task. You’ll note that on the Crow Women’s third album, Seasons, we have increased our use of pitched instruments (i.e. instruments that play musical notes of definite pitch). Although a capella (without instrument) singing has its charms, it is certainly easier to stay on pitch with the notes ringing in your ear!! And if singing isn’t really your forte, playing along with your ukulele is a way to make your singing friends very happy and give you a way to be involved in the music.

Pagan music is MADE for the ukulele. Almost all well-known pagan chants are written in a minor key—mostly A minor or E minor. A minor is one of the easiest chords on the ukulele. E minor is pretty standard as well. So, you literally can get a uke and learn two chords, and you are set to play pagan chants. Get a capo (a device that clamps onto the uke frets and raises the pitch) and you can shift that chant into a key that is most comfortable for you.

And contrary to popular belief, the ukulele is sexy! If you think “ukulele” and your first image is this:

You’ve been missing out. Think more like this:

Ukuleles have become cool in the past few years. Professional musicians appreciate the versatility of ukuleles and have begun incorporating them in creative and beautiful ways. You will not believe what magic some people can make on a simple ukulele.

Still not convinced? Check out my favorite ukulele video of all time.

Now I know you are chomping at the bit to run out and get your first magickal uke. First, a few pieces of advice from someone who learned the hard way.

1. You may be tempted to go get the cheapest uke you can find and then if you like it, you’ll go get a nicer one. And you can indeed get a little soprano (the smallest and generally cheapest of the uke family) for under $40. DON’T!!! You are unlikely to fall in love with a cheap instrument. A good quality ukulele is between $200-300, and the difference in what comes out of the strings is tenfold. If you can go ahead and invest in a decent instrument, do it. Your joy at what you can create will be well worth it. (Oscar Schmidt has become a popular brand recently, with many good instruments in the $100-200 range.)

2. Ukuleles come in a range of sizes. The soprano, concert and tenor scales are all strung the same (gCEA), the tone and pitch are just slightly different. The soprano has the highest pitch, the tenor the lowest and most resonant. A baritone is even lower, and is strung like the bottom four strings of a guitar (DGBE). If you are switching to uke from guitar, this is probably the easiest transition. A bass uke is strung just like a bass guitar (EADG). Plug it into an amp, and I swear you can’t tell the difference! Check online or, better yet, head to a music store to toodle around with different sizes and find the one you like best.

3. Find some good instruction. There are some excellent beginner books to get you going on your ukulele. You Tube also has a plethora of instructional videos. Play around a little to find out what comes easy to you and what you struggle with. And then see if you can find a ukulele teacher. Even if you can find a guitar teacher, it’ll work. Guitars and ukes are strung differently, but otherwise most of the concepts are the same.

4. Start finding some songs that you love and learn them. Playing things you love encourages you to practice. If you can’t wait to play your instrument, you are less likely to find excuses not to. You can find free and cheap downloads of uke songs on the internet, and uke songbooks are becoming more and more available. Mix up your practice between those songs you love and more challenging exercises to keep you improving. A few minutes a day will yield far better results than sitting down for two hours straight on the weekend.

Are you ready? Go create some magick! Then come back and tell me all about it.