If you are looking for more song lessons, sign up for our song library for access to more song tutorials, music sheets and backing tracks of your favorite songs! Once you confidently learn the song, you add your own creative spin on it and make it your own. As mentioned, the song is played rather slowly, which is especially advantageous since 12/8 beats tend to sound better when played slowly in the first place.Īlso, since it’s a slower song with a lot of space in between the chords, you have plenty of room to throw in your own extra strums without cluttering up the general structure of the song. 12/8 means that you have 12 beats for every measure, and the core of the song requires you to strum downward four times for each measure. The timing revolves around a 12/8 timing pattern, which might seem unusual if you aren’t familiar with it, but it’s not a complicated timing pattern to master with a little practice. Learning the Timing and Strumming Patterns As epic of a song that it is, it’s not a very complicated to song to learn on the ukulele, so let’s get started!

In this article, we will focus on Leonard Cohen’s’s rendition of ‘Hallelujah’ translated for ukulele, along with some useful tips for learning the chords, timing and strumming pattern. Fortunately, the slow tempo of the song helps to make it an easy song to learn on the ukulele. There aren’t that many chords but there are still some very interesting changes along with a unique timing structure. The original version recorded by Cohen in 1984 is not a ukulele-driven song, but over the years, renditions of the song have developed that feature a uke as it’s centerpiece. It has been featured in several films and TV shows, and there are more than 300 known renditions in several different languages.

Leonard Cohen’s ‘Hallelujah’ is a classic and epic song that has sold several million copies worldwide and has been covered and re-recorded by countless musicians over the years.

Fingerpicking ukulele hallelujah