Liz and Jim Beloff’s Daily Ukulele songbooks provide beginners with an accessible starting point for their ukulele journey.
Written by John Allnutt / Published September 13, 2024
Last updated: September 13, 2024
Today, I will be reviewing the Daily Ukulele Songbooks to see if they are appropriate for beginner ukulele players. You may have seen these books at ukulele gatherings, jams, conferences or festivals. The Daily Ukulele Songbooks may be the most ubiquitous, but premium ukulele books available at the moment.
Short History of the Daily Ukulele Songbooks
The Daily Ukulele books were written in 2010 by authors Jim and Liz Beloff. Jim and Liz both witnessed many large group gatherings of retired or semi-retired folks playing songs together with big bulky music binders and had the idea to compile a pretty large book that encouraged playing a new song each day for a calendar year.
Additionally, the goal of these books was to ensure that all participants could play the same songs without having to make copies.
A Compilation of Ukulele Sheet Music for Beginners
At the time of its inception, there was not much printed music for the ukulele (not since the 1920’s). So, Jim and Liz decided to go out to flea markets to gather as many ukulele songbooks as possible to help compile their collection.
For further reading if you are interested in all of the specific details on the history of the Daily Ukulele books check out Jim’s excellent book “Uketopia!” that he wrote in 2021.
Benefits of the Daily Ukulele Songbooks
An apple a day keeps the doctor away and similarly the Daily Ukulele books claim to “Help bring you joy, make you smarter, make you laugh and give (you) romantic advantages…” I enjoy these books not only for the reasons listed above but because the books are full of mostly easy arrangements and time-tested tunes.
The Daily Ukulele books are each quite thick and have a good mix of public domain songs, Hawaiian Classics and oldies. My favorite arrangements in the Daily Ukulele books are the Beatles songs, which are timeless classics.
The Essence of the Original Songs
While the songs in the Daily Ukulele books aren’t always in their original key or to their full duration, the arrangements of the songs contain the essence of their originality. When the songs aren’t in their original keys they are ukulele friendly (easy to play); C, F, G, D, or A. The melody is written out in music notation with the chords listed above the melody in each measure.
Arrangement and Typography
Besides the chord shapes recommended for each song (which are usually excellent), the musical typography is just as gorgeous and is in proportion to the page.
Many other books I run into do not make the best use of space on the page and are very clunky in comparison. If I had to show someone a great use of paper space, the Daily Ukulele books would be my example.
The chords are listed in the order that they appear in the song and will easily be learned as you make your way through the book. Assuming that you are a beginner, I recommend starting with two chord songs first and working your way up through three to four chord songs.
Criticisms of the Daily Ukulele Songbooks
The main criticism of these books is that many of the songs (at least in the first book) are a bit old, outdated or forgotten. For that reason, I took it upon myself to learn these songs and cover them on my YouTube channel – John’s Ukulele Cafe.
So many ukulele players that I know knew the Daily Ukulele songs better than I did and I wanted to make sure that I was up to speed and could help others learn these songs as well. At the time of this writing, I have about 70 more songs to cover and then all 365 of the first book’s songs will be available on my YouTube page to play along with.
The other main criticism of the Daily Ukulele books is that it was made for those only able to read music. This gets to the crux of a great beginner songbook – to include or not to include written music notation. If you are an absolute beginner musician or ukulele player that has not learned to read, the Daily Ukulele books may not be appropriate for you.
Alternative Ukulele Songbooks for Beginners
If the older songs drive you crazy (in a negative way) and you are looking for some more contemporary songs, the Ultimate Ukulele Fakebook by Hal Leonard with 400 songs is probably going to suit you better. This book includes songs from the 1980’s to the present.
Another great alternative (regardless of age) is the Hal Leonard Ukulele books for Kids Method and Songbook. The songs that are listed in those books do not show the written notation for their melodies but rather “/” marks for each strum. I have given an example below of how that would look with chords:
Different Editions of the Daily Ukulele Songbooks for Beginners
Currently, there are two main books: The Original (yellow cover) and the Leap Year Book (blue cover). Jim and Liz Beloff chose the songs in the Original book and then opted in their subsequent book to let friends and fans choose the songs in their Leap Year book.
In November of this year, 2024, a newer book will be released called Another Year (purple cover). Similarly to the Leap Year book the purple book will have 365 songs that were requested by fans of the Daily Ukulele series.
Recommendations for Beginners
If you are a ukulele player of any level, including beginner, I recommend first starting with the original (yellow) Daily Ukulele book. In general, it has songs with less chords to learn per song than the Leap Year book. It also has a section for holidays and kids songs.
If you are looking to play the songs from the Daily Ukulele (yellow) book in chord order (two chords, three chords, etc.) Ukulele Tonya has a great resource that lists all of the songs in this order that you can learn.
Final Words
Overall, I find that these books are an excellent, well-thought out package and just nice to hold. If BIG books aren’t your thing, they also make a To-Go version of the book that can fit in most ukulele cases. Additionally, the books are also available on any device where you can access the Kindle App (including iPads.)
If you own a baritone ukulele, there are also baritone versions of each book. The songs in the baritone books maintain the same key as the Daily Ukulele books so you could easily play along and add baritone players to your ukulele groups.
All of these books are generally available in the $30-$50 range. While that may seem a premium price, I find that the Daily Ukulele songbooks are excellent value for beginners.
John Allnutt
Writer & Ukulele TeacherJohn has been teaching music since 2008 and resides in Richmond, Kentucky with his wife Laura and dog Sam. In his spare time he enjoys growing and cooking food, roasting coffee, playing board games, and spreading joy through playing and teaching music.
