If you’re looking for guitalele books to help you learn the guitalele, you’ve come to the right post!
I’ve played the guitar since 2003, the ukulele since 2011, and the guitalele since 2019.
In other words, I am familiar with music and specifically, the guitalele.
And in this guide, I’m going to give you a brief overview of the major books available on Amazon for the guitalele along with my unbiased opinion as to how they might (or might not) help you learn this instrument.
The Guitalele Chord Bible: ADGCEA Standard Tuning 1,728 Chords (Fretted Friends Series)
If you’ve read my post about how to learn the guitalele, you know I recommend starting by learning simple chords.
The Guitalele Chord Bible helps you do just that!
With this book, you can learn not only all the simple chords you need but countless more complex chords that will really help you level up your playing.
Plus, it is one of the more highly rated guitalele books on Amazon.
So you can take comfort in the fact that many other people have found this book valuable!
Guitalele From The Start: The Complete Beginner’s Guitalele Course
I’ve mentioned in other posts how there just aren’t many learning resources available for guitalele players.
And that includes books for learning the guilele.
However, if you’ve done any looking around for guitalele books, you’ve probably come across this one by Frederick Johnson.
Unfortunately, this book doesn’t have the gleaming reviews you would hope for in a book you’re considering.
It seems like some people have found it genuinely helpful.
And others have apparently been disappointed with it.
If you look at the table of contents you can probably guess why.
Although this book has some good information, it’s very short!
It doesn’t seem to go into the details as much as many of its reviewers would like.
Given this disclaimer, I still think you could get some helpful information from it if you are an absolute beginner.
If you aren’t, you may want to skip this one.
Guitarlele for Ukulele and Guitar Players
If you’ve ever searched guitalele or ukulele content on YouTube, you may have come across Terry Carter’s videos.
He has a successful web brand and YouTube channel of instructional videos related to the ukulele and guitalele.
Terry has also written this book that typically goes along with his course on how to learn the guitalele.
His course has a lot more material including videos, worksheets, and more.
But if you want a less expensive way to get access to some of this course material, check out his book.
It has positive reviews. But most recommend his full course instead of the book alone.
Fingerpicking Guitalele Solo: volumes 1, 2, and 3.
These books feature sheet music and guitalele tabs for various popular folk songs.
They may not be best for an absolute beginner, but as I mentioned in my post about how to learn the guitalele, I highly recommend learning songs as a way to learn an instrument.
And volumes 1 2, and 3 will help you do just that.
To me, the downsides of these books are:
- limited song selection. I don’t recommend learning songs you don’t like. And if you don’t like any of the songs in this book, you’re out of luck.
- limited style. This book is about fingerpicking, not strumming. And I actually think strumming is easier than fingerpicking for a beginner.
Given the above disclaimers and context, I think these books can be helpful if you know what they provide.
Guitalele Songbook: 100 Children’s Songs
Because guitaleles are smaller and have easier to press down strings than steel-string guitars, they are often marketed to children.
As a result, you are bound to see some learning materials geared towards children, and this is one of them.
That said, this book can still help the adult learner as long as you are interested in the songs this book has to learn.
Of course, many of them probably won’t interest an adult learner (like Hot Cross Buns).
But they have a handful of songs that may be of interest to you (like Jingle Bells or Old King Cole).
And if you can learn several songs in this songbook, you will have learned the fundamentals of guitalele.
A Visual Guide to Scales for Guitalele In ADGCEA
This book is (unsurprisingly) more advanced compared to many of the books previously reviewed in this list.
Also, as you can tell by this book’s cover, it doesn’t have the graphic design to make it an easy or attractive read.
That said, if you’re looking to level up your playing and read more about music theory as it relates to the guitalele, this book is for you.
I’ve mentioned in my post about how to learn the guitalele that music theory can be a helpful tool for any musician looking to level up their skills.
Learning music theory can also help you get out of a rut and expose you to new styles and ways of playing you wouldn’t otherwise know.
The Big Book of Guitalele Songs
Unlike the guitalele songbook for children that I mentioned above, this book isn’t necessarily made for children.
That said, it still has some children’s songs in it with other songs as well.
Unfortunately, this book doesn’t have good reviews.
You can look inside on Amazon and see that it seems the author unnecessarily spaced out the content to increase the page count.
According to the reviews and the look inside, it just doesn’t seem to be a high-quality learning resource.
Thus, I’d recommend other books on this list before this one.
Ukulele and Guitalele – The ToneWay Music Method: An Easier Way to Play Music
This book is more professionally put together than many of the books on this list.
However, it attempts to be both a learning resource for the ukulele and guitalele which I don’t think is a good idea.
If anything, guitar learning resources might also be used for the guitalele because the guitalele shares the same number of strings and tuning intervals as a guitar.
That said, this book has some good information on the guitalele and how to learn it.
Check out the table of contents on Amazon to see what exactly it goes over on the guitalele.
If you’re unfamiliar with the concepts it goes over for the guitalele in the table of contents, you may want to check this one out.
Guitalele Chords For Kids…& Big Kids Too! (Fretted Friends Beginners Series)
Even though this book is “for kids,” it’s a better learning resource than many of the books I’ve discussed so far.
You can think of this book as the beginner’s version of The Guitalele Chord Bible.
So if you feel intimidated by the Guitalele Chord Bible, you may want to check out this book instead.
I recommend looking inside this book on Amazon to get a sense for what the book will go over.
Apart from the obvious (chords), the author also reviews some of the very basics of music theory.
The Canons for Guitalele
If you’re not familiar with the concept, a musical canon is when two or more people or instruments carry the same melody starting at different times but overlapping to create a layered sound.
This layered effect can be quite beautiful and is an interesting emphasis for a musical book.
Like I’ve mentioned for other books in this list, if you aren’t interested in learning the songs in this book, it’s probably not a good choice for you.
Although this seems obvious, I’ve talked with many musicians who find themselves learning songs they think they should but don’t actually want to learn.
I also find that many student musicians learn songs they don’t care for due to the influence of their teachers.
I understand that you may want to stretch yourself by learning a song that features a difficult musical structure you want to learn.
But in general, I recommend sticking to learning songs you enjoy.
Otherwise, you increase the odds of burning out with your instrument.
So be sure to check out this book on Amazon to see which songs it features and make sure you actually want to learn these songs.
Conclusion
I wish there were an abundance of high-quality learning resources for the guitalele.
But unfortunately, there aren’t.
That said, I hope this guide gives you a solid overview of what’s available and what might help you in your learning journey.
Do you know of another book about the guitalele I didn’t include in this list?
Let me know in the comments, and I’ll consider adding it!
Or if you have any other questions or comments related to guitalele books, feel free to let me know in the comments!
