Ashbury
Lonely Player

This is a Ukulele! - really!! 

It's the Ashbury "Lonely Player" travel Soprano and is such an unusual design that I knew I would have to invite one at some time, but Gremlin are a big distributor so there would be plenty about and they would be easy to get hold of, (with Gremlin behind it I'm surprised it went in the Ashbury line-up and not the Blue Moon one? Anyway...). They are also not very expensive so it was something that could sit on my list for a bit for when I hadn't invited anything for a while, or and I think this is the actual case, when I could resist no longer. Well it is certainly a striking design and I'm very much looking forward to seeing how it is to play and to how it sounds.

Now it's here and it is definitely different! Very different indeed; and small too. It came is a standard soprano size box and when I saw that I thought "they could have packed it with more padding, maybe a box within a second box too..." but when I opened it they had. Inside the standard Soprano box was plenty of protective padding and a much smaller rectangular box that the Ukulele came in. The box is cardboard and not a case or a soft case but given its size and shape I have seen pencil cases that could easily be used as a soft case for it and there would be plenty of options for repurposing something for a hard case too. To the Ukulele itself and the first thing was to tune it and this was "different" too With its headless design and the tuners at the base it was not as easy to tune as normal. Firstly you have to use the same hand you pluck the strings with to turn the tuner which is a little inconvenient; or use your other hand to pluck the strings, but then you need a third hand to hold it. Secondly as the tuners are at the other end of the Ukulele you have to turn them the other way than you normally would. Another tuning problem if you are using clip on electric tuning devices is the only place you can clip it is on the lip at the end and with the comfort curve and the size of the lip, this is not a very secure place to clip it, (it does tend to fly off). None of this is majorly difficult but it adds to the oddness of it, and once it is in tune the tone is not great, more like a cigar box instrument than a nice Ukulele, (I suppose that is to be expected, it is built like a cigar box Ukulele really). It's also not very loud, but like its looks it's sound is distinctive and different. It is not a Ukulele for beginners but it is certainly one for a collection; and one that is very welcome at Ukulele Corner.