1-2-3 Quick Start Overview

What’s It Do?

The JavaScript library reads your song, looks for all the chords, and automatically generates a nifty reference fingering chart (chord diagrams) while formatting your song for easy reading.

If you enter this:

I want to go [G]back to my little grass shack
In Kealakekua, [A7]Hawaii
I want to [D7]be with all the kanes and wahines
That I used to [G]know... so long ago

I can [B7]hear the old guitars a-playing[E7]
On the beach at Honaunau
I can [A7]hear the old Hawaiians saying
"Komo [D7]mai no kaua i ka hale welakahau"

{figure 1} Marking up a song is simple: simply surround your chords with square brackets, [D7]. Shown here’s a snippet from “My Little Grass Shack in Kealakekua”, one of the surprisingly few songs to reference a humu-humunukunukuapua’a (which means "fish with a nose like a pig", but you knew that)

UkeGeeks creates this:

Sample output with chords, My Little Grass Shack — {figure 2} The output is great for group or school handouts and includes a chord diagrams (fingering chart) and easy-to-read lyrics. You may choose to have chords appear above the lyrics (as shown) or inline.

That’s it!

Click Print and you’ve got super legible sheet music for your songbook!

Prefer your chord diagrams above the lyrics? Why not? Change one setting and viola!

Sample output for Greenday's Good Riddance with diagrams over lyrics — {figure 3} Generate play sheets in the format you want, including chord diagrams (fingering chart) above the lyrics.

Wait… what about Tablatures?

Sure. Mix tabs in with your tunes like this. Just surround your tablature with the tabs marker like this:

{c:First Verse}
I'm [F]gonna save a penny
Ev-'ry time I hold you tight
And we're gonna watch the pen-nies [Gm7][Gm7b5][C7]grow____
I'm [Gm]gon-na save a pen-ny
Ev-ry time we kiss good-night
And [C7]dar-ling, when we're [C7]mar-ried we can [F]own a [C7]bun-ga-[F]low:___

{c:Tablature for Chorus}
{start_of_tab}
A|---------0---|---------0-
E|---1-1-1-----|---1-1-1---
C|-0-----------|-0---------
G|-------------|-----------
{end_of_tab}

{start_of_tab}
A|-----------0-0-3-3-1-------
E|---1-1-1-1-----------2-0-----
C|-0---------------------------
G|---------------------------
{end_of_tab}

{start_of_tab}
A|---------1--|---------1------------
E|---3-3-3----|---3-3-3--------
C|-0----------|-0----------------
G|------------|--------------
{end_of_tab}

{start_of_tab}
A|--------1-0----------
E|------------2-1------
C|--0-2-0--------------
G|---------------------
{end_of_tab}

{figure 4} Mark tablature within your music with special "start" and "end" markers. (This is an excerpt from "A Penny A Kiss" (1951) by Buddy Kay & Ralph Care)

Your tabs get the pretty-up treatment, too, even handling those uneven tablature lines

Output for Penny A Kiss including tablature — {figure 5} Your output will include a cleaned version of your tablature