And the real star of the evening was Renato Marcianò,the bass player putting down his large double bass and picking up a tiny instrument- a ukulele – a bass ukulele.
The Kala UBass is the size of a baritone ukulele but has the range of a bass guitar i.e. it is tuned EADG in the same octave as a standard bass guitar. It achieves this through polyurethane strings.
The original bass ukulele was the Road Toad. The downside is that it was very expensive – out of the range of most ukulele players who might be curious about it. Then they hooked up with Kala who used Road Toad’s technology and adapted a standard baritone ukulele to produce a cheaper bass ukulele. The Kala U-bass is in a range that makes it affordable to someone who wants to include bass in their ukulele group but wants to keep the aesthetic.