Can you play Stairway to Heaven on ukulele?

Find out just how well this classic song by Led Zeppelin works on our tiny instrument in this performance by Jeff Peterson. Jeff’s arrangement includes the full song (even the guitar solo!), all on one instrument with only four strings. This is a fingerstyle arrangement in the key of D minor (originally in A minor) using Low-G tuning. The lower G offers a fuller range to approximate as best as possible the original.

So can you play Stairway to Heaven on ukulele? Absolutely! And if you would like to take a deep dive to learn how to play the intro to this iconic rock song, Jeff has a tutorial to walk you through it step by step. Check out Jeff’s tutorial on the intro here. Jeff also has a great tutorial on the rocking strumming section that you can watch here.

Background

“Stairway to Heaven” was written by Robert Plant and Jimmy Page in 1971 and released on their fourth studio album with Atlantic Records (usually called IV or Led Zeppelin IV). The song is on pretty much every top-100-best-rock-songs-of-all-time lists. And Jimmy Page’s searing solo toward the end of the song equally tops many of the lists of best guitar solos ever recorded. Musically broken up into three sections, the intro has been compared to a renaissance style, with a descending chromatic bass line contrasted with contrary motion in the upper voice.

We hope you enjoy Jeff’s performance on ukulele!

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