A few years when I bought one of my excellent Shimo ukuleles, “The Comet 3” I asked Shimo what the strings were as they sounded and played great. “Those are Hilo’s and they stopped making them!” I then started to seek out these Hilo strings wherever I could, especially when travelling in the USA and Japan. Dean Leoni from Ukulele Mania had a stock of tenor and concert Hilo strings and I bought his entire tenor stock. I am especially keen on Hilos with a low G and also favour using Fremont low G strings which are as good as the actual Hilos. Other stores in Tokyo had a few sets of Hilos and Elderley Instruments in the USA had some old stock. The best find in recent years was a bunch of baritone sets which I located in Hawaii and will be perfect for the three baritone ukuleles I own.
The Hilos are pretty chunky as strings and I suspect that this may be one of the reasons why they sound so good sonically. I imagine them to be like the Stevie Ray Vaughan of ukulele strings (Stevie played guitar with really big gauge strings) They are very different to my other favorite “Worth Browns” The Worth uke strings are much thinner and sonically great and in my view better for soprano and concerts. You can really drive the Hilos and Takahiro Shimo’s ukuleles love these strings. I was interested to read that James Hill is also a fan of Hilos and that’s no surprise to me. Seeking out Hilos is like seeking old Phillips/Mullard guitar tubes: players know how much difference these precision made components make in the overall sonic sequence. There are no “best ukulele strings” only different combinations that with specific ukuleles will create very specific sounds. My main live instruments the Rob Collins 5 string baritone and the African blackwood tenor both have Hilos. My main two Shimo recording instruments, the Comet 3’s also both have Hilos.
I have enough Hilos to keep me going for this incarnation, but still can’t resist buying more if I come across them, although this is increasingly rare these days!
