Wikimedia With its chunk-a-chunk sound, whispery nylon strings, and diminutive body, the ukulele is having a moment. Or maybe even a decade. Zooey Deschanel strums one while crooning sweetly with Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Tony Blair disrupts Labour Party conventions with one. When Eddie Vedder impulse-bought one on a trip to Hawaii, he was compelled to record a whole album of Ukulele Songs.