The Secrets to Tuning Your Guitar

Learning how to play the guitar is easy and convenient, all you have to do is pick it up and you can start playing. Okay, it’s not that simple. Before you start playing any guitar, you need to make sure it is in tune.

There are six strings to the guitar, which each play a different pitch or note, at different octaves sometimes than the others, making it a very complicated instrument to tune. The string numbers, from top to bottom, are 6,5,4,3, 2 and 1. Their musical counterparts are mi, la, re, sol, ti and me, or E, A, D, G, B, and E respectively.

You can tune your guitar very effectively with a tuning fork.

To use the tuning fork, first hold it by the handle and make it vibrate by lightly tapping it against a hard object. Then let the handle touch the guitar’s soundboard either above of below the sound hole while easing the handle toward the bridge. This will locate the spot where the resonance is loudest. You should hear a high-pitched A (la); if the guitar is in tune, the A will be the same as the sound made by playing the first string while simultaneously pressing it on the fifth fret.

Now that the first string (E/mi) is tuned, its sound will be the same as that made when the second string is pressed on the fifth fret. The third string on the fourth fret makes the same sound as the second string (B/ti); the fourth string/ fifth fret is the same as the third string (G/sol); fifth string/ fifth fret is the same as the fourth string (D/re); and the sixth string/ fifth fret is the same as the fifth string (A/la).

Be sure to touch your fifth string right over the fret wire; don’t let the string touch the fingerboard in order to get the highest degree of accuracy. When you strike the string while holding it in this manner, it should similar to the high-pitched sound made by the tuning fork. These sounds are called harmonics.

Harmonic 5 (the harmonic on the fifth fret) of the six string sounds like harmonic 7 of the fifth string. This is also similar to the open sound of the first string. Harmonic 5 of the fifth string is the same as harmonic 7 on the fourth string; harmonic 4 of the third string is the same as harmonic 5 of the second string and harmonic 7 of the first string. Due to the fact that harmonic 4 can take a lot of practice for some people, it is advisable to use harmonic 7 of the sixth string to tune the open second string. When sounded at the same time, these pairs of harmonics should produce a single steady tone. If the sound they make clashes or sounds at all wavy, then you have more tuning to do.

You have to use both tuning methods in conjunction. It is your choice which method you use first, but you always have to check your tuning using the other method. If you do the crosscheck and the strings still are not in tune, it may be necessary to repeat the entire process. After completing the process a second time, if the guitar is still out of tune, you may have a defective string. If you have new strings, you might even need to adjust your listening skills!

There are electronic guitar tuners that can eliminate all of these headaches that players typically experience. All you have to do is dial in the string’s name, and the machine will determine if the string’s sound is in tune using a condenser microphone.

There are other conventional guitar tuning methods, usually done using pitches from different instruments such as the piano or flute. There’s always the handy dandy and altogether silly pitch pipe. You have been warned!

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