How to Tune the Guitar?

Methods for tuning your guitar

Learn guitar easy from the following guide:

The guitar is such a simple and convenient instrument: just open the case and start playing. Well, it’s not THAT simple. A good practice before playing the guitar is to tune it first.

How Often to Tune Your Guitar?
Tune it every single time you pick it up. Guitars (particularly cheaper ones) tend to go out of tune quickly. Make sure your guitar is in tune when you begin to play it, and check the tuning frequently while you're practicing, as the act of playing the guitar can cause it to go out of tune.

Tuning the guitar prior to playing it will ensure that you will create harmonious music; for each string has a specific note to play and even if one goes out of tune, the rest will sound disarrayed. Note that some guitars may not need as frequent tuning (well constructed = expensive), but if ever it is well played (to the point of abuse, actually), then that just needs tuning as well.

Read on for an essential guide on guitar tuning.

Explanation
The guitar presents a particular kind of difficulty in tuning because it has six strings, each of which has an individual pitch or a place in the musical staff assigned to it.

The string numbers, as more popularly known, from top to bottom are 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, while their musical counterpart are mi, la, re, sol, si, and mi or E, A, D, G, B, and E respectively.

The open strings of a guitar from the thickest to thinnest are as follows:
• E - the thickest or lowest sounding string is known as the 6th string
• A - is the 5th
• D - is the 4th
• G - is the 3rd
• B - is the 2nd
• E - the thinnest or highest is the 1st

In order to tune the guitar correctly, one must have an axis or a reference pitch. You will need the commercially available pitch pipe o, better yet, acquire a tuning fork in case you don’t have a reliable instrument at hand to give you an axis.

Pitch pipes have a bad reputation of changing pitches after some time. Tuning forks are more reliable and easier to use.

The Steps
First, make the fork vibrate by tapping it lightly on any hard object while holding the handle. Then, let the handle touch the guitar’s soundboard below or above the sound hole while gently moving it towards the bridge.

This will locate the spot where the resonance is at its loudest. You are supposed to hear a high pitched A (la) which should be the same as the sound produced by striking the first string while it is being depressed on the fifth fret.

Now that you have tuned the first string (E/mi), its open sound is the same as the sound of the second string pressed on the fifth fret. The third string on the fourth fret is equal to the open second string (B/si).

Furthermore, fourth string/ fifth fret equals open third string (G/sol); fifth string/ fifth fret equals open fourth string (D/re); and the sixth string/ fifth fret equals open fifth string (A/la).

In order to check the accuracy of your tuning, gently or lightly touch the fifth string directly above the fifth fret wire, without pressing the string to the fingerboard. By striking the string in this manner, it should sound similar to that high-pitched tone produced by the tuning fork. Sounds of the string produced this way are called “harmonics.”

Harmonic 5 (Harmonic on the fifth fret) of the sixth string equals harmonic 7 of the fifth string (which is also similar to the open sound of the first string). Harmonic 5 of the fifth string equals harmonic 7 on the fourth string. Harmonic 4 of the third string is equal to the harmonic 5 of the second strung and harmonic 7 of the first string.

Incidentally, harmonic 4 may require lots of practice for some, so the best choice is use harmonic 7 of the sixth string to tune the open second string. These pairs of harmonics, when sounded together, should produce only one steady tone.

If the sound the produce clash or seem wavy, they are not in tune.

These two methods of tuning must always go together. You may use the harmonics method first then check with the other or vice versa. If, after crosschecking, the strings do not agree with each other, you may have to repeat the whole process.

If you still cannot get them in tune, your strings might be defective. If your strings are new, this may even be worse—your ears need tuning!

To avoid all the hassles of manual tuning, costly electronic device called strobo tuners are available. Just turn the dial to the string’s name and it will pick the string’s sound through a condenser microphone and tell you if it is in tune through a meter. That’s what we could called learn guitar easy.

Other conventional methods of tuning are through imitation of pitches from different musical instruments like the piano, flute, etc. You can even use that portable but silly investment, the pitch pipe set. But you have been warned!

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