Tuning and Harmonics
Tuning the guitar is one of the most difficult things for any beginner to get right quickly. It seems simple, but it is not nearly as simple as it first appears. I will be spending lots of time here - just bear with me and don't get discouraged. If your guitar is not in tune, it will not sound good. And if tuned incorrectly, it will apply the wrong tension to each string, which makes fretting easier/harder and can throw off your technique. Basically, you must learn to tune your guitar to succeed.
Contents
PreReqs
Tuners
On the guitar, the tuners are (usually) the pegs on the headstock that increase/decrease tension on each string. Here, I am referring to devices that detect pitch and let you know how close you are to a certain note - these are tuning assistance tools, also commonly called tuners which can lead to some ambiguity.
Even the most advanced players use some kind of tuning tool to help them. If you don't own a tuner, buy one or download a free smartphone tuner app. There are 3 kinds of tuners. The best kind for electric guitar is one you can plug the electical output of your guitar directly into the device. The other two either use a microphone or a vibration sensor to get an electrical signal to analyze, which can introduce noise. The vibrational ones can also get broken from a hard shock. A tuner app on a phone will use a microphone - with electric guitar it can be difficult to play loud enough so that the microphone can pick up a clean signal.
Most tuners only tell you how close you are to a target note (A, B, C, etc), not what octave that note is (A2, C3, etc). You should be able to tell if you are a whole octave off, however. If you are an octave below, the string should have very little tension and may not resonate at all. If it does resonate, it will likely flap against the frets. If you are an octave above, the string will be extremely tense, to the point where it will be near breaking. It's always safer to go lower than higher. So if your target note is E but the note on your tuner is A, and you are unsure if you need to raise or lower the frequency, try lowering it down to E first. If the string is now way too loose, you went the wrong way. no harm done, just tune it up to the next highest E.
While not a pitch-detecting device, pitch pipes are also a common tool used to help tune the guitar. A pitch pipe is generally any kind of pipe or harmonica-like instrument that creates a single, fixed pitch. For guitar-tuning purposes, specialized pitch pipes that have 6 pipes combined in a single casing, tuned to each of the notes of a standard guitar tuning. You blow on a pipe and tune the corresponding string by ear, which is described below.
Common Tunings
Standard Tuning on a guitar is
- 1 - E (E4)
- 2 - B (B3)
- 3 - G (G3)
- 4 - D (D3)
- 5 - A (A2)
- 6 - E (E2)
This is commonly written as (E A D G B E) or E-A-D-G-B-E. This is also called E Standard. Notice that it starts on the 6th string and ends on the 1st. Things in music are often written from the lowest pitch to the highest. However, this is the reverse the way the strings are numbered.
These notes are common to the keys of C, G, and D major (same as A, E, and B minor respectively), which are the most common keys for guitar-oriented music. All but one pair of adjacent strings are perfect ascending 4th/descending 5th intervals. It allows for patterns to emerge when playing scales, as well as common chord shapes.
Some rock players like to tune down a half-step - (E♭ A♭ D♭ G♭ B♭ E♭). This is sometimes called E♭ Standard or a half-step below Standard. This may be because this makes a key easier to play in that a keyboard or horn player can play more easily in. Or it may be to get a slighter lower open 6th string note, which some interpret as being "heavier". Or it might be simply to get less string tension, which can make fretting more effortless, but this comes at a price (covered in string gauge). One could similarly use thicker or thinner strings and retain similar tension at different tunings.
Another common rock tuning is Drop D. This is the same as Standard Tuning, but the 6th string is dropped down from E to D (D A D G B E). This allows the player to barre the 6th, 5th, and 4th strings with a single finger to get a "power chord" (covered later). When bands first started using this, they were often derided for being lazy; however, it allows a number of new opportunities, including a new lowest note, power chord playing nearly as fast as single note playing, and a different interval between the 5th and 6th strings (changing scale patterns).
There are also open tunings, named because all the open strings' notes belong to particular chord. For example, Open E is (E B E G♯ B E) - all notes are from the (E G♯ B) triad or E major chord. All of the 12 notes can potentially have an open tuning. Again, people may call this lazy, but it really has far more inventive uses.
How to Tune the Guitar
Using a tuner
Make sure you are only playing the open string you want to tune. Mute the other strings with your right and left hands as described above in the Basic Technique lesson. If you are using an electric tuner, use your neck pickup - it has less overtones relative to the fundamental frequency, allowing your tuner to more easily detect the pitch of the note being played. Use your left hand to rotate the tuner for that string. You should see the tuner adjust accordingly.
Again, you should be using a tuner to help you tune, but you also don't want to constantly stop playing and going back to the tuner. Also, sometimes your tuner will work very well on your 6th or 5th strings but not others (particularly if you are using an unplugged electric with a microphone-based tuner). This is where tuning by ear comes in handy.
Tuning Using the 5th Fret
To tune your guitar in standard tuning, each string should be an identical pitch to the next string when fretted at the 5th fret. So the 1st string E should be identical to the 2nd string 5th fret. 2nd string open should be B, the first fret is C, 2nd fret C♯, 3rd fret D, 4th fret D♯, 5th fret E. The only two strings this does not apply to are the 2nd and 3rd strings. The open 2nd string should be equal to 4th fret 3rd string.
E-------------0- B----------0--5- G-------0--4---- D----0--5------- A-0--5---------- E-5------------- A D G B E
Unfortunately, this requires fretting a note with the left hand while picking with the right hand. After picking, you have to quickly move your right hand onto the correct tuning peg and start rotating. Fretted notes don't sustain as long as open strings, so you may have to use your right hand to pick the note again. Your right will keep going back and forth between picking position and adjusting the tuning pegs, which can be quite frustrating and cumbersome and at some point counter-productive.
Harmonics
I prefer to use harmonics, which use "pivot points" to divide the string into equal lengths that can all resonate simultaneously. Each section of the string can resonate with the amplitude greatest at the middle of each section. The pivot points have essentially no amplitude - each section is resonating out of phase with the adjacent section(s), causing the point between them to be a null (not produce any sound). The pitch created follows the harmonic series - the fundamental pitch (open string played normally) multiplied by the number of sections produced. For example, the 12th fret harmonic divides the string into 2 sections, and has a pitch 2x as high as the open string's pitch. The 5th fret harmonic divides the string into 4 sections, and has a pitch 4x as high.
To sound a harmonic, you lightly place a finger from your left hand on the pivot point, but don't push down (don't fret the string) and pluck the string. Almost immediately after plucking, remove your finger from the string - it will continue to resonate at the harmonic frequency. Harmonics are identified by a number (the multiple of the base frequency), but more often are labeled by the location of a pivot point in relation to fret numbers. For example, the second harmonic is also called the "12th fret harmonic". Note that beyond the 2nd harmonic, there are multiple pivot points on the string that can be used to achieve the same harmonic. The number of the harmonic indicates the frequency multiple from the first harmonic. Here are a list of the first 8 harmonics:
| Harmonic Nbr | Fret | Interval |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | - | Unison |
| 2 | 12 | Octave |
| 3 | 7, 19 | Fifth (12th) |
| 4 | 5, 24 | Octave (15th) |
| 5 | 3.9, 8.8, 15.9 | Major Third (17th) |
| 6 | 3.2 | Fifth (19th) |
| 7 | 2.7, 5.8, 9.7, 14.7, 21.7 | Seventh (21st) |
| 8 | 2.3, 8.1, 17 | Octave (22nd) |
Note that to sound the harmonic correctly, you place your finger at exactly the position specified. So to fret the 12th fret, you would actually press down behind, not directly on top of, the 12th fret. But for the 2nd harmonic, you want to be directly over the 12th fret.
Tuning Using Harmonics
Since the guitar is tuned mostly in ascending 4ths, we can use harmonics to get what should be completely equivalent frequencies between two strings. A 4th interval is 4/3 the base frequency. The 4th harmonic of the lower string will give a frequency 4x that open string. The 3rd harmonic gives a frequency 3x that open string. Using the 4th harmonic on the lower pitched string and 3rd harmonic on the next highest pitched string should be the exact same note.
--0-- = 4/3* x Hz; --<7>-- = 3* 4/3* x = 4* x --0-- = x Hz; --<5>-- = 4* x = 4* x
To demonstrate, the 6th string should be tuned to E, or 82.5 Hz. Sounding the 4th harmonic would give us 4x that pitch. 4 * 82.5 Hz = 330 Hz. The 5th string should be tuned to A or 110 Hz. The 3rd harmonic is 3x that pitch. 3 x 110 Hz = 330 Hz. So 6th string 4th harmonic = 5th string 3rd harmonic = 330 Hz. 82.5 Hz (E) x 4/3 (4th interval) = 110 Hz (A).
--0-- = 110.0 Hz; --<7>-- = 3* 110.0 Hz = 330 Hz --0-- = 82.5 Hz; --<5>-- = 4* 82.5 Hz = 330 Hz
So if we sound the 5th fret harmonic of the 6th string and the 7th fret harmonic of the 5th string, the same note should be ringing out. This frees up the left hand to rotate the tuners to achieve the same note. And like open strings, harmonics tend to sustain longer. This works on every pair of strings except the 2nd and 3rd strings. For these we can use the 5th harmonic of the 3rd string and the 3rd harmonic of the 1st string. That's the 3.9 or 8.8 fret harmonic on 3rd string and 7th fret harmonic on the 1st string.
3rd string G is 196 Hz. 196 x 5 = 980. 1st string E is 330 Hz. 330 x 3 = 990 Hz. But wait - 980 != 990. Unfortunate, but close enough for our purposes. If we tune the 1st string 3rd harmonic to 980, that means the 1st string is now 326 and 2/3 Hz. That's only 3 1/3 Hz away from our target of 330 Hz, and the human ear has trouble differentiating pitches within such a small window (approximately 1% off).
Once we've gotten the 1st and 3rd strings tuned together, we can use the previous 5th/7th fret harmonic technique to tune the 2nd string to the 1st string.
E----------------<7>----<7>- B-----------------------<5>- G-----------<7>--<8.8>------ D------<7>--<5>------------- A-<7>--<5>------------------ E-<5>------------------------ E A D B B
An excellent visualization of all the harmonics across the fretboard can be found here.
Homework
- Randomly turn each tuner a little bit, putting your guitar out of tune. Tune all strings back to standard tuning using the tuner. Repeat.
- Repeat, but this time only tune the 1st string using the tuner. Tune the other strings by fretting the next string - so tune the 2nd, then 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th.
- Repeat but this time tune the 6th string using the tuner and tune the other strings by fretting the in-tune string (5th, 4th, 3rd, 2nd, 1st).
- Try to sound a 12th fret harmonic.
- Practice finding the minimal amount of pressure needed to get the harmonic to ring.
- Practice how quickly you can remove your left hand finger from the string after plucking and retaining the harmonic ringing out.
- Once you are comfortable with all strings at the 12th fret harmonic, move to the 7th fret and repeat. Then the 5th fret.
- Repeat the tuning exercises above, but this time use harmonics instead of fretted notes to tune the out-of-tune strings.