What are the various methods of tuning the guitar?

Question

This is not a question as much as it is a discussion. I am curious to know what are the different techniques to tune the guitar (using standard tuning) given you know that one string is in tune. I usually tune the 1st string and then go on comparing E on B, B on G, G on D, D on A, A on E, and finally E with E,

$1.0.$2.5  $2.0.$3.4  $3.0.$4.5  $4.0.$5.5  $5.0.$6.5  $1.0.$6.0

which is, maybe, the most common way.

But I've seen different guitarists use different methods. Are there any? Main aim here is to find out which is the quickest way to tune the guitar accurately once a single string is in tune.

EDIT: I do have a chromatic tuner, but this discussion is about tuning by ear.

Answer 1

Tuning is almost as much an art as playing the guitar. You're trying to pull the strings to the point where most fretted chord combinations sound pleasant, even if they're not 100% true to their intended intervals.

First a note about tuning direction on the guitar. Your standard tuning machine uses a worm gear which has a nice property: it's extremely hard to pull a worm gear backwards. That means the force of the string, under tension, against the tuning peg has a hard time unwinding the peg. In order to ensure the worm gear's properties are being exploited during tuning you should always tune from flat. That is: flatten the string so it sounds lower than your desired note and tune up to pitch. Never tune down to pitch as the worm gear's resistive properties don't help you out here and you'll find the string slips past pitch pretty easily.

The method I've come to enjoy over the years does a pretty good job of handling the odd string out: the 5th string (B in standard tuning). And sweetens the temperament nicely even if the instrument isn't well intonated. It was shown to me by a luthier at the 12th Fret in Toronto. The approach may very well have a proper name but, unfortunately, I don't know it.

Let me try to describe the method...

You'll start by tuning the 1st string (low E in standard tuning). Use your ears or another instrument or an electronic tuner.

From there you use the 5th fret harmonic/7th fret harmonic technique to tune the 2nd, 3rd and 4th strings. To use this technique to tune the 2nd string you'd sound the 5th fret harmonic on the 1st string, letting it ring while sounding the 7th fret harmonic on the 2nd string. You'd then tune up (see paragraph above about tuning direction) the 2nd string until the two harmonics are at the same pitch, with no noticeable beats between them. Repeat this for the 2nd, 3rd and 4th strings.

To tune the 5th and 6th strings we'll use the harmonics at the 12th fret on preceeding strings and we'll tune to a fretted note. To tune the 5th string, sound the open harmonic at the 12th fret on the 3rd string (D in standard tuning). While this harmonic rings, fret the 5th string at the 3rd fret and, while holding the fretted note, tune it up to match the pitch of the harmonic -- where both notes are ringing without any beats occurring. For the 6th string a similar approach: ring the 12th fret harmonic on the 4th string and compare it to the 6th string fretted at the 3rd fret.

I want to show this to you using jTab but I can't figure out how to get it to show that the note is a harmonic, not a fretted note. Can someone help me out with these jTab pictures below?

Tuning The Second String

$E 5 $A 7

(both harmonics)

Tuning The Third String

$A 5 $D 7

(both harmonics)

Tuning The Fourth String

$D 5 $G 7

(both harmonics)

Tuning The Fifth String

$D 12 $B 3

(12th fret on D string is a harmonic, 3rd fret on B string is fretted)

Tuning The Sixth String

$G 12 $e 3

(12th fret on G string is a harmonic, 3rd fret on E string is fretted)

Answer 2

I came up with my "ultimate method" after reading that cheap Dover book on Piano Tuning. I believe it is the most direct and accurate way possible (so please school me if I err!).

• Start with a reliable A 440. I use a tuning fork. [To use a tuning fork with a guitar: hold the ball end and strike the fork against a knee-bone with a swinging motion; choke up (like a baseball bat) on the handle so end of the ball is exposed (quickly, while the fork is still freshly singing); place the ball against the bridge of the guitar (holding it in contact with your fingers); a loud clear note will emerge from the guitar. I use my right hand for the striking and placing, then I switch hands and continue holding with my left, freeing the right hand to do a pinched harmonic and adjust the tuning peg.]
• Tune the 1/4 (5th fret) harmonic of the A string in unison with the A 440.
• Tune the D to a perfect fourth above the A. (You can use the 2/3 (7th fret) harmonic if you like.)
• Nudge the D ever-so-slightly sharp, until you hear a very slow beat (about 3 beats over 5 seconds).
• Tune the G from the D in the same way (just a smidgen sharp).
• Tune the low E from the A in a contrariwise manner: scoop in from the D# side until you find the slow beat just before a perfect fourth.
• Tune the High E from the low E. (You can use the 1/4 (fifth fret) harmonic if you like.)
• Tune the B from the E the same way you took the low E from the A: scoop in from the A# side until you hear the slow beat.

Illustration:

$1.5 $5.0     $5.0 $4.0     $4.0 $3.0  
$5.0 $6.0     $6.0 $1.0     $1.0 $2.0  

And finally, check your work with the open triads: D-G-B and G-B-E. They should sound balanced and distinct. You can hear all three notes, but none of them sting. If the triads don't sound good, nothing else will either: Do it again in exactly the same sequence. You can also check all the tempered fourths against each other. They should all sound like identical intervals.

$4.0.$3.0.$2.0    $3.0.$2.0.$1.0  
$6.0.$5.0    $5.0.$4.0    $4.0.$3.0    $3.0.$2.1!    $2.0.$1.0  

Note: It is very difficult to hear the beats. One trick I've found is to hold my right hand a few inches over the guitar as I sound the notes. I seem to be able to "feel" the beats more easily than I can hear them.

Tempered fourths gives you equal temperament. But for music that stays in a diatonic key, you can make a few slight adjustments. Starting from equal temperament, fret the root chord of the key. Then nudge the fifth up a smidgen (to shake off the temper), and scoop the third in a little flatter (a Helmholtz third). Remember which strings you altered so you can scoop them back into tempered from the "stationary" strings.

The importance of re-tuning from scratch every time is that you don't know where you made a mistake. Had you known you would have fixed it before moving on, right? If you start fixing the bad note, you'll end up chasing your tail. This goes for any tuning method (except the "use a tuner" method, I guess).

The words nudge and scoop deserve some elucidation. If you're tuning the upper note of a tempered fourth, it needs to be just a little sharper than the center of the perfect fourth. So the action you perform on the tuning head is to tune up to the perfect fourth and then a very small amount further up to "temper" the fourth. Tune perfect, nudge the temper.

But if you're tuning the lower note of a temper fourth, it needs to be just a little flatter than the center of the perfect fourth. So you approach the perfect fourth from below (always tune up) but stop short by a very small amount. Scoop into the temper, merely approaching perfect.

You can use a different sequence if you like, if you remember what these 2 actions are for (tuning the upper/lower notes of a fourth). If you start with G, then it's scoops all the way. If you start with B (bizarre though it sounds) then it's all nudges. If you start with the low E, then you only have to scoop the B, the rest is all nudges.

I've made a video of tuning the guitar this way 5m35s. It's much easier to hear the beats thanks to the mpeg filters than it is in real life. This time I was pretty sure about E A D and G, so I took the E again from E, and the B the same way from E. I could also have adjusted G again from D, as it's a sort of independent branch.

---

Why/How this works. or More luser philosophy.

When you tune one note to another, the result is a ratio of frequencies. The musical apparatus of the mind is keen upon "harmonic" ratios: where several of the overtones of each tone coincide. This is perceived as "beats". If the two notes were runners on a track, the beat happens every time the faster runner laps and blows-a-raspberry-at the slower one. If they don't meet as often, the fast guy kinda zones out and is less offensive.

When you tune a perfect interval, you find two "zones" of beating around a central "can't really tell unless you focus on it" area. At the dead center between the beating zones is the perfect interval, essentially "infinite beating". But hovering around the dead center mark is the "temperate zone". The beats are slow enough that they aren't offensive. And this enables us to approximate Pythagorean intervals in any key using a base-12 logarithm. Thus, equal temperament. The guitar has frets installed according to this same base-12 logarithm (they slowly, evenly, get closer together).

Everybody knows, when you start with C and go around the Circle of Fifths you end up not at C again but some straunge beastie called B#. What equal temperament does is fix that problem by making B# == C. But it has to drag all the other notes with it; just a little bit.

So the interval of the Fifth becomes a little flat (not too much). The interval of a Fourth becomes a little sharp (Since a Fifth plus a Fourth makes an Octave, they temper in opposite directions to keep the Octave in the same place.) The squeeze decends from the Fifth into the Triad where the interval of the Major Third is flattened (from a Pythagorean Major Third, that is). To counterbalance and keep the Fifth stable, the Minor Third has to go sharp by the same amount. And the smaller intervals get smaller adjustments.

The Helmholtz Major Third is actually a different animal entirely, it deviates even further from the Pythagorean than the Equal-Tempered Third does. But it catches a different circuit of the musical mind which is keen on overlapping frequency spectra. But to do full justice to these kinds of relations, you need many more than 12 distinct notes in an Octave. One of his keyboards had 30-something keys to the Octave; another one had over 100!

Answer 3

My wife tunes her guitar to an open in C minor. 5th=C 4th=C 3rd=G 2nd=C 1st=Eb . She does not have a six string on her guitar just like Keith Richards. She just doesn't put one on. So the only thing she has to do is lay her fingers all the way across all five strings to get a minor chord. If she wants to make a major chord she uses her second finger to bring the first string up to half a step. Lazy but brilliant.

Answer 4

A simpler method:

Ring the 5th fret harmonic on the 6th (the fat, bottom) string and tune the 7th fret harmonic of the 5th string to it, as described by @IanC in another answers. Then...

On reaching the B (2nd) string, play the 7th fret harmonic on the 6th string and tune the open 2nd string to it.
Finally tune the top E (1st) string to the B (2nd) string using 5th/7th fret harmonics in the same way as the lower strings were tuned.

I play right hand harmonics though, so my left hand only has to twiddle the machine heads. On a well-intonated guitar, this method works well - for me at least. The beats can all be clearly heard with this method, especially if there's some distortion/overdrive switched on.
@IanC: Your guitar may be upside down if the 'fat' string is number one...