Learning to play guitar can be a very frustrating experience, at least in the initial stages, when one is unable to grasp the basic concepts, like ear training, guitar string tuning, and so on. In my guitar learning quest, I went through several of these hurdles and was actually stuck behind them for quite sometime. Hence, I know exactly how troublesome they are and also how to get past them effectively and easily. Acoustic guitar string tuning was something I felt I would never be able to do because of the vast experience needed for recognizing musical notes by the ear. However, I was able to tune my guitar quite accurately and very quickly using the beats theory of my physics lessons. It is very simple and does not require an ear that is trained for musical notes. Even a people without formal musical training can tune their acoustic guitar easily using this method.
What is the Beats Theory ?
According to Physics, beats are periodic variations in sound produced when 2 sources of slightly different frequencies are heard together. The more the difference between the frequencies of the 2 sounds, the more is the frequency (repetition) of beats that will be heard. When the frequencies of sound approach to similarity (when their frequencies match as in playing the same note of music), the number of beats reduces and we get a louder sound called resonance. Resonance is sort of an amplification of the individual sounds of the 2 sources, due to matching of the frequencies.
We all know that musical notes are nothing but characteristic frequencies of sound which we have conveniently named to A, A#, B, C, C#, D, D#, E, F, F#, G, G#. Thus, each of the 12 notes of music is a specific frequency and can be produced on a multitude of instruments. The naming of the frequencies has helped in the reproducibility and comparability of playing the same music on a variety of instruments. So making this short, the phenomenon of resonance and beats can be used for acoustic guitar string tuning.
Acoustic Guitar String Tuning
Tuning of an acoustic guitar is normally done with a standard protocol of using the notes EADGBE, starting with the fat string. There are many alternate tunings available, like dropped D, open G, Hendrix, Pentatonic, and so on. Lets not get into all that because it is highly advanced stuff. But before you tune your guitar you need to know the reason for tuning your guitar.
- Standardize the sound of each string
- Achieve a harmonious sound for chords
- Training your ear to recognize correct notes
So it is very important to tune your guitar before playing so that you develop a certain amount of familiarity towards the common notes.
How to use Beats in Guitar String Tuning ?
It is very simple !
Normally, a person plays the string to be tuned, listens to the sound and adjusts the tuning pegs accordingly to increase or decrease the tension in the string. This changes the frequency of the string and this process is repeated until the desired musical note is reached. The strings of a guitar are named 1st to 6th from bottom to top, so the fattest string is 6th and the thinnest string is 1st. The 5th fret of the string above the string to be tuned, is used as a reference for the note, except for the 2nd string for which we use the 4th fret of the 3th string. This is with respect to the relative positions of the notes on the fretboard, which one has to be familiar with by now.
In using beats theory, instead of playing one string we play 2 strings at a time. Say we want to tune the 4th string of the guitar, so we play the 4th and the 5th fret of 5th string together. If the guitar string is already tuned, you will hear a single loud sound. If not you will hear a sort of a tremolo type of sound, which is alternate variations of sound that we were talking earlier, the beats. Your goal for tuning the string is to eliminate the beats and have a clear loud resonant sound with the 2 strings. So adjust the tension of the strings until your objective is reached. Do this for all strings and that gives you a completely tuned guitar without the need of a musically trained ear.
The technical nature of this method eliminates all possibilities of error and subjective nature of the skill needed for tuning. Hence, it can be used by beginners and experts alike for accurately tuning an acoustic guitar or rather any other stringed musical instrument.
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