pianoola << I played with a country guitar player who change his tuning after what key his playing in. It would be intresting to check what he is doing. I asked a classic guitarist if he did the same thing but he said he didn't do it but he tuned the guitar between each tune so he probably changed the temprement not knowing it, just thinking the guitar is out of tune. >> Greetings, If you watch that "country guitar player" closely, you will probably see that he is changing the B string. It is this compromise that usually throws guitarists into tuning hell. Many guitarists unknowingly tune a pure or even a narrow fourth between their lower strings. This hidden sharpness then shows up on that high E, making the distance between the G and E strings so great that the B will not find a happy home between them, ie. if you make a tolerable 4th with the E, the G-B third is harsh. If you slow that third to a tolerable level, the B-E fourth sounds bad, and when they flatten the high E string to fix that, the whole guitar sounds flat and out. When the guitar's four lower strings are properly tuned, ( very slightly wide fourths), and a clean octave is found for the high E, the G-E 6th will be within musical limits and the B string then can be tuned to improve the B-E fourth while speeding up the G-B third, or flattened to improve the third at the expense of the fourth. It all depends on what key they will play in. I have handed a professional, session guitarist a guitar which I had tuned in as close to ET as I could, and he was baffled. He said it sounded pretty good, and all the chords worked in all the places, but he thought there was something just slightly off about the sound. I told him to retune it like he thought it should be, and he instantly lowered the B string. Told me he would bring it back up if they got into the key of E!! Regards, Ed Foote (Music row IS tuning hell...........)
This PTG archive page provided courtesy of Moy Piano Service, LLC