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Old 10-08-2012, 10:12 AM
tfs4473 tfs4473 is offline
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Join Date: Mar 2012
Posts: 117
Default Your Ear vs. the Tuner

Anybody even find your guitar sometimes just sounds off, even though you tuned it accurately? Then you play it later (either that day or at another time altogether) and it sounds spot on... but you didn't change anything?

I've really increased the amount of time I'm practicing lately, and I've noticed that some days the guitar sounds ever so slightly off, even after using the on-board tuner. Not for individual strings, but for chords (especially open ones). And on other days, things sound right from the git-go.

I've checked the on-board tuning against two clip-ons, and yep, it's right (and I've done this for multiple guitars, not just one). Innotation's good, too, but at that moment the chord doesn't sound right to me. I'll play, and sure enough the chord sounds perfect.

My take is that my hearing is subjective enough that some days I "remember" hearing a chord sounding a certain way, but that's not an accurate memory.

The guitar's fine... I just think it's kind of neat how expectation and memory color what we hear.

Thom
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