Quote:
Originally Posted by Purfle Haze
Fox, the Peterson is a well-regarded tuner, but don't buy the Peterson just to get the Sweetened™ tunings. The James Taylor/ACU/SBJ preset is a compromise tuning for use with a capo that flattens the strings from 3 to 12 cents. With open strings, it is abysmal. I can't understand how some players find it to be good, because it's not a subtle difference.
I favor the Unitune clip-on….
|
My feelings exactly. The ACU (a.k.a. ‘James Taylor’) ‘Sweetener’ makes all of my guitars sound horribly out-of-tune. I never use that tuning, I prefer the EQU (Equal Temperament) tuning or even the GTR (Electric) offsets. I’m perfectly happy to tweak any slight errors by ear - I believe it keeps my ears fit for purpose.
TBH, no-one has managed to explain to me yet how a set of tuning offsets designed specifically to suit the characteristics of JT’s guitar can possibly ‘sweeten’ every other guitar on the planet. I’m sure there are owners of guitars out there for whom the ACU ‘sweetener’ works because their guitars’ characteristics happen to be close enough to JT’s, but I’m far from being persuaded that it’s a universal solution.
The usual disclaimers apply......IMHO, YMMV etc.