Darn this forum! And sweetened tunings

[dnf777]

It happened again! After following an interesting thread about tuners and the peterson strobe tuners, i did some research, and the next thing I know....CLICK!

Big Brown is on the way again.

Question: does anyone else think of the old depth finders on your fishing boat when dialing in with a strobe Tuner?

Serious question: can someone explain just what “sweetened” tuning is? My simple thought is that each string should be tuned to a specific frequency referenced to a standard. (A-440 for example). Anything else is an alternate tuning, or out of tune! (Obviously, Im wrong about that)

Thanks,
Dave

[dnf777]

Maybe I should ask how to use the search feature. Found some old but good info. Cant wait to try these out, and interested to see how much Difference a cent here and a cent there can make.

[charles Tauber]

Originally Posted by dnf777

Serious question: can someone explain just what “sweetened” tuning is?

Sure. Here is a short answer.

The ear hears as being in tune notes that are whole-number ratios of a starting note or pitch (frequency). For example, a note A has its octave at twice the frequency of the starting note, exactly half the vibrating string length. Other notes are in other whole-number ratios, such as 4:5, 2:3 and so on. This arrangement is called Just or Pythagorean tuning.

By contrast, nearly all guitars are designed to produce pitches that belong to a specific arrangement of pitches known as Equal Temperament. The notes of Equal Temperament, but for octaves and unisons, are NOT whole-number ratios. Hence, all notes, but unisons and octaves, sound out of tune compared to what we want to hear as "in-tune". Not all notes in Equal Temperament are equally out of tune compared to Just tuning: some are closer to Just tuning than others.

To make those Equal Temperament notes that have the furthest deviation from Just tuning sound better, we tune them so they are closer to what Just tuning dictates. That is known as "sweetening" the tuning.

The reason that guitars are designed to achieve Equal Temperament, rather than Just tuning, is that Just tuning has issues that result in notes sounding in tune only relative to a specific starting point. As one deviates from that starting point, such as changing to a very different key, say tuning to C major and then changing to E major, it will sound VERY out of tune. Equal Temperament is a scheme that allows all notes to always play equally in tune and out of tune, regardless of what initial reference was used. "Sweetening" of Equal Temperament attempts to make individual keys sound more in tune at the expense of others, un-doing, somewhat, the purpose of having used Equal Temperament. "Sweetening" is "stealing from Paul to pay Mary", improving one thing at the expense of others. If one is playing in one specific key, for example, it makes sense to make that key sound as "in-tune" as it can be. If one changes to an unrelated key, one will, generally, need to change the tuning to sweeten that new key.

Without getting into the numbers of it all, take a simple example. If you tune your guitar so that it "perfectly" matches an Equal Temperament electronic tuner, then play a standard D major chord, the F# note of the first string will sound out of tune (sharp). To sound more in tune, one often flattens (sweetens) the high E string, so that the D major chord sound more in tune. If one then plays an E major chord, letting the high E string sound, the high E will sound out of tune - it will sound flat for the E major chord. Thus, to play in tune in D major, one wants the high E string a little flat: to play the E major chord, one wants it at what the Equal Temperament tuner says it should be. If you are playing predominantly the D major chord, it makes sense to tune it so that it sounds best: doing so make playing the E major chord sound worse, "stealing" from one to benefit the other.

[emtsteve]

Originally Posted by charles Tauber

Sure. Here is a short answer.

The ear hears as being in tune notes that are whole-number ratios of a starting note or pitch (frequency). For example, a note A has its octave at twice the frequency of the starting note, exactly half the vibrating string length. Other notes are in other whole-number ratios, such as 4:5, 2:3 and so on. This arrangement is called Just or Pythagorean tuning.

By contrast, nearly all guitars are designed to produce pitches that belong to a specific arrangement of pitches known as Equal Temperament. The notes of Equal Temperament, but for octaves and unisons, are NOT whole-number ratios. Hence, all notes, but unisons and octaves, sound out of tune compared to what we want to hear as "in-tune". Not all notes in Equal Temperament are equally out of tune compared to Just tuning: some are closer to Just tuning than others.

To make those Equal Temperament notes that have the furthest deviation from Just tuning sound better, we tune them so they are closer to what Just tuning dictates. That is known as "sweetening" the tuning.

The reason that guitars are designed to achieve Equal Temperament, rather than Just tuning, is that Just tuning has issues that result in notes sounding in tune only relative to a specific starting point. As one deviates from that starting point, such as changing to a very different key, say tuning to C major and then changing to E major, it will sound VERY out of tune. Equal Temperament is a scheme that allows all notes to always play equally in tune and out of tune, regardless of what initial reference was used. "Sweetening" of Equal Temperament attempts to make individual keys sound more in tune at the expense of others, un-doing, somewhat, the purpose of having used Equal Temperament. "Sweetening" is "stealing from Paul to pay Mary", improving one thing at the expense of others. If one is playing in one specific key, for example, it makes sense to make that key sound as "in-tune" as it can be. If one changes to an unrelated key, one will, generally, need to change the tuning to sweeten that new key.

That's the SHORT answer? Oh boy.

[charles Tauber]

Originally Posted by emtsteve

That's the SHORT answer? Oh boy.

That IS the very short answer. It is a complex subject, one that scientists, musicians and instrument makers have been struggling with for centuries.

[Rosewood99]

So if it is sweeter why don’t the majority of people use it?

[charles Tauber]

Originally Posted by paulzoom

So if it is sweeter why don’t the majority of people use it?

There are two ways to "use it". The first is to understand what the problem is that you are trying to solve and then identify the options for solving it. This seems to be more effort than many guitar players are willing to expend. Most "accomplished" players will do some amount of sweetening of tuning, be it based on their trial and error or based on a more theoretical understanding of the problem and its potential solutions.

The second is to simply blindly follow whatever one's favourite Equal Temperament electronic tuner says is in tune. The simplest version of that is to change the tension on a string until the red light turns green, then you are "in tune": the tuner just proved it, since it turned green. The next step up, complexity-wise, is to set your tuner to a built-in, pre-determined "offset" sweetening. Many of the better guitar tuners include pre-programmed sweetenings. Choose one, tension the strings until the light turns green, or the needle is "in the middle". A popularly discussed example of that is James Taylor's particular sweetening. Buzz Feiten's is another popular sweetening. Many who use electronic tuners that have pre-programmed sweetening are likely unaware of what they are and how to use them. A smaller number of players seem to experiment with the various settings and settle on one they think sounds best for them.

[Chipotle]

Originally Posted by paulzoom

So if it is sweeter why don’t the majority of people use it?

1) They don't even know what tempered vs just intonation even is.
2) They don't have the ear to hear the difference anyway.
3) You have to re-tune every single time you did a song in a different key.

That said, although many guitarists don't tune to "sweetened" tunings as such, they DO--if they have a good ear--will tweak notes here and there, depending on what they're playing. Not all tuning up between songs is because something has slipped and gone out of tune.

For example, personally, I know that I have to tweak more than just the bottom string when I go to Drop D, or it won't sound good. The G string needs to be adjusted when going from a song in D to a song in E. Etc. I don't use a tuner with sweetened tuning--I never even heard the term before joining this forum--but I've always heard what's "out of whack" so to speak, and fixed it up.

[charles Tauber]

Originally Posted by Chipotle

1) They don't even know what tempered vs just intonation even is.

We need to be very careful about the use of terminology. There is already much to much confusion regarding "intonation".

There is a very important distinction between "system of tuning" and "intonation".

The system of tuning - such as Equal Temperament, Just, Mean-tone ... - defines what pitches are desired or are the target that an instrument should produce.

Intonation is how closely an instrument can get to achieving the desired or target pitches.

The system of tuning - what are the target pitches - is something very different from intonation - how closely an instrument can achieve the target pitches.

Guitars are nearly universally designed with target pitches that belong to the system of tuning defined by Equal Temperament. How closely and uniformly an individual guitar is able to achieve those target pitches is related to a combination of design - such as correct positioning of nut and saddle - and setup.

Since Equal Temperament will always sound somewhat out of tune to most discerning listeners, guitars, by design, will also always sound somewhat out of tune. It is a deliberate design choice, one that allows the instrument - and many other instruments - to play equally in and out of tune in any and every key.

The starting point for a guitar to play as in tune as possible is that it have good intonation - that it be able to accurately and repeatably achieve the pitches of Equal Temperament. If an individual instrument cannot - it has poor intonation - the player will be fighting the instrument and continually chasing his or her own tail trying to tune it. If the amount that an instrument deviates from the target pitches varies from one fret, one string, to the next, accurate tuning becomes impossible.

[Chipotle]

Originally Posted by charles Tauber

We need to be very careful about the use of terminology. There is already much to much confusion regarding "intonation".

There is a very important distinction between "system of tuning" and "intonation".

Whoops, you are right. I was typing a little ahead of my brain, there. Thanks for the correction & clarification.

[Racerbob]

Couple of items. The human ear in general will accept a slightly flat note as opposed to a sharp note which will stand out. It's like the mind says "that's not right !"

It is just as important to get all the strings "working together" to produce what sounds to the ear like "in tune". So as Charles says, it very common to flatten or slightly tune off of the ideal note on individual strings so the ear hears something acceptable.

I often tune the 2nd string at the d note slightly flat and find most chords sound better that way, especially when the 2nd string note is played proceeding the 1st string note.

Also as a rule I tune to the first fretted note on a string rather than the open note as that fretted note slightly stretches the string which moves it toward being slightly sharp compared to an open string note.

It's an art, not a science. And some say lucky are those with what is called a "tin ear", they don't even notice.

[Mr. Jelly]

And here I thought sweetened tuning meant getting the guitar to sound in tune all over the neck. I didn't really grasp that much from the posts here except I was wrong.

[Misifus]

The problem with “sweetened” tunings is that they improve the accuracy of tuning for a specific key. That makes some other keys farther out of tune. If you always play in the same key, that may work for you, but if you play in various keys, it may not.

That’s the reason why music developed the tempered tuning. It is a compromise, but one that allows an instrument with fixed tuning to play equally well (not perfectly, but well) in all keys. By fixed tuning I mean keyboards, organs, guitars, etc. Violins and the like can adjust the notes they play to stay in tuning in any key.

It was during the development of tempered tuning that J. S. Bach wrote “The Well-Tempered Klavier.” That work required the playing of fugues and preludes in all 24 keys (12 major, 12 minor), without having to retune the instrument. Retuning would have been required just a few years earlier.

[Silly Moustache]

Right, sweetened tuning !

This is my method.

It is relatively simple to tune a string that will give you the desired note when played open, but we guitarists, mando, banjo and whatever all have a tendency to stop/fret/capo the strings at various places between nut and saddle.

This causes tuning issues a various variables come into play:

1. String gauge.
2, Finger downward pressure.
3. Fret height.

Bending a string secured from tuner to bridge already has to travel across the nut and saddle - deforming its shape/direction, giving the possibility of tensions differing between tuner and nut, and saddle and bridgeplate (or tailpiece.

Adding extra hurdles for it -capos and fingers also affects the tension which , of course is what we need to do to play the fretted notes.

Although I tend to play on guitars with exptemely carefully placed frets, I think it unreasonable to assume that if the string is in tune open tat it will be in tune when every note is fretted.

As I mostly play out of a 1st position G or C key SHAPE, using a capo to give me any other KEY, I tend to tune my strings by checking the notes of a fretted G chord.

This to a major extent copes with my normal finger pressure, and he thickness of the string and the fret height.

however, when using a capo it is probably that it can also add pressure and sharpen certain strings - I find that the 6th string is most vulnerable to this, with the 5th being the second most likely to need adjustment, possibly because the playing action is higher.

When playing at home there is rarely much time limitation, but when performing, I try to anticipate which capo position the next song demands and fit it and make adjustments quickly before the applause dies down.

Here is a video I made demonstrating this some three years ago when a) I still had hair, and b) when I was still working at regaining my voice. I hope it helps.

[dnf777]

Tauber, that is the best run down Ive heard yet- thank you very much! I read a fascinating book years ago about the historic split that occurred with western music and eastern music, that lead to our current 8 step octave versus the more complete eastern system. (I have seen a few quarter-step frets on guitars- i think Geo Harrison had one). Archimedes was rumored to have dabbled in acoustic theory, with early integration of tones beyond whole number ratios.

Me? I sweeten my sound by adding a little Pennsylvania whiskey to my glass. But Im excited to try some tunings when big brown brings my strobe tuner.

Thanks again, your comments were really helpful.