Alternate tunings on 12 string

[JimmerO]

Kaki King has played around with this kind of 12 String guitar tuning. I don't have any specific link to share. But if you tool around her website or youtube you're bound to find some of her songs with such turnings.

[Naboz]

Originally Posted by islandguitar

Naboz...thanks so much!! Best of luck in the retrieval efforts!

Well, I think it will be easy now that she has become absorbed by her writing; she just finished writing her first novel! It will be off to the editor shortly, cover is already done, then to Amazon's writer friendly self-publishing/sales dept.!
Thinking hit movie offer

[SkipII]

Sorry, but when I read the post title I was thinking: "Hmmm...an alternate tuning for the 12 strong is for it to actually be in tune!"

Sorry, snarky, but I feel the pain.

[Twin Six]

Originally Posted by donlyn

Yes, tuning a 12 string can be an adventure in itself.

A wise man who did do ad hoc, on stage, alternate tunings (Michael Cooney) once said that tuning a 12 string was like tuning a centipede. Always liked that phrase. Just requires a slight imaginative adjustment to see how apt it truly is.

I was so glad when they mass produced digital tuners. I've been playing 12 stringers since the late '60s, and was almost never truly satisfied with my results tuning them. With a digital tuner, I confirmed an on-going 12 string suspicion that strings already tuned go out of whack as you tune more.

Now it's a 2 pass process. I tune all the main strings from bass to treble, and then all the octave strings again bass to treble. Then I repeat the process, the second time way easier, sometimes just each course together, bass to treble. With so much tension on the guitar from the extra strings, they can adversely respond to other strings being tuned.

Don
.

Tuning a sitar is like tuning a millipede by that standard. It's a three or four pass process as tuning all 20 strings puts incrementally more tension on the hollow neck, pulling every other string slightly out of tune.

Same with 12-string but less pronounced.

Originally Posted by SkipII

Sorry, but when I read the post title I was thinking: "Hmmm...an alternate tuning for the 12 strong is for it to actually be in tune!"

Sorry, snarky, but I feel the pain.

Just got my first digital tuner after having used a pitch pipe and then using the 5th fret method, discovered that I'd ended up tuned nearly a half tone sharp.

[Jimi2]

Originally Posted by JimmerO

Kaki King has played around with this kind of 12 String guitar tuning. I don't have any specific link to share. But if you tool around her website or youtube you're bound to find some of her songs with such turnings.

I love kaki king - should have figured she beat me to it!

[Jimi2]

Originally Posted by Twin Six

Tuning a sitar is like tuning a millipede by that standard. It's a three or four pass process as tuning all 20 strings puts incrementally more tension on the hollow neck, pulling every other string slightly out of tune.

Same with 12-string but less pronounced.



Just got my first digital tuner after having used a pitch pipe and then using the 5th fret method, discovered that I'd ended up tuned nearly a half tone sharp.

So my new 12 came detuned, and it took a few passes to get all the strings tuned up- I started at the low e, but by the time I got to the treble e, the low strings were out again. I guess I don’t understand why that would happen on a guitar with a fixed bridge. Once brought up to pitch, why wouldn’t they stay there?

[Twin Six]

Originally Posted by Jimi2

So my new 12 came detuned, and it took a few passes to get all the strings tuned up- I started at the low e, but by the time I got to the treble e, the low strings were out again. I guess I don’t understand why that would happen on a guitar with a fixed bridge. Once brought up to pitch, why wouldn’t they stay there?

It's made of wood and therefore flexes enough that the increasing tension on the neck as you tune successive strings slackens the strings you tune first. At least that's my observation.

[donlyn]

Originally Posted by Jimi2

So my new 12 came detuned, and it took a few passes to get all the strings tuned up- I started at the low e, but by the time I got to the treble e, the low strings were out again. I guess I don’t understand why that would happen on a guitar with a fixed bridge. Once brought up to pitch, why wouldn’t they stay there?

It's all about the string tension affecting the neck. You've got 6 extra strings added to the total tension. This means that a small increase in tension seems to cause a disproportionate and noticeable change in tension than you might normally get when tuning a 6 string. I would posit that the reason it too 4 passes was dependent on how far you had to go from the de-tuned tension to the final tension. The neck itself may have been adjusting to the higher tension more slowly as you had further to go. Just applying the SWAG method.

See also post #42 in this thread.

Edit > Pretty much the same thing that Twin Six had to say.

Don
.

[Jimi2]

Originally Posted by donlyn

It's all about the string tension affecting the neck. You've got 6 extra strings added to the total tension. This means that a small increase in tension seems to cause a disproportionate and noticeable change in tension than you might normally get when tuning a 6 string. I would posit that the reason it too 4 passes was dependent on how far you had to go from the de-tuned tension to the final tension. The neck itself may have been adjusting to the higher tension more slowly as you had further to go. Just applying the SWAG method.

See also post #42 in this thread.

Edit > Pretty much the same thing that Twin Six had to say.

Don
.

That makes sense. I guess I didn’t realize there was THAT much tension from the extra strings, not having experienced such fluctuations on my six strings. Definitely does complicate doing strange tunings, somewhat at least.