tuning the classical guitar

[DyPxLaMo]

I have a question about tuning the classical guitar.

I am a beginner. Tuning by ear is important, and someday I will be able to. I have watched a couple of lessons on it. But at the present time I can’t get within 10 cents of being in tune when I tune by ear. So I have to use an electronic tuner.

I am using the Airyware tuner, a phone app. It reports the tone it hears to the tenth of a cent, but the reviews say that it is only accurate to the cent. And that is sufficient, as I cannot hear any difference smaller than three or four cents at best.

What it shows me is that when a string is plucked, assuming that it is in tune, the sound starts out 1or 2 cents sharp, then, within a second or so, settles down to in-tune, which it holds for three or four seconds. Sometimes, not always, as it is fading, it falls flat by a couple of cents. This makes sense to me. At the moment of the pluck extra tension is generated as the string is displaced to the point at which it will be released.

My question is: am I right to be tuning the string so that it is the frequency that it settles down to that is in tune? Or should I be tuning it so that the first plucked sound is at the right frequency. After all, most of the time the next note is played before the previous string has settled down to the frequency that it will hold.

Mind you, I only know this by watching the tuner. My ear (brain, actually) cannot really tell that it is sharper at first than when it is being sustained. I can only tell that the initial sound at the pluck has a different quality than the sound that is sustained. I could not tell you which was higher or lower, but only that they are different.

I am assuming, of course, that this phenomenon is proper to the sound of the guitar, and not just an indication that my guitar is not as good as it should be. If truth be told, I like it. It is part of the complexity and richness of the sound. A guitar, after all, should not sound like a sine-wave generator.

May I please be instructed by someone with more experience and expertise?

Of course, it is always possible that I am being silly, that the tuner shows finer discrimination than any ear can hear. But I would have thought that making sure that what I hear is what I want my ears (brain) to be trained to recognize is worth while.

[mr. beaumont]

Phone app tuners are just not "there" yet, in my opinion. A decent clip on will be better.

But you have the right idea-- allow the pitch to settle. A lot of folks like to use 12th fret harmonics when tuning because the pitch fluctuates less.

I saw this method years ago on a classical forum...it's more work. But it absolutely works.

1.) tune A using the 5th fret harmonic by comparing it to a tuning fork (440 Hz)

2.) tune low E by comparing the 12th fret harmonic on E to the 7th fret harmonic on A

3.) tune D by comparing the 12th fret harmonic on A to the 7th fret harmonic on D

4.) tune g by comparing the 12th fret harmonic on G to the 7th fret harmonic on G

5.) tune B by comparing the 7th fret harmonic on lower E to 12th fret harmonic on B

6.) tune high E by comparing the 7th fret harmonic on lower A to 12th fret harmonic on high E.

[btbliatout]

What a fun question! I would completely defer to those who are classically and formally trained at some real school of music, however I have some thoughts.

I think most of us tune for the "steady state" frequency. We're not really considering the moment of attack (t = 0+), or the extremely short transient time where it starts sharp and settles into the "steady state." (0+ through 40ms?)

During that transient time, the sharpness will (at least in part) be a function of magnitude. As in if you attack/pluck "harder", the sharpness will vary. Accordingly, it'd be very hard to tune to a SPECIFIC attack, and hard for the guitarist to be able to consistently perform that specific attack consistently in order to get the exact f(t) response desired (where f = frequency). Things like different string gauge, tension, and even the differences from each nail would probably change things. So the only consistent method of tuning is to tune for steady state.

However, for pieces that might be purely staccato, I imagine the guitarist that's trying to push the limits of human potential, that guitarist might actually work on their ability to be so precise that they could down-tune their strings and nail the perfect pitch on each attack. That person may actually down-tune their strings slightly. But...I suspect not anyone else (which is...practically everyone).

Such a fun question to ponder though. Thank you for it!

[nickv6]

Originally Posted by mr. beaumont

Phone app tuners are just not "there" yet, in my opinion. A decent clip on will be better.

But you have the right idea-- allow the pitch to settle. A lot of folks like to use 12th fret harmonics when tuning because the pitch fluctuates less.

I saw this method years ago on a classical forum...it's more work. But it absolutely works.

1.) tune A using the 5th fret harmonic by comparing it to a tuning fork (440 Hz)

2.) tune low E by comparing the 12th fret harmonic on E to the 7th fret harmonic on A

3.) tune D by comparing the 12th fret harmonic on A to the 7th fret harmonic on D

4.) tune g by comparing the 12th fret harmonic on G to the 7th fret harmonic on G

5.) tune B by comparing the 7th fret harmonic on lower E to 12th fret harmonic on B

6.) tune high E by comparing the 7th fret harmonic on lower A to 12th fret harmonic on high E.

There's something odd about step 4?
Using 7th fret harmonics won't leave you with ET if that's important to you as the harmonics there are natural and ET notes don't fall on the natural harmonics.
Nick

[DyPxLaMo]

Thank you. This is the most helpful response that I received.

[TBman]

Get a Snark tuner. I have one and it is more accurate than my phone app.

For standard tuning EADGBE:

Tune the 6th string to the tuner then

5th fret on the 6th string = open 5th string
5th fret on the 5th string = open 4th string
5th Fret on the 4th string = open 3rd string
4th fret on the 3rd string = open 2nd string
5th fret on the 2nd string = open 1st string

After you've trained your ear you can just use the tuner for all the strings.

I also use the harmonics to cross tune, but keeping it simple at first is best.

[DyPxLaMo]

THis is very helpful.

[Gitfiddlemann]

All the methods above will get you there sufficiently.
I also use a snark clip-on tuner for tuning quickly. It's much better than the phone ones.
But I was also taught a method by my classical guitar teacher years ago, which I think works best:
- Start by tuning the 5th string open A to pitch.
- To tune the low E, pluck its 12th fret harmonic and get it in unison with the fretted E on the A string at the 7th fret. (not the harmonic).
- To tune the D string, pluck the 12th fret harmonic on the 5th string A and get it in unison with the fretted A on the D string at the 7th fret. (not the harmonic).
- To tune the G string, again pluck pluck the 12th fret harmonic on the 5th string A and get it in unison with the fretted A on the G string at the 2th fret.
- To tune the B string, fret the A string at the 2nd fret, then pluck the artificial harmonic* at the 14th fret of the A string to get it in unison with the open B string.
- To tune the high E string, fret the A string at the 7th fret, then pluck the artificial harmonic* at the 19th fret of the A string to get it in unison with the high open E string.
(* If you're not familiar with artificial harmonics, just fret the notes at the 2nd and 7th frets of the A string to get the B and E notes. But using the harmonics is better.)
Main advantages of this method:
1) All the strings are tuned to one reference string (A), which eliminates little deviations going from string to string.
2) Harmonics at the 7th fret should be avoided when tuning, because they result in pure fifths, which runs counter to tuning in equal temperament. Some chords will sound great, others not so much. Tuning in equal temperament means that all pure 5ths need to be lowered slightly.
3) When tuning a guitar, harmonics at the 12th (and 5th) frets work best because they are one and two octaves above the open strings. Using artificial harmonics at the 14th and 19th also involves the use of octaves.

That's what I learned anyway. And it does work. Very well.
But so does the Snark.

[mr. beaumont]

Originally Posted by nickv6

There's something odd about step 4?
Using 7th fret harmonics won't leave you with ET if that's important to you as the harmonics there are natural and ET notes don't fall on the natural harmonics.
Nick

My bad, I copied and pasted that without checking.

At any rate-- Andre's method below is more like the one I thought I was posting.

[rick-slo]

Originally Posted by DyPxLaMo

What it shows me is that when a string is plucked, assuming that it is in tune, the sound starts out 1or 2 cents sharp, then, within a second or so, settles down to in-tune, which it holds for three or four seconds. Sometimes, not always, as it is fading, it falls flat by a couple of cents. This makes sense to me. At the moment of the pluck extra tension is generated as the string is displaced to the point at which it will be released.

Just physics of a plucked string. When just plucked the string will initially go sharp for a short time (for a second or so
(more so the harder plucked)) though usually not enough to be audible to the ears. Then the string settles into the pitch
you want to tune to if looking at a tuning meter. Also when the string's sound fades out to the approach of silence the
string's pitch goes slightly sharp (physics of the overtones I suppose).

[Aspiring]

The OP mentioned using Airyware as a phone app. From my experience that is a very accurate tuner at least compared to other sources I have to work with Although I'd say the comments on accuracy being in the order of .5 seems to line up with my experience as well.

I played a little bit last night with comparing my Petersen hd strobe tuner clip on my korg sh-pro strobe tuner clip on my fractal Axe FX III and my phone app. (Airyware)

The short of it is the app the Fractal and the Petersen were very consistent with each other when I played an open string. If I was off by more than 1.5 cents they would all consistently show that I was in the same direction from the note and slightly off.

If I looked up the exact frequency of a pitch (E4 / E5 at 329.6 and 659.25 were the ones I used) and tuned such that the two with numerical readings settled at the target pitch (Fractal and Airyware app) they both settled within 0.1-0.2 Hz of each other and the strobes on all three showed stopped as best I could judge.

A2 /A3(110/220 Hz ) was pretty similar

At E2 / E3 ( 82.4 / 164.8Hz) I saw a little more divergence.

The Fractal was reading about 0.3 Hz lower than the Airyware app numerically and the Fractal and Petersen mostly lined up for stopping the strobe slightly above where the Fractal indicated the correct frequency.

The Korg was consistently off of the other three showing that the notes were consistently reading as flat across all strings compared to the others being in tune.

My take on this is that the Airyware app is as good as or perhaps slightly better than some very good clip on tuners.

I do not have a reference to determine how accurate that is overall but the app seems to be as good a choice as any tuner I have access to for how it reads.

I will add that this was done in a quiet room. Obviously the app will not do as well in a noisy environment as a clip on tuner or direct tuner attached through a pickup.

To the ops question I was comparing that all after the initial attack and tuning to the steady pitch.

Update I found I had the Korg set in 442 reference pitch which had predictable results. When set back to 440 it tracked in line with the Petersen.


Sent from my motorola edge (2021) using Acoustic Guitar Forum mobile app

[nickv6]

When using a phone app you really need to calibrate the app to your phone's chip for absolute accuracy.
A good app should have calibration sequence somewhere in it's settings.
Nick