To protect your ears, you should own one of the following types of earplugs:
Once you’ve chosen a pair of earplugs and bought them, it is naturally necessary to get into the habit of wearing them when the volume gets high. It is therefore important to think about taking them before going to an event. It is also recommended to wear them throughout the event rather than only at the end, because they might not be as helfpul at that point. Finally, it is a bad idea to remove them before the volume is lower.
I would like to end on a positive note. Despite the hardship that people go through when they first have to deal with hearing damage, in a lot of cases people end up simply getting used to tinnitus, to a point where they don’t find it a major inconvenience anymore. It might even go away in certain cases. Protect your hearing as much as you can while can. But if an accident happens, then try to not dwell on it too much.
]]>A bass guitar’s tuning is the same as that of a guitar. There are two differences, though. The first is that the bass guitar, as its name implies, is an instrument whose range is low. It might therefore be more difficult for the tuner to pick up exactly which note is being played, and you might have to use your ear to polish the tuning after you use the tuner. Especially on the lowest strings.
The second difference is that a regular bass guitar only has four strings while a guitar generally has six. E standard tuning (EADGBe) therefore becomes EADG: the same tuning as on a guitar, minus the two high strings.
Just like on guitars and bass guitars, mechanics at the top of the ukulele neck are used to tune each individual string. The ukulele standard tuning is GCEA. The main difference with a guitar’s tuning is that G, the first string, is higher than C and E; unlike the guitar where strings go from low to high. This ukulele tuning is called re-entrant tuning, and it is the standard, but there are also other options depending on the style and tunes you’re looking to play.
Producing a pleasant sound with a violin is not something that’s easy to achieve, especially when the violin’s not in tune! That process is again a matter of tweaking the mechanics. Except there might be two per string on a violin: one on the neck, but another at the bridge. If you’re only going to do a small change, then use the knob at the bridge. For larger changes, use the mechanics on the neck. Do not put too much pressure, though, or the string might break! The notes that you’re looking for are GDAE for the violin and CGDA for the cello.
It is generally a bad idea for somebody who doesn’t have past experience with the instrument to try to tune a piano on his own. Although the pitch is also determined by the strings’ tension, upright and grand pianos are way more complex to handle. First of all, a dedicated tool is required to twist the mechanics. But then, it is not only six strings you’re looking at, but 88 notes, with one to three strings per note! It might even be, depending on the piano’s condition, that it would be impossible to get it to match A440 in one try, and that it would have to be done in multiple smaller steps. This is the reason why professional piano technicians learn the job in school and charge for their service. They have an experimented ear and can feel how the instrument’s going to react.
]]>Choosing the right guitar is crucial in that it will have an influence on how eager you are to practice your new instrument in the first months. Since this period is when most people quit, it is important to be motivated enough to go through obstacles.
There’s many different types of guitars (some of them even are hybrids), but, put simply, there are two main categories:
The main difference is that acoustic guitars are made of a hollow body that amplifies the sound produced by the strings, whereas electric guitars must be paired with an amplifier.
Acoustic guitars can again be split into two main categories:
Steel-string guitars generally have a larger body, made out of bright, yellowish wood. Most importantly, they use steel strings, which produce a sharp, metallic sound. Classical guitars also have three steel strings (the three low strings), but the three highs are made out of nylon, which have a mellow sound. Genres of music played on those two types of guitars include classical music and latin music for classical guitars; rock, pop or blues for steel-string guitars.
Here’s how an acoustic guitar sounds:
Here’s how a classical guitar sounds:
(Please note that there are multiple guitars playing at once in this clip.)
Electric guitars have a full body that’s paired with an electronic setup made of pickups that are located below the strings in order to capture the signal. They also feature tone and volume knobs. Played on their own, they’re really quiet. A guitar player might be able to hear himself if he plays in a quiet room, but this isn’t the sound anybody is looking for. The sound will have to be amplified, and the amp plays a big role in the final tone.
Sound effects such as reverberation, distortion, chorus, etc. can also be added to an electric guitar’s sound, which allows for great flexibility. Electric guitars can by the way be heard in all genres: rock, pop, funk, metal, jazz, etc.
Electric guitars have thinner strings and necks, and so this is less demanding of a beginner player’s hand. It hurts less. That being said, the various settings that can be tweaked on the instrument and on the amplifier can be very confusing when starting out.
Here’s how an electric guitar sounds:
At the end of the day, you should mostly think about what genre of music you like the most, and get the kind of guitar that is used to play that music. Then you’ll truly enjoy the process, and difficulties won’t bring you to a halt. If you’re on a budget, an acoustic guitar might be a good choice considering that there’s no amp nor cables to buy on top of the guitar. Good luck!
]]>All musical instruments need to be tuned on a regular basis. This is true for guitars, but also for pianos, harps, violins, etc. Every single guitar string is under a tension that ranges from 15 to 20 pounds, and that energy tends to dissipate over time, making the guitar out of tune.
On top of that, humidity and temperature variations have an influence on wood and make it swell or shrink, which also leads to small changes in the instrument’s setup. This is why a guitar should always be tuned before it’s played.
A440 is a reference pitch used by all musicians and available on all tuners. It is also the note given by most tuning forks when they’re hit and start to ring.
To tune a guitar string with such a reference, you have to turn the corresponding mechanic (the knob in which the string is eventually wrapped at the top of the neck) so that the note A on the string matches the external reference. This might be hard to do when starting out, this is why I would advise getting a tuner instead. But it is a process worth understanding.
The vast majority of guitars use six strings that are tuned in standard E tuning. Each string set is made out of three low strings, and three high strings. The lowest string is E, which means that when it is played without any left hand fretting (we say ‘open’), the note produced is an E. Here’s the list of strings in the same order as on your guitar:
Once a note on your guitar is aligned with A440 (the A at the 5th fret of the high E string for instance), then the whole string will be in tune, no matter whether you’re playing a D at the 10th fret, a C# at the 9th fret, or an F at the first fret. You’ll therefore be able to use this string as a reference to tune other strings against, the same way you used A440 as a reference to tune the first string.
The classical approach is indeed exactly about tuning the A on the 5th fret of the high E string with a reference A. Then, the high E string is played open, and it should sound the same as the E at 5th fret of the B string.
Once the B string is in tune, it should be played open and compared to the B at the 4th fret of the G string:
Now let’s play the open G string and match that to the G at the 5th fret of the D string:
Next, let’s match the D on the 5th fret of the A string with the open D string:
Finally, let’s match the note A on the 5th fret of the E string with the open A string:
Congratulations, you now know how to tune a guitar! Although it can be frustrating for a guitar beginner, it is an excellent exercise in order to improve your musical ear. To tune faster and with more precision, you should look into purchasing a tuner.
]]>There’s way too many tuners out there. On this page alone, I’ll be dicussing three models from the dozens that Korg has for sale. Obviously, Korg is not the only brand to sell electronic tuners.
With that being said, let’s look at it calmly. This post is here to guide you and will advise a particular model for each situation. I know those models and I know how they’re going to be a great fit for the various scenarios in which guitar players need a tuner (beginners, electric vs. acoustic guitars). I’ve been through those.
If you:
Then the Korg PC-2 clip tuner is a great choice and a handy tool in every guitar player’s toolbox.
If you:
Then the Korg GA1 tuners is a good choice as far as ‘advanced tuners’ are concerned. While not as lightweight as clip tuners, they remain portable (slip easily in a case), and very affordable.
If you:
Then the model I personally recommend is the Korg Pitchblack. I’ve used it for many rehearsals as well as twenty gigs a couple of years ago, and it’s never let me down.
Its features are the following:
Jimi Hendrix was a legendary guitar player with a terrific sound that could be identified in just a few notes. Fourty years after his first hits, many guitar players still admire him and try to learn his tunes as well as get closer to his tone.
It is worth mentioning here than on top of being a left-hander (but playing on regular right-handed guitars), Hendrix used to play in Eb tuning, which is different to the standard E tuning. He started tuning so early in his career due to the fact that he was playing in rhythm and blues clubs with horn players, and those tend to play tunes in the keys of Eb or Bb most of the time.
Eb tuning is fairly similar to standard tuning, since they are in fact the same tuning, with a semitone difference. To tune a guitar in Eb, simply lower each string by a semitone, which would give:
A huge Hendrix fan, Stevie Ray Vaughan also liked to play in E flat tuning. But ‘SRV’ even took it further: he’s also gone for very thick strings (13-58 vs. standard 10-46), which helped him reach his beefy sound.
When switching your guitar to a new tuning, you’re changing the force being applied by the strings on the neck. If you’re only going to occasionally switch from E standard tuning to E flat tuning, then that might be fine; but if you’re looking to keep a new tuning in the long run, then check that with a guitar tech who’ll let you know if your neck should be adjusted for that.
Jimmy Page is one of the top guitar players from the 70’s; he was sought after in London studios, known as one of the 10 best guitar players in the world, and founding member of one of the most known rock bands: Led Zeppelin. In Kashmir, one of the band’s most iconic songs, it is the guitar riff’s exotic power that give the song such an edge.
In order to tune a guitar to play Kashmir, follow these steps:
The final result is the following, from the lowest string to the highest:
This tuning is called Dsus4 open. A tuning is said to be open when a particular
chord can be played by simply strumming the open strings. In this case, Dsus4.
But in fact any sus4 chord could be played with a bar chord at other frets:
Esus4 at the 2nd fret (222222
), Fsus4 at the 3rd fret (333333
), etc.
A chord is said to be sus4 when it has a fourth and a fifth, but no third. With Dsus4, the notes are: D (tonic), G (fourth) and A (fifth); which are indeed the notes of that tuning’s open strings!