Why tune guitar to non standard?

Started by Yohanes, October 12, 2015, 10:31:16 PM

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lespauled

I read an interview with Jake E Lee many years ago, playing for Ozzy, where he spoke about cover bands playing Shot in the dark in standard tuning.  I remember his quote "I looked painful".

So, of course, they give you more voicing options, like Led Zeppelin - Rain Song. 

gumtown

I have an interesting situation to solve.
With an upcoming large festival gig being organised, one song we require bagpipes, which we are going to give a young lad (Angus) a go.
The song is "It's a long way to the top" by ACDC
The problem is bagpipes are tuned to between Bb and B and not concert A,
so with a bit of research on Bag-Pipes, I have found they do not conform to the standard Western equal temperament system,
but use Pythagorean tuning.

We had a practice last night with the young piper, only to discover this tuning issue,
we tried retuning guitar and bass to suit the pipes, but the result was the song didn't sound right tuned 3/4 step up, and the singer couldn't hit that tuning either.

Will see how that goes next week..

The only option is to retune the bagpipes, the easy part will be to tune the drones down to concert A, the chanter may be a little more challenging.
But I think taping off some/partial  holes in the chanter might bring the tuning down, and have to live with the Pythagorean tuning it uses, at least most notes will be in tune.
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Now_And_Then

Quote from: Yohanes on October 12, 2015, 10:31:16 PM
Hi Vguitarists,

I am playing guitar by learning partiture from popular musician songs, like Ain't Talking About Love (Van Halen), Every Breadth You Take (The Police), and many others that tuned down a semi tone. Why do they do that? To say that so it is easier to play, but wouldn't bassist, keyboardist  also prefer to play easier fingering? Or because they have to play as high as the vocalist can reach?

Thanks in advance for anyone who can shed me some light.


I am not sure if this applies to the specific songs which you've listed but I have always thought that one of the main reasons for tuning the guitar down a half step was to turn it into a transposing instrument - handy when writing notation or orchestration for an arrangement that also includes transposing instruments such as horns / brass.

Writing notation, charts, or orchestrations for a mix of transposing and non-transposing instruments looks like a bitch and a half (but maybe it isn't, really), and if the guitar (and / or bass) is re-tuned, then all the musicians can get the same chart.  I don't think that this is a problem with piano, as there do not seem to be any advantages to one key over another for an experienced keyboardist (or, I suppose, vocalist). Not 100% about that, though. 

I don't really want to get into a discussion about notation for transposing instruments because it makes my head hurt. Maybe someone else will assume that burden. And thanks in advance for doing so!

chrish

Quote from: gumtown on October 22, 2015, 01:48:07 PM
I have an interesting situation to solve.
With an upcoming large festival gig being organised, one song we require bagpipes, which we are going to give a young lad (Angus) a go.
The song is "It's a long way to the top" by ACDC
The problem is bagpipes are tuned to between Bb and B and not concert A,
so with a bit of research on Bag-Pipes, I have found they do not conform to the standard Western equal temperament system,
but use Pythagorean tuning.

We had a practice last night with the young piper, only to discover this tuning issue,
we tried retuning guitar and bass to suit the pipes, but the result was the song didn't sound right tuned 3/4 step up, and the singer couldn't hit that tuning either.

Will see how that goes next week..

The only option is to retune the bagpipes, the easy part will be to tune the drones down to concert A, the chanter may be a little more challenging.
But I think taping off some/partial  holes in the chanter might bring the tuning down, and have to live with the Pythagorean tuning it uses, at least most notes will be in tune.
what if you sampled the pipes and de-tuned the sample to an equal number of cents and then doubled the bagpipe part to produce  a chorused effect. Or maybe no one will notice that the pipes are out of tune, just like what's been happening for centuries.:-)

Now_And_Then

Quote from: chrish on October 23, 2015, 11:17:27 AM
what if you sampled the pipes and de-tuned the sample to an equal number of cents and then doubled the bagpipe part to produce  a chorused effect. Or maybe no one will notice that the pipes are out of tune, just like what's been happening for centuries.:-)

Or go to a bagpipes forum (of which there is at least one and I know because I found it) and ask how to do it.

gumtown

Quote
what if you sampled the pipes and de-tuned the sample to an equal number of cents and then doubled the bagpipe part to produce  a chorused effect. Or maybe no one will notice that the pipes are out of tune, just like what's been happening for centuries.:-)
It's for a live band show with a 13 year old making his first debut in a one song guest spot at the gig , so sampling is not an option.

Quote
Or go to a bagpipes forum (of which there is at least one and I know because I found it) and ask how to do it.
I did just that, and have now learnt the tuning involved and how to re-tune the bagpipes.
Lengthen the drone pipes to tune down to 'A', the then tape off a hole and a half on the chanter pipe.
Hopefully there is enough tuning range on the pipes. I shall find out next week :-)
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neshel

#31
@ConstruKction: it's all a matter of what you want to the instrument to do for you. Anything else is just pissing in the wind.


Quote from: maxdaddy on October 22, 2015, 05:34:34 AM
...guitarists should really appreciate the standard tuning for what it provides. It is one of the reasons why the guitar 'won' over many of the other stringed instruments through history (lute, banjo, gittern, cittern, etc...) and has become the dominant stringed instrument.

That's what the Wiki bit I abstracted said.  Won over....: I didn't read all the way; chordophone includes the bowed instruments.....which in my mind they are different because of how they resonate....anyways, guitar has become the dominant instrument period because of several things in Culture.


@gumtown: what did ACDC do?........  Oh, you found a solution.


@Now_and_Then: learning where instruments sound and where they're written is like learning fixed and moveable Do. It's required of any formal musician. I wasn't interested in any o that, though.

Elantric

extreme  example of "non standard tuning'

BobbyD

Quote from: Yohanes on October 18, 2015, 01:13:18 AM
Thank you all for very interesting replies. I do a short research about "Every Breadth You Take" by The Police, although I can not find exact answer but according to Andy Summers in his interview he is not fond of using non standard tuning and the rumor is that the recorded tape of "Every Breadth You Take" has been slowed down for unknown reason so what we get is the song played in the key of A but sounded as A flat (guitar play in the key of A but all strings are tuned down a half step). A music book for beginners write the song in the key of G for easy playing (with simplified chords) and at least one DVD tutor teach the song in the key of A flat.

As a novice (and I only have one guitar until recently), I expect every book/DVD/teacher will teach me in the 'correct' and the same key so I can reuse the included CD tracks whenever it is available, because not all books/DVDs/teacher provide the backing tracks to practice and play along. But now although I haven't progress much in skill, I have some guitars and a Boss GP-10 (yes I should improve my skill not my gear).

Besides the odd things above, I would like to conclude (and maybe to try/experiment also for my guitar some time later) that:
1. Using extra heavier gauge strings need tuning down to makes it easier to play and get special timbre
2. After you are skillful enough, you won't be limited to standard, you will explore beyond normal and leave us mere novice to stuck with standard tuning and standard guitar.
3. I can't believe a pro guitarists cannot transpose his playing to cope with limited ability singer, except if the song or the riff is created with special tuning(like the Rolling Stones song: Honky Tonk Woman?) or extremely difficult like Yngwie Malmsteem songs? Or can he?
4. OK, pro guitarists may still want to play in their 'comfort zone' or favorite style, so they retune their guitar to match their liking like MusicOverGear said.

Special thanks to Elantric for sharing your experience about playing guitar with other musicians.

Now I can learn guitar again with much understanding if there are many version of keys for a song. I will research info for the original key intended for the song and see if I would like to learn it in different key.

If you are a novice on guitar meaning you are probably playing less than one year, I would not be concerned at this point about alternate tunings or tuning down a half step.  Focus on playing in standard tuning and learn theory. I don't mean learning how to read music because that's a skill I wish I had and I have been playing 38 years.  Learning to read music is  a gift and there only so many hours in the day, so for me, I can advice because I don't know enough about your musical goals. If you want to become a session guitarist, probably a good idea.    But start analyzing song structures when you play something simple. Example: what key is this song in and what progression are they using.  is this this song a 1 IV V in key of G starting song on V chord?  .  Don't panic, this is simple stuff.  I remember when I was 15 years old and someone showed me the A pentatonic scale. I already had a good ear and was learning everything by ear, but that day my guitar life changed in a big way because everything started to make sense.  Than a I learned about the relative minor chord and relating pentatonic scale. .  Another miracle and once I started to combine the two pentatonic scales like the pros do, I progressed so fast on guitar. Than came the modes and when I started playing the A MixoLydian  scale over songs in key of A, magic happened again.  Than I went on to chromatic scales which I still practice to this day because you will learn that there is not a bad note you can ever hit on guitar during a solo as long as you don't emphasize the note or stop a phrase on the note.  This seems like a lot of info but I am sharing with you what I would do if I was in your shoes.  But I respect the fact that you are even aware of tuning down a half step.  I used to love playing along with Hendrix, Robin Trower, and some other blues cats and I always had to tune down because all the riffs in key of E were based on using the open E strings.  What is also a cool challenge is play the song in standard tuning even though they are tuned down a 1/2 step. Just opens your ears and makes you learn the neck better.    You should be focusing now on being able to figure out the key of any song, chord progressions, 7th chords, progression, and various scales that would work over song. I don't know how much of a novice you are but you should at least understand what arpeggios are, inversions, cycle of 5ths, and basic theory.     I personally believe playing rhythm guitar  is more important than solo guitar in early stages even though you can practice both. Master your rhythm chops over next 2 years and you will thank me.  There is so much free guitar lessons on youtube, plus software that enables you to slow down songs without changing keys to figure out some licks that may seem a tad fast.  If you want, PM me and I will give you a free guitar lesson to help you out and get you going in the right direction. Skype is a wonderful app..  But take the time to find a system, teacher, mentor, whatever it may be because it will cut your learning curve down so quickly you can learn in 2 years what may have taken you 5 years without a mentor or teacher.   I still take occasional guitar lessons and started studying jazz because it opens you ears to so many things that when you can start hearing the basic jazz progressions like ii V I.  It will spill over  to your blues, rock , funk or whatever you like to play.   Plus, you have no idea how lucky you are to be playing guitar in this day and age with the advancements in MIDI technology.  Go woodshed for a year, and practice every night for at least one hour with a specific goal before you start like learning E pentatonic in second position. every night. Not 7 hours on a Sunday.  Pay your dues now and reap the rewards later. Plus I never felt like practicing was work, but just fun. . And BUY a metronome.  Also I am sure you have a basic DAW for playing chords and laying scales on a different track.  You need to listen back to your playing and let other people hear it as well.  Criticism is your best friend so learn to deal with it now and be grateful for anyone who takes the time to listen to your playing and give you feedback.    If you want a free lesson to get you going, PM me. I have given so many free guitar lessons in my life because I never wanted people to not enjoy this wonderful instrument because of a lack of money.

Best of luck.

BobbyD

#34
Quote from: MusicOverGear on October 13, 2015, 07:39:45 AM

i played standard tuning for over 30 years and then switched to fourths. within two weeks the new tuning was much easier and music became more fluid and subconscious. for me personally a consistent tuning is demonstrably better
i uploaded to the GP-10 patch exchange, the Roland stuff can do that for me without interfering in my mental interface with the instrument. i.e. after decades of playing and trying really hard to solve all my problems, i'm finally home. viva v-guitar!

What tuning are you using for 4ths. I always keep one of my guitars in a different tuning for at least 3 months and would like to check this tuning out. Are you starting on low E and each higher string is a 4th?   To me, the only difference would be raising B string to a C and high E string to an F.   Or maybe you mean something completely different.  Thanks.  And love to hear a song you write in this tuning. Post on soundcloud brother man.

Elantric

#35