Went to a gig... WTF guitar tuning?

[swarfrat]

I'm going with 1) brand new, insufficiently stretched strings, 2) probably with poor wrapping technique. The only thing that can save you in that case is a locking nut.

Playing with a light touch supports the insufficient stretching theory.

 

[Dan025]

Well, not to get into perfesser-land, but - the equal-temperament tuning that has to be used to play in 12 keys has serious deviations from "just intonation", AKA harmonic-series tuning. Scroll down here to the chart labeled "Comparison to just intonation" -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equal_temperament#Comparison_to_just_intonation

What you see is that major 7ths and minor 9ths are 11.73 cents off, minor 3rds and major 6ths are a whopping 15.64 cents off.

A "cent" is 1/100th of the distance between two adjacent notes. With some training, it's easy to hear an interval that's more than 4 or 5 cents off, and because the way the ET tuning works, there are chords where the notes that are + cents off are added to the notes that are = cents off. If you play a chord with an augmented 4th and a minor 6th, you're looking at notes that are a whopping 31 cents off from each other! Eeeeeeeyew.....  :sad:

The point being that all guitars are noticeably and permanently out of tune. But you train your ear to gloss over it. Most people who play steel guitar with any serious interest take some time to work on intervals training - playing against a drone tone, counting out the "beats"... One end result is that you notice much of your favorite music is really, really out-of-tune - so you then have to train yourself to get over it.

I would get reamed for saying this on certain forums, but I think one of the reasons that jazz guitarists favor fat, thuddy hollowbodies (even flatwound strings!) is because there really aren't many upper harmonics - so if they go fast enough, you won't realize how out-of-tune the complex chords are. Ditto for fat, thuddy nylon strings for classical guitarists. It's much harder to distinguish the actual tuned center of low, flubbery tones, because the wavelengths are so long. Ever see your tuner freak out over the low B of a 5-string bass? It can't find the note.

thank you! guitars always sound out of tune. can't do anything about it. changing songs or keys may make you aware of it after you recalibrate. tuners are nothing but a tool to keep the band in tune with each other and equally badly tempered. the whole flat b thing is an atempt for people to play certain chords in tune.

i happen to like "rolling" thirds from an even temperment.  ive tried to tune in thirds so there is no beat and the chords sound pretty dull. harmony is over rated. and i agreee on the classical and jazz instruments. keeps disonance down when you cut the harmonics. same goes with "metal" nothing like distortion to highlight the upper harmonics so you have to have a dark guitar and amp setup to cut it down. notice that some metal players use those goofy harmonizer pedals where you select a key and it modulates the notes to be more in tune with the key? there is a reason they need those.

all the compensated nuts out there can only make you intonate better. it may help with some compensation for common open chord forms if you engineer it in but even a perfectly intonated guitar isn't tempered well and any open chord compensation will go out the window in other positions. its why there is so much atempt to make instruments with squigly frets but you will still be using an imperfect tuner to tune the thing...

 

[Ace Flibble]

Well, all else I can say is that in my experience, where I twat my strings so hard I've ripped bridges out of guitar bodies on several occasions (nerve damage means I have virtually no control over how hard I pick or fret, I'm either full-on or barely scraping the strings), I can go days and even weeks without having to retune a guitar, which I attribute to my very careful restringing technique. Locking, non-locking, fixed bridge, vibrato, tiltback, straight, high action, low action, thick strings or thin, never had a problem with any of 'em. Tuning stability has always been one of my top priorities and I'm glad to say that outside of a complete break, I've never had a single tuning problem on stage, even with cheap guitars and parts.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, if you're having tuning problems and there isn't obvious damage causing it (burrs in the saddle or nut, for example) then it's going to be down to how you're restringing and treating the guitar. You've got to be doing something severely wrong if you're having to retune a guitar every couple of songs. I murder my guitars and they're stable as a rock.

 

[Strat Avenger]

Well, all else I can say is that in my experience, where I twit my strings so hard I've ripped bridges out of guitar bodies on several occasions (nerve damage means I have virtually no control over how hard I pick or fret, I'm either full-on or barely scraping the strings), I can go days and even weeks without having to retune a guitar, which I attribute to my very careful restringing technique. Locking, non-locking, fixed bridge, vibrato, tiltback, straight, high action, low action, thick strings or thin, never had a problem with any of 'em. Tuning stability has always been one of my top priorities and I'm glad to say that outside of a complete break, I've never had a single tuning problem on stage, even with cheap guitars and parts.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, if you're having tuning problems and there isn't obvious damage causing it (burrs in the saddle or nut, for example) then it's going to be down to how you're restringing and treating the guitar. You've got to be doing something severely wrong if you're having to retune a guitar every couple of songs. I murder my guitars and they're stable as a rock.

Or......perhaps you're just tone-deaf. 

NO guitar will stay in-tune for "weeks".  And re-stringing technique is pretty much moot when they are clamped at both ends (Floyd Rose with locking nut).

I'm not actually accusing you of being tone-deaf,  :evil4:  but a lot of people are, and think they are sounding great when in reality, their guitar is out-of-tune.

 

[Ace Flibble]

That is why we use tuners and not our ears.

And, how you restring does matter even with a double-locking design. You need to remember that clamping down is not really as sturdy as the "locking" term implies, especially if the parts are a bit old. I've had to replace a fair few saddles and nuts for friends who have over-tightened their Floyds to 'lock' them, and in doing so just wore a big string-shaped dent over time, which lead to nothing really being locked in place at all. By making sure you're still tying the strings off at the tuners properly, you minimise any risk of slipping at the nut, which in my experience seems to be the first bit to wear in.
That's aside from the issue of Floyd knife edges dulling, but that's another topic for another day.