How to Use an Acoustic Guitar Tuner

Video Transcript

"Hello, my name is James Manuele. I'm a guitarist and instructor at Clark College, here in Vancouver, Washington, and today we will discuss how to use an acoustic guitar tuner. Now there are many different types of tuners for the guitar. There is a pitchfork that usually are used for the "E" string or the "A" string of the guitar. You can also use a pitch pipe that will tune each string separately. There's also relative tuning, tuning the guitar to itself after giving the guitar a concert pitch. Today we will use the electronic tuner. Now the one I have with me today will demonstrate two ways to tune the guitar. The first thing that you will need to do is make sure that you have it on 440 hertz per second, which is common, standard tuning. At this moment it's on a gauge so if I strike the sixth string of the guitar, which is the low base string, this needle will try to go to the middle of the gauge in order for the sixth string to be in tune. The lights will reflect red or green, green of course telling you if the string is in tune. So without saying too much, I'll let the tuner do it's job. So here I raised the pitch of the "E" string and both lights should come on green. Now, another way, without using the gauge, to tune each string separately, you could also have the actual pitch sound from the tuner. So here it's giving you the actual pitch of the sixth string of the guitar, also indicating the needle will also raise and set in the middle. If you are wanting to go to the fifth string, then with this arrow, from the "E" to the "A", then you will match your string to the "A" pitch. Let's do one more, going to the "D" string. So you will hear the actual pitch from the tuner and you will try to match the string to that pitch. So the electronic tuners basically have those two functions, whether you're using the needle and the gauge, or it's giving you the actual pitch for each string to tune. So in many ways you can tune the guitar in different styles using a pitchfork, a pitch pipe, or the electronic tuner. This really is one of the most accurate ways to tune the guitar especially if you're learning how to tune the instrument and developing your ear. I will highly recommend the electronic tuner."