It’s freeandeasyguitar.com, it’s Aaron Gallagher and this lesson right here is going to be what I think is the most important things that you can keep, and check when you learn to play the guitar. And that is using a tuner. Like I said in the guitar gear video, the most important accessory in my opinion which is not by any means, experts opinion but I have played guitar enough to know and tell a few people enough to know that you want to make sure your guitar is in tune at all times.
If you pick up your guitar and play a D chord in your guitar with that tune even if you play perfect D chord, it’s going to sound awful and it’s going to be a frustrating, and it’s not going to be encouraging. Which is what you want to make sure you do is you want to make sure that every time you pick up the guitar and you do something as encouraging a little bit.
So this tuner that I’m going to I guess endorse even though I’ve never talk it about before but It’s KORG and it’s just—the first tuner I ever used and I think it is really easy one to use. So I don’t know how good the picture you can get on this but KORG has a little screen here. The number that is at standard tuning I guess you’d say is 440. That just means it vibrates 440 times per second to produce a note.
So there are three little bumps up here. You have the one on the left that looks like a lower case of B and that’s flat symbol. And what flat means, it means the pitch is lower than a certain note. So if you’re trying to play an A note and you play it flat, you’ll be playing something lower than an A note.
The other note you have on the other side looks like a little pound sign on your phone or a number sign and what that is, is a sharp sign. What a sharp means, you’re playing it higher. So if you’re going to play an A and you played something higher than an A, then you’ll know it’ll be sharp of an A, maybe an A sharp, maybe two step sharp, but it still above it. Also on this tuner, there’s this little red on-off button and there’s three buttons here the guitar, slash, and bass. This tuner if you press it on the screen, you’ll see a bass. You don’t want that unless you’re tuning bass guitar and press again and you’ll see a guitar. That’s what you want.
The third, the second button down there is called the flat button it says FLAT. It may have a little B is flat symbol. But what that is, is every time you press that it’s going to drop each of your tuning down half step. So if you had a tuner and your guitar is in standard tuning which is from the thickest string to the thinnest E, A, D, G, B, and finally the thinnest string E, that’s standard tuning. That’s440 hertz. Each time you press that flat symbol, it’s going to take each one of those down half step. So if you hear me saying on the lesson half step down tuning, that means you get your tuner out, press that little flat button, and play the tune in each of your strings down half step.
Now the cool thing is whenever you play a note, it’s going to recognize what pitch is near, it’ll actually tell you. So if I were to play—if I were going to play an E note, it’s going to tell right up in this corner that it’s playing an E. And it will recognize it on your guitar so you’ll it’ll E. Now if this middle one here lights up, that means it’s your own pitch. So if you’re trying to play a low E strings, your thickest strings, it’ll say 6E up here because it is at your 6th string. The strings are numbered from the thinnest to the thickest. It’s going to say 6E up here if you’re playing your thickest string and then if you’re a little bit flat which means you need to tighten your string a little bit, this light is going to light up when you play that string.
If you’re a little bit sharp, that one is going to light up there. The number signs, that means you’re going to need to loosen your string a little bit to get back down. And you’re going to—it may take you some time when you first start. I recommend going to the guitar shop where you buy a tuner, where you take lessons anything like that and just practicing it by yourself. I recommend having someone who knows what they’re doing and work with you a little bit because the last thing you want to do is over tune and break a string, because that is frustrating and yet to change a string which is also frustrating.
So if you’re going to half step down tuning, you press this flat button and then you still tune to that middle note because it will still say E up here, it won’t say E flat. Tt will say E and then there’ll be a little flat symbol that shows up right here. You probably can’t see it. But each time you press that flat, it’s going to take a half step down so you want to take it down. Press that button once so there’s one little low case to B then you’re going to play your note, it’ll say E and there’ll be a little flat symbol over here somewhere, and you just tune in to that in that middle thin again.
If you want to go back up to standard tuning, press the flat button a few more times. Mine goes to five flats before it resets and then you can tune it back up to standard tuning. So I know it’s hard to learn how do and use a tuner through a video. I said it’s small and you can’t see it but I just want to say this is the type of tuner that I’ve used for a long time. It’s easy to use, it’s very basic. There are also tuners that you can use that are hooked up to a pedal if it’s an electric guitar. There’s lot of different types of tuners. My recommendation is the final one that you can learn to use. If your friend uses a different type of tuner and he’s going to teach you, then use the type of tuner that he is showing you how to use. But that’s the number one less important thing in my mind in learning the guitar and that is to make sure you’re guitar is in tuned.
So I hope this lesson has been helpful a little bit and whenever you’re ready, and your guitar is in tuned or you just to see the next lesson, then take a look at the next lesson and we’re going to talk about fretting notes. How to hold your finger on the note and how to hold a pick, how to hold the guitar so we’re just getting started into playing a guitar but when you only when you’re guitar is tuned. So alright take care.
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