On Sun, 2004-12-19 at 23:29 +0200, John Anderson wrote: > On Sun, 2004-12-19 at 18:55, Russell Hanaghan wrote: > > Fact is, it is impossible to tune an acoustic guitar > > "perfectly"...Invariably, when you have it tuned so an open G chord > > sounds spot on, an open A or even C will be a tad off. And the same > > applies to the inverse of course. This all due to a general lack of > > adjustment for intonation on acoustic axes. > > Actually, even guitars with adjustable bridge saddles won't be perfectly > in tune with themselves, except for octaves, 4ths and fifths which are > close enough that one can't really hear the difference. This is because > the frets are in the wrong place in relation to the overtone series > (pl). This applies to any instrument that has fixed notes (piano springs > to mind), and which use the 12-tone equal temperament tuning. > > It's a long story, so I won't go into detail. Google for Just Intonation > if you want to know more. It sheds a different light on various > questions like, where *is* that confounded blue note? Why do major > chords sound crap on overdrive? What's the deal with barbershop and > string quartets? Why is D minor the saddest key? If I tune the B string > by ear to the G string, why is it out of tune with the E string? I think this is called "well tempered tuning". Lee
