3 ms·

I'm not a music theory expert, just a guy who has played guitar by ear for 28 years. Equal temperament is definitely a compromise .. I find myself constantly t

I'm not a music theory expert, just a guy who has played guitar by ear for 28 years. Equal temperament is definitely a compromise .. I find myself constantly trying to "sweeten" the tuning of my guitar strings relative to the song/key I am playing. You can tune your guitar with the most accurate guitar tuner in the world (I have strobe tuners by Sonic Research and Peterson), and some things still just sound out of tune.

criddell 4y ago
There are guitars with frets that aren't straight lines that try to address some of the problems: https://guitargearfinder.com/faq/true-temperament-frets/ https://guitargearfinder.com/faq/true-temperament-frets/
- locusofself 4y ago
  I've seen those! Pretty cool. I've also seen people put intermediate frets on certain notes.
- khitchdee 4y ago
  FWIW, A sitar also has a 12 note scale, but the frets are moveable so you can tune by ear. The drawback is, you only play melodies on the top string and there are no chords. It's possible to design a guitar where the frets are spaced at harmonic intervals and not equal tempered, but then, you can only play in one key, the key of E and you can't capo or play barre chords. However, if you do play such a redesigned guitar in the key of E, it will sound sweeter because all your notes will be harmonic and you could play chords.
- tshaddox 4y ago
  I'm a bit confused by that article. It says things like "the problem is that equal temperament isn’t perfect" and "because guitars are imperfect instruments, they can never be completely in-tune" and "if you tune your open strings perfectly to pitch, you may still notice that some chords sound slightly out-of-tune." That doesn't sound like a description of a problem with equal temperament. In fact, the whole point of equal temperament is that any given chord has precisely the same tuning in every key. Isn't the purpose of these staggered frets to tune the guitar to more accurately match equal temperament? In other words, a guitar string played on the 7th fret is supposed to be tuned exactly 7 12-TET semitones above that string played open, but with completely straight frets (in lines exactly perpendicular to the strings) it's difficult to get every fret on every string to be accurately tunes. I believe this is what's referred to as intonation. Many guitars have some form of manual adjustment, like a movable bridge saddle for each string, and it's common to use that to slightly adjust the length of each string so that e.g. the 12th fret is accurately in tune with the open string. These "true temperament" guitars seem to have done a similar thing but with small adjustments to each fret on each string. Presumably the fret arrangements are designed to match that exact guitar fretboard with some specific guitar strings? The article says "with a normal guitar, if you play an A Major chord, then play a D Major chord, those chords will be slightly out-of-tune with each other." Again, this doesn't sound like a description of a problem with equal temperament. From what I can tell, these "true temperament" frets would help specifically with playing the same chord/interval in different positions.
  - xhevahir 4y ago
    I mentioned this fretboard yesterday in another thread ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32626218 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32626218 ). One of the main proponents of the design talks about its advantages here: https://youtu.be/D8EjCTb88oA https://youtu.be/D8EjCTb88oA I'm not crazy about the sound, myself. It's kind of like a guitar sample played through a MIDI keyboard.
    - tshaddox 4y ago
      Yeah, that video is linked from the article I was responding to. The video certainly makes sense: he's demonstrating that intervals sound the same in every position and specifically that octaves are very in tune across huge distances on the fretboard. From the small clips I've heard, it sounds great to me, especially when the guitar is playing alone. Back when I played a lot of guitar I was often pretty bothered by intonation issues, even with decent gear that was setup well and didn't seem to bother other (much better) guitarists. But of course guitars often play together with 12-TET instruments that are likely to be much more accurately tuned (like a piano or organ), and it makes sense that the every-so-slightly out-of-tune nature of guitars has become part of what sounds distinctively guitar-like, especially the specific tuning you're likely to hear a lot with common guitar chord voicing in many styles of music.
InCityDreams 4y ago
Apart from ensuring my intonation was spot on, and my frets nicely shaped, scalloping my frets allowed me a lot of what may be the 'sweetness' you are after - a slightly harder pressure, without finger gymnastics, allows minor pitch corrections (but you can't go flatter). Regular guitars just seem dead to me. I also shaved parts of my neck - significantly - along different parts of it ie it's not 'smooth', it's shaped only for me, and how i want to play in the different registers.

criddell 4y ago

There are guitars with frets that aren't straight lines that try to address some of the problems: https://guitargearfinder.com/faq/true-temperament-frets/ https://guitargearfinder.com/faq/true-temperament-frets/

locusofself 4y ago
I've seen those! Pretty cool. I've also seen people put intermediate frets on certain notes.
khitchdee 4y ago
FWIW, A sitar also has a 12 note scale, but the frets are moveable so you can tune by ear. The drawback is, you only play melodies on the top string and there are no chords. It's possible to design a guitar where the frets are spaced at harmonic intervals and not equal tempered, but then, you can only play in one key, the key of E and you can't capo or play barre chords. However, if you do play such a redesigned guitar in the key of E, it will sound sweeter because all your notes will be harmonic and you could play chords.
tshaddox 4y ago
I'm a bit confused by that article. It says things like "the problem is that equal temperament isn’t perfect" and "because guitars are imperfect instruments, they can never be completely in-tune" and "if you tune your open strings perfectly to pitch, you may still notice that some chords sound slightly out-of-tune." That doesn't sound like a description of a problem with equal temperament. In fact, the whole point of equal temperament is that any given chord has precisely the same tuning in every key. Isn't the purpose of these staggered frets to tune the guitar to more accurately match equal temperament? In other words, a guitar string played on the 7th fret is supposed to be tuned exactly 7 12-TET semitones above that string played open, but with completely straight frets (in lines exactly perpendicular to the strings) it's difficult to get every fret on every string to be accurately tunes. I believe this is what's referred to as intonation. Many guitars have some form of manual adjustment, like a movable bridge saddle for each string, and it's common to use that to slightly adjust the length of each string so that e.g. the 12th fret is accurately in tune with the open string. These "true temperament" guitars seem to have done a similar thing but with small adjustments to each fret on each string. Presumably the fret arrangements are designed to match that exact guitar fretboard with some specific guitar strings? The article says "with a normal guitar, if you play an A Major chord, then play a D Major chord, those chords will be slightly out-of-tune with each other." Again, this doesn't sound like a description of a problem with equal temperament. From what I can tell, these "true temperament" frets would help specifically with playing the same chord/interval in different positions.
- xhevahir 4y ago
  I mentioned this fretboard yesterday in another thread ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32626218 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32626218 ). One of the main proponents of the design talks about its advantages here: https://youtu.be/D8EjCTb88oA https://youtu.be/D8EjCTb88oA I'm not crazy about the sound, myself. It's kind of like a guitar sample played through a MIDI keyboard.
  - tshaddox 4y ago
    Yeah, that video is linked from the article I was responding to. The video certainly makes sense: he's demonstrating that intervals sound the same in every position and specifically that octaves are very in tune across huge distances on the fretboard. From the small clips I've heard, it sounds great to me, especially when the guitar is playing alone. Back when I played a lot of guitar I was often pretty bothered by intonation issues, even with decent gear that was setup well and didn't seem to bother other (much better) guitarists. But of course guitars often play together with 12-TET instruments that are likely to be much more accurately tuned (like a piano or organ), and it makes sense that the every-so-slightly out-of-tune nature of guitars has become part of what sounds distinctively guitar-like, especially the specific tuning you're likely to hear a lot with common guitar chord voicing in many styles of music.

InCityDreams 4y ago

Apart from ensuring my intonation was spot on, and my frets nicely shaped, scalloping my frets allowed me a lot of what may be the 'sweetness' you are after - a slightly harder pressure, without finger gymnastics, allows minor pitch corrections (but you can't go flatter). Regular guitars just seem dead to me. I also shaved parts of my neck - significantly - along different parts of it ie it's not 'smooth', it's shaped only for me, and how i want to play in the different registers.