How to Tune a Guitar by Ear

In this day of electronics, tuning a guitar is a very simple task. With electronic tuners you can tune a guitar in a relatively short time with your eyes. Just pluck a string and watch an indicator tell you it is tuned. But how about tuning by ear. There is value in learning to tune with your ears rather than your eyes. What would you do if your tuner batteries went dead and you wanted to play right then? If you know how to tune by ear there is no issue.

The most common tuning for a guitar is called 440hz. This means that the high e string fretted at the fifth fret (an A note) vibrates a 440 hertz per second. The corresponding note on a piano is the first A note above middle C. While you could tune your guitar from having just this note it is really only a reference point.

To be able to tune your guitar properly, you need a starting point. If you have a piano you can easily get a reference note. There are numerous other ways to get a reference note like with a pitch pipe, tuning fork or even one of the many websites that have an audible frequency generator.

To get the corresponding pitches from an 88 key piano follow the chart below. In reality you could tune a guitar with only the E note at the second octave of the piano.

To get open E use piano key E2 (E at the 2nd octave)

To get open A use piano key A2 (A at the 2nd octave)

To get open D use piano key D3 (D at the 3rd octave)

To get open G use piano key G3 (G at the 3rd octave)

To get open B use piano key B3 (B at the 3rd octave)

To get open E use piano key E4 (E at the 4th octave)

Now that we have a reference we can tune the guitar.

1.Tune the low E string to E using one of the methods from above. Then to tune by ear continue with this method below.

2. Fret the 5th fret of the 6th string. This will give you the pitch for the 5th sting. (A open)

3. Fret the 5th fret of the 5th string to get the pitch for the 4th string. (D open)

4. Fret the 5th fret of the 4th string to get the pitch for the 3rd string. (G open)

5. Fret the 4th fret of the 3rd string to get the pitch for the 2nd string. (B open) Careful here this one is different.

6. Fret the 5th fret of the 2nd string to get the pitch for the 1st string. (E open)

This is the most common and simplest way to tune a guitar. There are many many other possible tunings for the guitar but this tuning is used in the vast majority of all guitar music.