Electronic guitar tuner?!
Question: Is this a good investment?
Answers: Is this a good investment?
Hi Again Snozzberries!
I can't tell you not to get an electronic tuner, because I have a good chromatic tuner I use every now and again.
IF you do buy an electronic tuner, make sure to shell-out a few more bucks and get a good Korg Chromatic tuner. This way, the tuner seems to me, to be better/higher quality and a bit more precise about getting your guitar in closer proximity with "in tune well". (Also, with a Chromatic tuner, you can tune your guitar up to alternate tunings, if and when you learn what those are).
Electronic guitar tuners come in handy if you're playing an electric guitar and get to gigs, only a bit before you have to be on stage for sound-checks. Then, you can plug a chord into your axe, (guitar), into the tuner and tune-up real quickly and have it tuned fairly close.
But, if you're playing an acoustic guitar, whether it's an acoustic-electric, or a straight-up acoustic only, then I don't know as I would recommend you buying an electronic tuner at all.
Buying an electronic tuner to tune an acoustic guitar is kind of a waste of money, since to use the tuner, you will have to have it VERY quiet wherever you are when you tune your guitar up! You will need the tuner switched on and placed up against the body of your guitar while you tune. This is because acoustic guitars have no electric chord to plug into the tuner, so the tuner has to utilize a little mic in the plastic tuner housing. Often these mics are cheesy quality at best and make your guitar tuning effort a waste of time, since they don't get your guitar tuned up well at all.
There are just so many variables that affect whether your acoustic guitar is tuned well, using a tuner/mic this way, because; if anyone is talking in the room with you, their voice will invariably hit one or the other frequencies of the strings you are tuning and the mic can't tell the difference between the frequency the voice is in, or your guitar string.
Using an electronic tuner to try and tune an acoustic or acoustic electric before a big gig in a full house, is next to impossible to do! A total waste of time, which you never have enough of, as a musician out playing gigs!
That's why, IF you are learning guitar on an acoustic guitar particularly, you need to learn to tune your guitar up well, by hand and ear, just as the instruction books tell/show you!
If I am out with my band on tour and find that I am only getting to gigs a few minutes before sound check or playing a gig, I need to do 2-3 things to make sure I have enough time to tune my guitars up correctly:
1. Call my booking agent and give him a little "what-for" about running me on such a hopelessly tight tour schedule, I don't even have time tune-up my guitars before-hand! Tell the agent to make sure to book every gig past this next one I'm playing today, to where I get to the gig with at least a couple hours to spare before sound-check! 4 or more hours before sound-check is preferrable, so that if I need to wash cloths and take a shower and clean-up a bit as well, maybe even time to choke down a gag burger or two at a golden arches somewhere nearby, and still have time to tune-up my guitars before playing the gig, I can easily do all that!
2. Then I would stay on the bus long enough after everyone else gets off, to tune my guitars up there, where it's at least quiet enough to do a good job tuning them! or:
3. Go back stage and find the stage manager to help me find my dressing room, get in there and get my guitars tuned up. I have even used the mens restroom backstage before sound check, to get off to myself where its usually pretty quiet, to tune my guitars in! There's always some room or area back-stage you can use to tune your guitars in, where noise will be minimal!
I cannot stress enough to you though Snozzberries, how important it is to learn to tune your guitar up, by hand and with your ears. To be able to recognize the exact pitch and tone each string makes, when it is tuned up almost perfectly. To get to the point that you can tell, by tuning the guitar up by hand, the exact vibration ocillations between the two strings you are striking to tune the one string up; when you have that string tuned very well! Because, there is always those times when out playing gigs, when the tour bus breaks-down or an accident on the freeway backs traffic up and you get in late, just before you have to play and sing at a gig and you realize your guitars are way out of tune.
You can, if you are used to it, tune a guitar by hand & ear, even in a crowded concert hall, in a few seconds time, if you have done it enough and you KNOW when each string is in tune!
Yes, you need to develop almost pure, true perfect string tuning pitch, for tuning your guitars by hand! Yes, you CAN develop an ear for this skill!
The exception to this is: IF you play only electric guitars. Then you not only need to know how to tune them by hand, using the sound of your guitar amp to hear when each string is in tune, but, if all I played was electric guitars, I'd go out and buy a new Korg Chromatic tuner and be done with it!
I don't know as if you've ever said on Yahoo Answers, what kind of guitar you are learning to play on, or will be using. IF you have done so, I just don't recall that. Please forgive me!
So that is why I give you my best recommendations for tuning most kinds of guitars you might be playing now, or want to play in the future!
Have FUN learning guitar Snozzberries!
Sincerely,
Jazzme 109
afkourse its is i love the electric guitar tuner!!!!
yes. get a good one though.
Good to have as a back-up if you're trying to tune up in a noisy place, but...
Remember...a crucial part about being a good musician is that you need to train and enhance your tonal hearing by being able to tune up without one...and those tuners operate in a vacuum with no consideration for air density and the size of the place you'll be playing in...
I don't have one, and don't need it...I can tune up instantly without one from sheer experience and practice...a lot quicker than using a tuner...especially if you're gigging and need to do it in a hurry...
yes - buy a chromatic tuner