Why didn't Frusciante tune his guitar?!

[Music] recently I was recording a video in which I tried to recreate certain tones I was comparing what I was playing my sound to the sound on the record and something weird happened his B string is a bit my guitar was hundred percent in tune but it was definitely off with the record okay that happened before maybe the record was a bit down or a bit up no this was even weird because it was off on one string only so I tuned that string to match the record resulting into something I was not expecting my guitar sounded way better detuned what ok so here's a little snippet from the intro and with my guitar is out of tune definitely it doesn't sound nice together but if we take a look at the tuner my notes are spot-on [Music] you see right in the middle so now let's detune until we are at his okay that's about it I think so it should be super out of tune but when I'm playing these notes it sounds pretty good so hold on what's happening is that guitar Rong is a tuner on it's a recording wrong well neither is wrong let me explain all intervals which is just the distance between two notes like a fifth or third are based on the ratio to one another for instance the octave is two to one meaning the frequency of the octave is twice the frequency of the lower notes this means that the a string for example is ringing twice as fast if you play an octave higher the third is five to four and we can do this to each interval so using these ratios to determine the intervals is called just intonation and these intervals are how it actually should be how they sound hundred percent accurate this is also how they occur in nature the harmonic overtones we're hearing in our voice or in our instruments so this is beautiful but also very problematic for a lot of reasons because we're calculating each note to the C the ratios of other notes to each other in that key or get messed up the two chord in the key of C for example D and an F so that happens if you stay in one key but if you switch keys oh man [Music] these intervals are off by so many cents and that's why it's very problematic as you can hear wait a minute you said cents what do cents have to do with it okay so let's jump back to modern times nowadays cent is derived from the tuning system we use today it's called the twelfth tone equal temperament from now on twelve tet it's how I tune my guitars it's how all music you hear on the radio is tuned this tuning system divides the octave into twelve bars that are equally distance from one another creating twelve semitones or half steps these are the frets on the guitar or the notes on the piano all these semi tones are measured in cents so each half tone or each fret or or each piano key whatever is hundred cents apart exactly 1/12 of an octave which is twelve hundred cents apart so but why is this an imperfect system like you just told us so we learned that in just intonation these errors are really huge with the twelfth tone equal temperament system we minimize these errors and then we spread them evenly so each interval is just marginally off so yes each interval is a little imperfect also in relation to the root note but just slightly wait a minute that slightly off sounding interval can actually pretty annoying didn't you ever tune your guitar by ear thinking you're exactly there but then the tuner says you're quite off the tuner you're using is based on the twelfth death system with all the imperfections that go with it so it's not weird that your ear try to adjust to these little imperfections at all so now back to the song we talked about scar tissue could it be that John detuned his guitar specifically for that intro to match the exact ratio of five to four of the third interval let's do a simple calculation math the frequency of tea is 294 Hertz five to four ratio brings us to an F sharp results in a tone almost three Hertz lower than the F sharp from the twelfth Tet so the major third is always a little bit too high compared to what it actually should be thirteen point six nine cents too high to be precise wait a minute I know that number when a teacher in my guitar to match John Frusciante stone I had to ditch in my you know thirteen or fourteen cents lower to match his sound that is incredibly out of tune according to the tuner who so now you might think why doesn't everyone do that well now I tune that string to match the lower major third right but what if I continue playing and I want to play a minor six interval on that B string [Music] Wow that sounds horrible yes because the minor six interval actually needs to be corrected the other way around so we need to tune the B string 30 cents higher to get the right interval so unless you're absolutely sure you're never going to use that string for anything other than just one interval it could be pretty cool to experiment with this I use it when playing a G major chord and at open B string sounds a little sharp although it was tuned right so just slightly lowering it can result in a much more pleasing sound let me show you [Music] so all strings are in tune I play a G major chord [Music] and now slightly lowering the b-string [Music] do you hear that it sounds way less dissonant although the b-string is Wow extremely out of tune according to the tuner and I found it especially that major 13 AFOL just like four shanties playing in scar tissue could be quite harsh in the 12th 10th so I think he made the right decision slightly detuning his major third for that recording which resulted in a less dissonant sounding intro overall if you ever run into some tuning problems and you're not trusting your ears anymore just remember that chewing it perfectly to the standards of a guitar tuner is never perfect and if you're up to it feel free to disagree better tune to a tuner if you're not sure by the tune to ensure anyways thanks so much for watching this was Paul I hope you like this video let me know by leaving a reaction or a comment below and clicking the thumbs up and subscribe to the channel if you aren't already thank you so much have a great day [Music]

Channel: Paul Davids

Views: 3,012,940

Rating: 4.9456563 out of 5

Keywords: paul davids, frusciante, equal temperament, just intonation, guitar tuner, wrong, interval, detuned, scar tissue, guitar, string, cents, cent, twelve tone, 12-TET, intonation, problems, maths, ratio, sharp, flat, major third, octave, how to tune, video, lesson, guitar tuning, guitar out of tune, red hot chili peppers, detune, tuning issue, john frusciante

Id: Daw93bRHe4Y

Length: 8min 32sec (512 seconds)

Published: Mon May 13 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/Fingrepinne]

It's not an uncommon trick to "tune" the thirds of triads. It is almost unavoidable in good choirs and string sections, for instance (although vibrato might mask these effects a tad). For guitar, this way of tuning only one string is probably the best way of accomplishing something similar (in particular detuning, as you can bend to "fix" the detuning when not playing a M3).

The video explains it very well, and also makes the incredibly crucial point that if there were more and different chords/harmonies played, it could crash land quite spectacularly.

[u/falconx50]

Wow never realized that! Way cool video.

[u/Tolliug]

I mean, although this is pretty cool and interesting, I wouldn't call Frusciante a "Genious" for that. I mean, he did a bunch of much greater things than that, which are much more valid reasons for calling him a genious. Here, he just listened to his ears, which is pretty smart indeed, but pretty common actually.

[u/MixableTuna]

Any chance someone Collins let me know who this gentleman is?

[u/Qbekbear]

Actually there’s a strong possibility it was producer’s or recording engineer’s suggestion. These guys are not there just to press rec button, they know all of these tiny things that make a record sound incredible. (awful mastering of this album is a whole different topic and has nothing to do with these guys’ craft)