The guitar is a 6 stringed, or double 12 stringed instrument, duh. It once was open necked, but now almost all guitars have "frets", raised contacts that afford an exact tuning and measured expression. The first string is standardly set as an E, with the first five frets being E, F, F sharp (#), G, G# and A, which is the setting of the second string. A, A#, B, C, C# and D, with D being the third string, G being the forth, B the fifth and back to E as the sixth. Every sharp is a black key on the piano, and full keys are the white keys. 5 sharps or 5 flats to each octave. From the first to the third E are 24 half tone, and this is where most chords and melody notes are found.
D tuning, is when you take the first E note, a full tone down, but this is as low as guitars go. The bass guitar; bigger, longer, larger strings has lower resonance. The standup and electric bass are tuned so that the first five frets are aligned with the bass, treble signature of the full musical arrangement. the sixth string typically has an additional 12 to 15 additional half tones with these and 5th string being the major playground for lead guitar riff's.
A full piano will have 88 half tones (combined white and black keys), and the low end and upper ends are well below and above the average singer's range. Most people have a vocal range of less than two octaves, most singer's have three octaves, with a few special people like Julie Andrews and Paul Robison being credited with five octave ranges.
This is a simple explanation of the instrument, it's natural alignment with the circle of fifths theory of western music, and its limited singing range, the guitar can be a simple instrument full of surprises and an excellent friend and companion.
Next blog will go over four basic chord patterns, how they show up on sheet music, and how to take a standard sheet music and transpose chording as you read along. You need to know 7 letters of the alphabet, they repeat, sharp and flat (b) signatures, and the rest of the signatures will be left for later. Stay tuned to the blogs, and soon, we can have lesson'
s via zoom.
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