>> A mechanical tuner is going to be
a great friend to you as you learn to play the guitar.
This tool will allow you to stay in tune no matter what the situation.
Here's how it works.
There's a lot of different types of this and they basically work in the same way.
There's an on button usually right on the center or on the side, and you'll hit that.
You'll see an indication that it's on, it'll light up.
Then you're going to take the tuner and you're going to clip
it on to this part of your guitar,
which is called the head of the guitar.
Because it's clipped here,
it's going to work on the vibration of the string as you hit it.
You don't have to be plugged in, if you're an electric guitar player.
That's what makes this great.
You could be in your living room with a lot of people talking,
it could be backstage, at a club,
anywhere you are, this is going to work.
The next step is you're going to play each string individually.
I'm going to start here.
This is the lower string,
this is the E string.
What we're looking for is the letter E to pop up.
[MUSIC] You'll see that there's a pattern on each type of tuner.
When the letter comes up,
the letter that last the longest,
that's the note that you're playing.
That's the one you're looking for,
and you want the pattern to be consistent.
Different tuners may indicate differently when you're in tune or out of tune.
There may be different colors,
it may show it on different sides.
It's really important to read the little booklet that comes
with your tuner and it'll tell you exactly what to expect.
If you need to make the string tighter,
if you need the note to go up,
you turn your tuning peg towards the top of your guitar.
If you need the note to go lower,
you turn it towards this part,
the body of the guitar.
What I'm going to do is I'm going to make the string too low on purpose.
I'm going to turn it down. You can see what happens.
[MUSIC] You'll see that the lights on this one are low,
they're beneath the letter and that means you have to go up just a little bit.
[MUSIC] Now it's right in the center of the design. Now we're in tune.
If I was too high,
[MUSIC] you'll see the lights
on top of the letter and that means I have to come down by tuning it this way.
[MUSIC] There it's in the center.
For each one, here's the A string.
[MUSIC] You'll see that's right in the center, so we're good.
Here's the D string.
[MUSIC] Once in awhile
like that you'll see a different note flash and that's
because of the way the guitar resonates when you hit the strings.
Sometimes other notes are included in that overall note.
But again, you're looking for the one that stays the most consistent.
That's the note that you're on.
Here's the string called G,
[MUSIC] right in the center.
Here's the B string, the second string,
[MUSIC] right in the center.
The last string is also called E. [MUSIC]
One important tip to remember is that you'll notice that I'm not
turning the pegs very much when I'm turning them.
Especially when you turn them tighter,
you don't want to turn too much or that could break your string.
You want to go nice and slow, nice and easy,
and just watch for the note you're looking for.
We'll go through this as the class progresses.
You'll know, you'll remember,
you'll memorize what the names of
the strings are and then you'll know what to look for here.
When you're done, you're going to take it off.
In some tuners, when you flip it down,
it automatically turns off.
While this one is set to turn off in 10 minutes so that the battery doesn't run out,
I always make sure to hit that button though just in case.
Then you'll see an indication,
some lights will flash and it'll tell you that it's turned off.
There's generally a little light right on the bottom
of your screen that will let you know if it's on or off,
so you don't run out of battery.
These are the little round batteries you can get.
I would grab a few of them and just throw them in your guitar case.
This is a tool I think you should get and
it'll take you through a lot of great playing opportunities.