The British Steelies Society

Hiya fellow steelers,

I was jamming with some friends a couple of weekends ago and I tuned using Pitchlab with a "sweetened" temperament, which works perfectly at home but... but could'nt play in tune with the other instruments!!!

Tried tuning with a regular tuner but it didn't sound "natural" to my ears (especially when using the pedals & levers)... I managed to convince my buddies to tune their instruments to my lower E and that did the trick, but I swear they were almost half a note up, he he.

I'd love to hear tips from seasoned players (currently using the tuning chart from the Jeffran College website and ordered a Strobostomp tuner to stop using my mobile phone).

Steel does not sound 'right' to me unless it is tuned JI sweetened. I use a Sonic Research tuner. I programmed offsets from the Emmons Tuning Charts which sounds sweet but well flat, then experimented with the reference setting and lo & behold ended up setting A=442.5, essentially the same as the Newman Tuning.

Still have to sort out those darn F#s by ear though .

thanks!

Sorry, I did'nt explain myself properly - during the jam I was tuning with my mobile phone (using PitchLab with custom temperament, which makes it sound in tune when playing on my own) and everyone else was tuning using regular tuning pedals. It sounded well off.... They all tuned to my low E and no probs. I ordered the Strobostomp last Friday and is yet to arrive! (considering the price of a regular Boss chromatic tuner that goes for 100 euros it's a great deal, only 130 euros and I can also use it to tune C6 on the wonderful Super Pro I purchased from John as well as my lap steels + guitar, bass, etc.).

However you tweak the other notes (like, in E9th, how many cents flat you tune them) the "E"s have got to be right on - usually the "B"s too. The other notes get "sweetened" to fit in with the "E"s. Because it's an "E" based tuning, all the other strings are tuned from that. So when your guys re-tuned to your "E", it came good.
When you put your bar on the first fret, then it becomes an "F" based tuning but, because you tuned the intervals of the open strings (and the pedals) from one string, all the intervals between strings remain the same, just worked off an "F" note. And so on up the fretboard - F#, G, G#, A etc. etc. so every chord on any fret is ok because the intervals are relative to the same originally tuned string.

Wow Tony, that makes sense. Actually it doesn't but it sure seems like you know your stuff!!!

Just kidding, fantastic explanation Tony, big thank you

John - I did order the StroboPlus HD... muddled up talking about the strobostomp (pedal?). Arrived today with a nice Jack & Danny Mini tele for the holidays, I'll try the Strobowazinga when I get home, thanks a lot for your comments!

I tune the E`s to 442.5 with a tuner the rest by ear ,never have problems. Sounding in tune with the band the duo or my solo gigs



Jimmy.

I use the SE9 tuning from Peterson but find I have to sharpen string 6 (G#) a smidge to ensure A+F chords sound in tune.