Any tips on how to tune the guitar to match your voice?

[Crawldaddy]

Or train up your vocal range

Hmm.

(to thread starter) ESPECIALLY if you intend to do Led Zeppelin. I myself trained my vocals and guitar skills just by learning 'stairway to heaven'. I have to admit that I might not be of the same calibre of robert plant, but hey... there's no shame in singing a song the way you wanna sing it.. be it an octave lower.

Look at Johnny Cash. His baritone vocal has been applied to so many of his own songs and covers but they still carry the original essense with the addition of his own character.

Have to compromise. No such thing as a short cut or an easy way out man.

 

[zenguan88]

y do u transpose its only when you cannot sing the key in that range.

if you want to transpose lets say for eg the fella in the ablum is singing a C as his highest note and u can only reach a B .

which means you have to transpose a semitone down. so whateva chord that you play for eg C A F D E u have to play B G# E C# D# . if you cannot hit a C and you don wanna transpose theres no way you can sing and play the song unless you increase ur vocal range. transposing is used when someone espically a vocalist couldnt reach his notes.

another usage of transposing is to bring out a chorus like say during the end. it will gives emphasis on it and also create an impact on the song.

so the best way is to get to know ur chords well so that you will be able to transpose better as and well to suit ur singing.

what i advice you to do is to read up on chords. basic chords . in the end its experience which will lead you to transposing at ease and also which key to transpose to. hope you take this post as an advice to help you .

secondly i don advise you tuning ur guitar like guns and roses thats because if you tune it to a semitone down the chords ur playing will be different . what i mean is the usual C chord that you play is going to be a B chord instead unless you are really familiar with the frets and everything thast goes around it den you might consider tuning ur guitar down a tone for a song or smething.

thats what i thought

 

[thor666]

I don't think there's any magic to it other than transposing or using a capo. I'm fairly certain there are other solutions, but transposing/using a capo seems to be the most straightforward options.

 

[MadWerewolfBoy]

if u are refering to using open strings or open chords, yes tune down u must...

the main reason is because u wanna hit the bass root or u need to play a open 6th string... for normal gauge, u can down tune ur whole guitar by a whole step... then the strings start to lose significant tension...

if u needa go lower, u gotta buy higher gauge strings...

however, if lets say u needa down tune like, 3 or 4 steps... then i suggest u do not but an ultra high gauge string and tune down 3 or 4 steps but instead, use a capo on the 5th+ fret and play the exact same thing (1 octave higher)...

unless all ur songs require u to down tune, i don't suggest doing it... cuz it'll get messy if u want to tune it up to normal again if u use high gauges...

get a capo and transpose ur open chords... so capo + traspose works better than heavy down tuning... get a bassist to do the bass parts..

 

[NabilFitriMusic]

If you use Capo, the frets willl become smaller. But are you using it to Strumming or plucking? Coz i use capo to strumming. Meaning i use chords which takes only 1-4 frets. So even if i capo on 10, there will be no problem.. = )

 

[theunknown]

four ways i know

capo: if you wanna go high, raise it up. easy and convenient, u get to play the same chords shapes, only higher.

tune the guitar itself: troublesome if you have a variety of songs to play in different keys. say, you wanna go high on song A but low on song B, u have to tune in between songs. good if you're consistently playing in that key.

transpose: easy unless you have been studying a song with all your heart and sure will cock up if play in different chords.

play power chords!: very easy to transpose. lol

 

[logicdroid]

Dude/dudess, sing the song in all 11 semi tones, find your bloody comfort zone and off you go. Your guitar skills and voice would probably improve along the way. This is so annoying.

Songs are composed in certain keys with certain instruments to get the best out of a singer's voice. If you don't got it, best is to get someone to help you or, live with your voice.

Not sorry for being harsh, it's just the way it is.

If all the world's a short cut like that, there'll be no legends.

 

[dmateo]

I normally just play it with whatever that suits my voice.
If I can't reach it I can always go one octave (not sure if the spelling is correct) lower.. I can't scream like Celine dion or paparoti no matter how I tried.

Another way, play with bare cord and then transpose. You can imagine something like A = 5th fret and then just move it a long and the rest of the key follow. My lame definition of transpose..:mrgreen: