The Self-Tuning Guitar 512
CowboyRobot writes "With the TransPerformance Performer you push a button to activate a mechanical re-tensioning of the strings to any of a few hundred tunings, 'accurate to within 2 cents over the entire tuning range', in a couple of seconds. They can even refit your existing guitar. There's a long audio interview with Jimmy Page on the site. It's funny to hear him speak."
Even more fabulous (Score:5, Informative)
See this New Scientist article [newscientist.com]
Re:Even more fabulous (Score:4, Insightful)
"From a pragmatic point of view I think it's an absolutely appalling idea. It would put me out of a job," says Martin Surrey, who tunes pianos for the English National Opera company.
No shit, Sherlock.
Welcome to the world of automation. The other 99.9999% of the population has had their work been influenced by it for a couple of decades now.
Re:Even more fabulous (Score:5, Informative)
Alternate tunings are not very widely used today, mainly because it's such a pain in the ass to retune a whole guitar. Some company back in the 80s made a guitar bridge where you could flip switches at the base of each string to change its tuning . . . I think it worked fairly well, but was not widely used. There's also a tuning key that just drops the low E down to D with the flip of a switch . . . that one got used a fair bit.
Re:Even more fabulous (Score:5, Informative)
Alternate tunings is exactly why this is huge for guitarists.
I would never put a device like this on my piano, because manual tuning only needs to be done twice a year, and any professioinal piano tuner worth his wage is also going to check all the pads and maintain the action of the keys for me.
But when I play guitar with my garage band, I mostly play in standard tuning, but switch to open-G for a lot of slide-blues songs. Currently, I do this by having two guitars, so an autotuner that can quickly switch like this is easilly worth the price of a second guitar to somebody like me.
Re:Even more fabulous (Score:4, Informative)
This is sort of like the bridge, and they can also allow you to quickly retune from the Open-G to Open-D tuning.
Bill Keith (http://www.beaconbanjo.com) makes some, and I have a set on my banjo and they're awsome!
Alternate Tunings (Score:5, Informative)
Pragmatically speaking, there are (as far as I'm aware) alternate tunings for pianos, organs, and harpichords which relate to specific musical periods, such as the baroque. Thus, for truly faithful reproduction, you may want to tune to the Werckmeister III scale for performing some baroque pieces. Not to mention the different "pure" tunings for all the major and minor keys.
Re:Alternate Tunings (Score:5, Informative)
Some modern works might call for alternate tuning, I'll leave it to music critics to argue over whether that's being done as a cheap gimmick or not, but otherwise just about all non-tempered keyboard music comes from an era before pianos. If you are enough of a purist to play a re-tuned piano when playing a pre-Bach work, you are probably enough of a purist to play it on a period instrument.
Besides, modern listeners have grown acustomed to the tempered scale. Playing in a "pure" tuning will only impress a handful of snobs.
Re:Alternate Tunings (Score:5, Informative)
AHEM. Your "tempered" scale is the "equally tempered" scale and it's actually only recently (in the history of music) come into vogue. There's a great book called "Temperament: How Music Became a Battleground for the Great Minds of Western Civilization" by Stuart Isacoff. Basically Bach's Well Tempered Klavier is written for "well" tempered pianos, not "equal" (aka modern) temperament. And there are a ton of great keyboard works from that era which call for specific differently tempered tunings.
That said, you're right, most modern music is written for equal temperament. But if pianos were easier to tune to alternate temperaments I'm sure many composers would take advantage of that. Sure some might use it as a gimmick, but most serious piano composers are above gimmicks. And while I like John Cage and other modern radicals, it's not his kind of music that I think would benefit most from a piano that could quickly switch to alternate tunings, but the less experimental modern composers. Keyboard music didn't end when Mozart died.
Re:Alternate Tunings (Score:3, Informative)
"The title J.S. Bach gave to his
Re:Alternate Tunings (Score:3, Insightful)
Blue notes?
Does nobody play the blues anymore?
Wow, a whole genre died and nobody told me.
Re:Even more fabulous (Score:3)
Re:Even more fabulous (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Even more fabulous (Score:3, Informative)
500 watts x 24 hours/day x 30.5 days/month = 366,000 Total Watts
366,000 Total Watts / 1000 watts = 366 kilowatts
366 kWh x 7/kWh = $25.62/month; $307/year .
I can't wait... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:I can't wait... (Score:5, Informative)
"Tuning" on a car, as in a "tune up," refers to the adjustment of the fuel and ignition systems to provide maximum efficiency. On mechanical cars, this meant adjusting the carburetor, adjusting the timing, adjusting the ignition points and condensor, etc.
All of these parts are computer controlled, and have been since fuel injection became popular around, well, some time between 1980 and 1990. It's even more efficient that way. And the computer is auto-adjusting -- it senses microscopic knocks and adjusts the mix on the fly. When a computer part fails, it fails obviously, unlike the gradual loss of power you face with a carburetor. I had my Ignition Control Module go on me two weeks ago and it was OBVIOUS...one cylinder just stopped firing (ouch).
So yeah, cars are self tuning. In fact, anybody in the past 10 years who's sold you a "tune up" either did nothing at all to your car, or checked a lot of other things that had nothing to do with what we called a "tune up" before the 80s.
Re:I can't wait... (Score:2)
Someone gonna hop on that patent?
Re:I can't wait... (Score:3, Informative)
Check it out: ATI Overdrive [ati.com]
Re:I can't wait... (Score:3, Informative)
Sweetness... (Score:5, Funny)
I have the fealing that most guitarists use the F just to stop me from trying to learn the song.
--Turvey
Re:Sweetness... (Score:2)
Of course, since re-tuning is now possible in very short time, you could just tune all the strings up a half tone when you need an F, fret an E and tune the strings back down when you're done with it.
Re:Sweetness... (Score:3, Insightful)
To the original poster
Re:Sweetness... (Score:4, Funny)
Remember kids, there is no money in the first five frets! :)
Re:Sweetness... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Sweetness... (Score:3, Insightful)
Maybe you should consider PRACTICING a little bit instead of looking to technology to make you a rock star.
If automation is really the way you want to go, there are even better [fisher-price.com] guitars out there with your name on them. They don't stop at a mere F chord, they'll play the whole damn song for you! Rock star in a box!
But really, is an F honestly that hard to play? ;-)
Re:Sweetness... (Score:5, Insightful)
Roadies (Score:5, Funny)
No more tuning the guitars.
Sucks to be them.
Guess its mic checks from here on out. Sorry fellas.
Re:Roadies (Score:5, Funny)
but mic checks are so much more rewarding:
(big festival, crowd waiting for next band)
Roadie: Microphone check
Roadie:
Crowd: ONE, TWO!
Roadie: CHECK, CHECK, ONE, TWO!
Crowd: CHECK, CHECK, ONE, TWO!
(Singer enters the stage, hugs roadie)
Singer: That nice guy is Jimmy. Everybody say "Fuck you, Jimmy"!
Crowd: Fuck you, Jimmy!
ahh, the sweet memories
Re:Roadies (Score:4, Funny)
Reminds me of an old joke:
Q: Why do sound technicians only count to two?A: Because if they could count to three, they'd be lighting technicians.
Nathan
Re:Roadies (Score:2, Funny)
Cool, but... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Cool, but... (Score:2)
That would bring new meaning to the term "Chorded Keyboard".
Re:Cool, but... (Score:5, Funny)
vocalists (Score:5, Funny)
Re:vocalists (Score:5, Informative)
Re:vocalists (Score:4, Informative)
It was also used by Pink in the song "Get the party started". If you listen to the track, the metallicy bit was produced using Autotune.
(fact courtsey of the Science Museum, London)
Re:vocalists (Score:3, Insightful)
Should everything be live, off-the-floor, with a pair of large diaphragm mics (stereo), running into a 2-track?
What about drum loops? Can they be "trusted"? What if said loops are sampled as opposed to composed?
Or delay pedals? How about live-built guitar loops? Or a lead singer doing his own backup vocals? Is it ok to mic an accoustic guitar at the sound hole, AND at the base of the neck? How about something as simple as an EQ? Or reverb that DOESN'T come from a 30 foot tall, rock-l
Re:vocalists (Score:3, Insightful)
Look at it this way. Rush recorded "La Villa Strangiato" (a 9-minute masturbatory instrumental that goes through a bunch of time signatures, if you're not familiar with the song) in one take, live, with no overdubbing or editing. They had it all together and knew what they were going to do well before the tape got rolling.
Today, they would probably record one part at a time and an engineer would cut and paste it together and smooth out the transitions with a plugin.
It's hard
I wonder... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:I wonder... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:I wonder... (Score:4, Funny)
Ironically, they were going out of style!
--RJ
Re:I wonder... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:I wonder... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I wonder... (Score:3, Insightful)
- Electric tuners do not sit next to your amp and you can use them without anyone in the audience noticing.
- If you turn your guitar/amp down so the audience doesn't hear it, you probably won't hear it either. Do you know how the sound is wired at a gig?
- Re-tuning a string or two doesn't mean that you won't go out of tune with your other bandmates.
- Many professional players DO have tuners and use the
Re:I wonder... (Score:4, Funny)
You can even do this while you're talking, chewing gum, or arguing about which song to play next.
Tuning by eye, however, is something else entirely. It is an obscure talent that I've only seen demonstrated once. The guy played a steel string and he would just hold the where he could see it from the front and then turn all the knobs. When he was done, he'd announce, "That looks about right," and then hold up the guitar for the audience to inspect it. He was good, too -- the guitar was always in tune.
(It was an act of misdirection while he used his footpedal tuner. It got a great reaction from the crowd.)
Re:I wonder... (Score:4, Insightful)
Tuning is a science, not an art. Either the guitar is in tune, or it's not. If it's not, it sounds wrong. An out of tune guitar sounds bad, period. The only issue I can see, is if the tuning mechanism affects the tone, but this is unlikely, if they've designed it properly.
Can a computer really tune to the level that they can hear it needs to be tuned to for them?
I'll wager a computer can tune a lot better than most guitarists.
Re:I wonder... (Score:3, Informative)
Before you say tuning is a science you need to learn something about tuning. The correct tuning is NOT based on math, where you have A at 440 double it for the next A, and then divide that interval into 12 and put each note in its place based on the division. Well it is, we call it standard temperment (or even temperment), and it is the most common temperment in use today. However Standard temperment is always wrong. We use it because it sounds okay everywhere and we have trained our ears to accept i
Re:I wonder... (Score:3, Interesting)
Personally I use a tuner about once every couple years... and usually just prove to myself that I don't need it. If you use the harmin
Not true ... tuning is part science, part art (Score:4, Informative)
The most common scheme today is "Equal Tempering", in which every half-step is a multiple of 2^(1/12) above its neighbor. In this scheme, C# and Db (for example) are considered the same note, whereas in other schemes, they are not. The upside of this is that all keys sound equally "in tune"; the downside is that no key sounds perfectly in tune.
Historical note: some early Klaviers had seperate keys for sharps and flats, since those notes were not considered to be the same.
So, the "science" part of tuning is what you see in the autotuner. The "art" part is tuning the instrument to make the music sound like you hear it in your head.
Bottom line: if a guitarist tunes all of its open strings to a piano, it will not sound "in tune" to the guitarist. Of course, an autotuner can presumably be customized to taste.
Re:I wonder... (Score:2)
After a day or two, the strings have already settled and can stay in tune for a little while longer.
Jimmy Page (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Jimmy Page (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Jimmy Page (Score:5, Funny)
"You can see everything from here! There's Big Ben, there's Picadilly Circus, and there's Jimmy Page, the greatest thief of American Black Music who ever lived!"
Re:Jimmy Page (Score:2)
Re:Jimmy Page (Score:3, Insightful)
Jimmy Page is an amazing guitar player.
-Steve
-----
This Sig best viewed in a drunken stupor.
Worried (Score:5, Funny)
"But will it auto tuna fish ?" (Score:5, Funny)
Cool, but (Score:5, Insightful)
That being said, since I *can* tune by ear, I probably wouldn't mind the convenience of being able to 'dial in' whatever tuning I want.
Let's just make sure that newbs learn things right before you let them have one of these
Re:Cool, but (Score:3, Insightful)
I agree that developing a good ear is important, but when you're paying huge $$$ for the rehearsal room, or have 300 people listening to you, you don't want to spend half of your time tuning your guitar. It's something all gui
Re:Cool, but (Score:2, Funny)
Just what we need (Score:5, Insightful)
But then I remembered I fellow I used to play with who was enamoured with oddball tunings. I would have loved to get him one of these, because he had to change tunings so often that the audience would get bored in between songs. Wouldn't have been so bad if the guy had had a pesonality to keep them entertained with
Hmmm (Score:5, Funny)
Believe it or not, it's neither a typo nor a joke (Score:3, Informative)
It gets better... (Score:4, Informative)
Professionals only, please (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Professionals only, please (Score:2)
Would a professional want a computer tuning his guitar for him, or would he be so paticular that he would want to do it himself?
Re:Professionals only, please (Score:5, Interesting)
I think a lot of guitarists think of tuning as an annoyance, much like setting up amps and monitors. That being said, it's still cheaper and more efficient to buy 4 guitars for a thousand dollars each and have them tuned up for different songs than to spend 4000 on retrofitting a one thousand dollar guitar unless you change tunings during the song.
As anyone who has seen Jimmy Page live in the last 8 years or so can tell you, he uses the auto-tuner to change tunings in the middle of the song and even uses contant tuning changing as an "effect". Some of his effects would be otherwise impossible to create live.
Re:Professionals only, please (Score:2)
Bang goes most of the /. crowd.
I mean, they don't bang...Damn.
Accurate within two cents? (Score:3, Insightful)
Besides, who would want that big nasty thing on a Beautiful Taylor, Les Paul, or Strat? Its a cool toy, but I don't see much use for performers.
Time to move on (Score:2, Funny)
Kind of interesting (Score:3, Interesting)
Well, perhaps as the strings age the guitar can compensate for that I suppose...but I use Elixers on my Martin and they last a good month before they need changing.
Ah, also forgot, if you're into alternate tunings this would be a quick way to switch them around without having 5 different guitars all tuned differently.
Also, in case you haven't check it out yet, go buy the Led Zeppelin DVD that was released last year. You'll see why Zeppelin ruled the stage in their day. Much better than the lack-luster "Song Remains the Same" performance we were stuck with for so long. I actually saw them in concert in May of 1977 in Maryland, and they were MUCH better than that movie. This new DVD shows this, and without all the silly acting parts (remember Jimmy Page's eyes glowing red?).
Re:Kind of interesting (Score:2)
Re:Kind of interesting (Score:5, Informative)
The tuning of your guitar depends on many factors, and only one of them is the quality of the guitar. For example:
- How often and how hard you bend
- How hard you bang your guitar while you play (blues vs. punk)
- The gauge of the strings
- How fresh/old the strings are
- Use a tremolo/whammy bar? Things go way out of tune with those.
- Retune your guitar often for alternate tunings? This can also affect the stability of the strings
- Alternative playing methods, a la Sonic Youth (playing with drumsticks etc)
For some people, it is easy to stay in tune. For others, tuning between each song is a must, even with really good equipment.
Bridge (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Bridge (Score:2)
"My action is 1 inch, but the guitar is in perfect tune!!!"
Re:Bridge (Score:3, Insightful)
(*)action: Shortest distance from the strings to the fingerboard.
Re:Bridge (Score:3, Informative)
In other news (Score:2, Funny)
Cannot tune by machine alone (Score:4, Informative)
The human ear has a problem with "b". Even though the tuner may say it is perfectly in tune a simple "D" chord will sound awful.
Compensating bridges make up for this intonation problem but it is still not exact.
Automatic tuners may look cool but will go the way of locking nuts. Remember those locking nuts and big ass whammy bars forced on us by Eddie VanHalen in the 80's?
Yes, I DO remember.... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Cannot tune by machine alone (Score:3, Interesting)
It's all about equal temperament not matching the notes one really wants to use. Good guitarrists compensate slightly by stretching strings just a bit, but it still can't match the flexibility
i teach bass.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:i teach bass.... (Score:3, Interesting)
Now when I hear pop songs I can determine every bass note played without having to have a bass in my hands. I can then go and play the song (not perfectly, practice is _always_ necessary
Seems interesting... but... (Score:3, Interesting)
This seems like a cool thing, but all it all I doubt seriously it'll catch on. Plus, I can't can't see anyone who can afford a $2k(US)+ guitar taking a chance at killing its resale value by doing this mod.
From their FAQ: Some wood is removed and replaced with the computer and mechanical device.
These aren't new (Score:2, Informative)
People... (Score:5, Insightful)
It's for professionals, who want to expand their sound by being able to change tuning midsong and at a rate of a tone a second, so that you can get effects and changes in sound that are impossible on a normal guitar tuning headstock (believe me, I just tried to emulate this video with my guitar: http://www.selftuning.com/video/video.html )
I think the price tag of 3300$-3899$ says it all really.
Re:People... (Score:3, Interesting)
It's not impossible, just really really hard. I saw Adrian Legg open for 3G, he would hit a note and while it's ringing, change the tuning of his guitar. The result is what sounds like an impossible bend on an acoustic guitar.
Bluetooth support? (Score:2)
Stavinsky's comments... (Score:2, Funny)
"Harpists spend 90 percent of their lives tuning their harps, and 10 percent playing out of tune".
butterface guitar (Score:3, Insightful)
I like the idea of having embedded electronics in guitars, but when you get down to it, it's a really dumb idea. A guitar is a musical instrument, that can be played for years and years. A circuit board will be obsolete by next christmas.... why would you want to disgrace a 3,000$ guitar with some cheap silicon junk? Let the effects processors do the processing and tuning, and the guitar just play the damn music.
Tea Party (Score:3, Informative)
Check out this [www.exn.ca], from the Discovery Channel (.ca) ("Jeff Martin on 'smart guitars'").
S
Also done on Tympani... perhaps... (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm not sure how far he got with the project.
Actually, I should probably call him a percussionist
Sorry for the rant, but really!!! (Score:3)
What ever happened to talent and skill?
Re:Sorry for the rant, but really!!! (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm reasonably sure that Jimmy Page knows how to tune a guitar.
Don't fall for it!!!!!!! (Score:5, Funny)
Tips (Score:5, Informative)
Also, there's a handheld tuner that you can buy that physically turns the peg for you, all you do is pluck the string. I'm surprised no one's mentioned it yet, it's been around for over 10 years. The difference is that it only does one string at a time, and you hve to physically hold it in place while you tune.
In the long run, tuning a guitar is not rocket science and keeping your nut in good shape and having a decent set of tuners (even ones on a cheap Fender Squire are pretty good nowadays) will keep you playing alright. This invention is pretty cool for a wow value, but it's like using an Abrahms tank to kill a mosquito. I play several guitars with old-school Bigsby tremolos and I don't have any tuning problems.
Not meant for beginners (Score:3, Insightful)
Very Cool (Score:4, Informative)
IMHO the posts about "ruining the musicians ear" are bogus. If you RTFA you'll see that this gizmo allows the scales to be tempered to suit the musicians taste. You want to modulate the B-string a few hertz flat -- go ahead, that's what a tempered scale is. Besides, you develop a good ear by playing a well-tuned instrument, not by compensating mentally for a discordant mess.
I have a reasonably good ear, and use harmonics when "ear tuning" because they're more accurate than the fret placement (and less subject to the rising tone problems caused by fretting the previous string, which raises it's tone slightly). I'm at least as good as the cheap electronic tuners, but not as good as the higher-end needle-guage based units. Based on the price of this unit, I'm betting it uses a pretty high quality tuner - far better than most guitarists ear! Having strings 1 hertz off doesn't make much difference on a six-string played with high distortion at a rock concert. But on a twelve string, even a small difference between paired strings leads to an unpleasant audible "beating". The same thing happens with classical guitars, where it becomes annoying (usually when lower strings are fretted above the twelvth fret, and sound out of sync with a supposedly identical note played on a higher string).
So, this unit is faster than a human, more accurate than a human, allows complete control over scale tempering, and stores a couple of hundred alternate tunings. It's got me beat hands down, and I suspect that's why professionals are paying nearly 4g to get one!
Guitar Value (Score:3, Interesting)
I'd rather manually tune it than ruin a fine piece of craftmanship with modern technology that isn't worth the bang for the buck.
I'd have trouble even changing the pickups on a Les Paul for fear of devaluing it....
Jimmy Page tuned within 2 cents (Score:4, Funny)
Why? Is he out of tune?
Re:tuning (Score:5, Informative)