The Creation of Harmony

There are certain lessons that stay for life.
My first guitar class more than a decade back happens to be one of them. I couldn't possibly see the beauty and subtlety then, but somehow looking back it's probably one of the best pieces that fit in.

Our Music teacher, Mr. Felix started off...

"Before you play any instrument, its essential that it's in tune.
There is a certain relative tightness of the strings that ends up creating and contributing to the harmony... to what you call music.

First, the primary elements of your guitar that goes into the tuning.
The head-stock which contains the tuners.
The 6 strings that connect the head-stock and the bridge over the sound-hole.
The sound-hole or the heart of the guitar that echoes and reverberates the vibrations of the strings and goes on to produce music.

It may seem a wee bit difficult for you guys to start with, but I swear you'll appreciate and enjoy the music a lot better once you've learnt how to tune them yourselves.
While experienced guitarists can get their instrument tuned without a reference frequency, it is always advisable and in fact necessary for beginners to have a reference note.

The 6th string which is the thickest string is generally used as a reference string as this string does not detune easily. Pluck the sixth string and figure out, how much the note reverberated from the sound-hole deviates from the universally referenced note you want to tune to. To begin with we'll use the commonly referenced E note.
You could use your vocal chords to match the plucked note and see if you have to raise or lower your pitch. Using the tuning screw in the head-stock, either tune it up or down.

Hold down the 5th fret of the 6th string play the open 5th string and tune the 5th string till the notes match. Tune the 4th, 3rd and 1st strings similiarly using the 5th fret of the preceding strings as a reference. For the 2nd string alone, hold down the 4th fret of the 3rd string and match it with the open note of the 2nd string.

It is important to remember that the sixth string forms the best reference for tuning and the other 5 strings may be tuned relative to this.

Also remember that before you tweak the tuning nuts at the head-stock, first listen closely to the notes swaying out from the sound-hole. It's the notes from the sound-hole that truly tell you if you are tuning right to produce the music you want to. Take all your time doing this till you get to master the art of tuning.

Ultimately, the first step in the creation of harmony and the music from your instrument reduces to how well the 6th string is tuned with the reference note and the 5 other strings are tuned relative to each other.

The very first step any good musician must take to produce great music..."