Estimated reading time 4 minutes
Table of Contents
Introduction
Do you like how Hawaiian music sounds? Do you feel frustrated that you can’t capture that sound yourself? Your tuning effects how the guitar sounds. Read more to learn how to tune C wahine like a Hawaiian.
In Tune Your Guitar Like a Hawaiian we discussed how Hawaiian slack key guitar draws its sound from the player’s tuning. Specifically, slack key players will get into alternate tunings by strumming the open strings while turning the pegs. However, they don’t compare fretted unison notes with the open strings as they adjust the machine heads.
When you get into standard tuning using unison notes, the frets push the guitar into equal temperament (ET). This means that C wahine will have a different sound than standard tuning, because the notes fall outside ET. For full details, you can review these posts:
In today’s post, we’ll look at tuning up C wahine.
(This article uses musical terms. For definitions, see the Glossary at the end of the post.)
How to Tune C Wahine Like a Hawaiian: Tuning up
Tuning by Ear
Mobile users: for best results reading the music, tilt your screen 90o to the right.
- Our first example for How to Tune C Wahine Like a Hawaiian comes from Keola Beamer and Mark Nelson. I pulled the cent values in the table above from the CD tuning track for the lesson book Learn to Play Hawaiian Slack-Key Guitar. (For an explanation of cents, click here.)
- The second example comes from the tuning track for Keola Beamer Teaches Hawaiian Slack Key Guitar. First off, you can see that the two charts above have different cent values. This means that when a guitarist gets into an alternate tuning without using frets, the results will be different each time. Nonetheless, despite some differences, the two charts show that the two C wahine tuning tracks have a lot of similar cent values.
- Beamer has given us no specific instructions on how to get into C wahine. However, he gets into F wahine by strumming the open strings while tuning. This is a common way to get into alternate tunings, so he probably does that for C wahine as well.
- Are you new to tuning alternate tunings by ear without using frets? I suggest you try out some of the alternate tunings from Tune Your Guitar Like a Hawaiian before tuning C wahine by ear. Click here to read the post. Once you’ve mastered those tunings you should be well prepared to tackle tuning C wahine by ear.
Turbo Tuner
It will be easy to tune C wahine like a Hawaiian if you use a strobe tuner to grease the wheels. In How to Use an Extremely Accurate Guitar Strobe Tuner we discussed using electronic tuners to micro adjust tunings. This means you can use a strobe tuner, such as the Turbo Tuner ST-300, to get into C wahine.
If you use the Turbo Tuner for C wahine #1, adjust the machine heads until the ST-300 reads as:
1st String = -4 cents
2nd String = -1 cent
3rd String = -7 cents
4th String = -4 cents
5th String = 0 cents
6th String = 0 cents
For C wahine #2:
1st String = +1 cent
2nd String = -2 cents
3rd String = +1 cent
4th String = -3 cents
5th String = 0 cents
6th String = +7 cents
Try both versions of C wahine and see which you like best.
In addition, your strings will also impact the sound of your guitar in C wahine. According to Beamer, “It may be a good idea to string your bottom string with a slightly heavier gauge string if you experience buzzing. Be sure to recheck your tunings often; the strings may retain some memory of their former pitches and go out of tune” (Beamer and Nelson 72).
How to Tune C Wahine Like a Hawaiian: The Videos
Once you’ve learned how to tune C wahine like a Hawaiian, you’ll want to play something in the tuning. In the first video, Jeff Peterson teaches you how to play his arrangement of Koke’e (by Dennis Kamakahi) in C wahine.
Keola Beamer states, “One of the secrets to great slack key tone is to play out of chord positions rather than moving your fingers for each and every note” (Beamer and Nelson 50).
You can see this in Jeff Peterson’s arrangement. Moreover, this relates to the parallel chord voicings you find in many alternate-tuning-based styles. For more info:
The second video has a performance of Auntie Alice Slack Key (Ka Manu). I got the cent values for C wahine from Keola Beamer’s tuning tracks. Therefore, it only seems fitting that we should also include a C wahine song written by Beamer (performed by Terry Liberty).
Jeff Peterson C Wahine Video
Keola’s Beamer’s Auntie Alice Slack Key Video
Concluding Thoughts on How to Tune C Wahine Like a Hawaiian
How does it impact your guitar sound when you tune C wahine like a Hawaiian?
- Beamer asserts, “There’s this beautiful stuff, sympathetic vibration… In a nutshell, that means we take that guitar and we pluck one string and the rest of them sing along.
- “We’re not touching them, we’re not activating the string, we’re not playing it. But the pressure of the air vibrating around the string generates movement so the entire instrument sings with each note.
- “Now that is magnified in these tunings we use. It becomes a more active instrument because of the mathematical relationships of the chord…” (Beamer and Nelson 70).
The guitar’s tuning has a pivotal role in the sound of Hawaiian guitar. When you’ve tuned your guitar like Beamer and the other Hawaiians, it can help you achieve the sound of Hawaiian slack key guitar.
© 2022 Geoffrey Keith
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