I have to admit, I’ve been perplexed. I’m a reasonably smart guy and have a long history with music composition, but this new viola I’m trying to learn how to play has thrown me a curve ball.
The issue has been the high string on the viola, which is the “A” string, and why it has been an octave lower in pitch than I thought it should be. It is typical for a stringed instrument to go up in pitch as you go from the low string to the high string. However, on this viola when tuning it up it would not hold a pitch anywhere above the lower octave-pitched “A” note. I’d twist the tuning peg tighter, but each time I let go of the peg, it would unwind back down in pitch. Fearful of breaking something, I left it at the lower octave pitch assuming it knew something I didn’t.
Violas are definitely much more delicate than guitars and bass guitars with which I’m more accustomed. The immediate thing I noticed when picking it up for the first time was how incredibly light it is. The wood feels like balsa wood – ever have one of those toy balsa wood airplanes with the wind up rubber band propeller? Well, that’s about the feel of the sturdiness this viola has in my hands. And look at that bridge – is it made out of a piece of flattened cork?! No, if I try to keep tuning this “A” string higher, I’m definitely going to break something. I guess this is just a quirk in tuning that violas have?
I continued to be pestered by this quirk, becoming more convinced at what I already knew to be true – this string was supposed to be an octave higher! Tuned to where it was, the string was weak in volume and loose on the fingerboard. My new hypothesis was that the viola I was renting had a broken tuning peg and that I would now need to have it repaired. Somehow, I must have broken it already.
For the last few days I have just avoided practicing on the “A” string altogether and have been transposing any musical pieces that use the “A” string down to the other strings. However, today I finally had some time available and did some research online to figure out this dilemma.
After numerous search results were weeded through, the answer to the tuning problem came from an offhand mention in a tuning video I was watching on YouTube. It was such a quick mention I almost didn’t catch it.
My assumption for using the tuning pegs was simply to turn them, just like you do with a guitar’s tuning pegs. However, the trick is to twist them while pushing in on the peg. This locks the peg in place and keeps it from unwinding from the tension of the string. I tried it and ‘viola’ it worked! I hadn’t broken the viola after all!
Now when I originally tuned the other strings I never applied the push while tuning, so I can speak for why those strings didn’t give me a problem, but at least now I know the fix moving forward.
So now that I finally have the viola tuned up as it should be, I must say that the “A” string really sings! It is very bright and edgy compared to the other more mellow strings. However, the whole instrument sounds louder now with the “A” string properly tuned. Possibly the proper tension on the instrument helps all the strings to resonate?
So how do you tune a viola?
Well, just in case you are interested and have one lying around (of course you do, right?) here’s a quick overview of how I do it. First of all I downloaded Cleartune, a chromatic tuner app, to my iPad. Since I’m already a musician, I have a rack mount tuner in my gear rack, but since the viola is an acoustic instrument, you can’t really plug it in. Hooking up mics just to tune it with the rack mount tuner is too much a pain to do, so the $2.99 I spent on the handy app was well worth it. Just fire up the app and the iPad’s mic feeds the sound of the viola to the tuner for instant feedback.
There’s plenty of free tuner apps out there, but spend the money to get a good chromatic tuner like Cleartune. I find that the Cleartune app performs almost as well as the pro-level tuner I have in my rack that’s a hundred times the retail price of Cleartune.
Start with the lowest string and tune it to “C”, or as close to “C” as you can get with the tuning peg. Remember to push the peg in as you tighten the peg. The tuning pegs, at least on my rented viola, are extremely touchy. It is very hard to get an accurate tuning just using the tuning peg. Once you get close to “C” turn your attention to the fine tuners on the tail piece. Twist is to tighten or loosen the string tension until you get an exact “C” note.
Now do the same technique on the other strings. The next string after “C” will be “G”. The next string after “G” will be “D”. The highest string will be “A”.
Once you have tuned all the strings, make another pass over the strings to fine tune each string again until perfect.
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