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Originally Posted by Chris Fitzgerald Like many, I always tune to the piano or guitar when I'm on a gig - seems silly to tune to reference pitch that may be different from the fixed-pitch instrument on the bandstand. That said, for practice, I'd go with the Dr. Beat, since it has a million and one other uses for practice and also forces you to use your ears when you tune.
This is a tricky subject which has been the topic of more than one thread around here. To recap the fundamental issue (no pun intended):
Tuning a DB is always interesting because it's difficult to hear the lower pitches clearly, and because the "pitch envelope" of the Bass is screwy - sharp at the attack and then lowering slightly as the vibration dies down. When I tune to a tuner, it seems to hear differently than I do, and I always want to retune after one "tune" because a tuner never seems to find that "sweet spot" between the attack and decay that, to me, is where the ever elusive "in tune" place lies. |
agree strongly with this. also, on many basses the tuning is going to move a bit as a bass warms up. tuning a bass with an electronic tuner is asking for trouble. pizzed, the true pitch is all over the place. arco, maybe, but I prefer to use ear and match to whatever reference pitch is avaliable. For jazz, assuming there's a piano, I ask for an A sus chord, and tune all four of my strings 'til they sound sweet against this chord.
Dr Beat and the like are great for practice. Aside from the versatile metronome features, playing scales and arpeggios to a drone is fantastic ear training for intonation. And don't stick with just tonic. try doing scales against a drone on any scale pitch, or even a non-scale pitch.
