Tenor tuning survey

[Michael Eck]

OK folks. I'm curious.

Tenor guitars and banjos are commonly tuned three or four different ways -- CGDA, GDAE and Chicago (DGBE). I know there are also a few common modal/open tunings.

i would like to conduct a simple survey.

Which instrument?
-tenor guitar
-tenor banjo
-both

Which tuning?

Style of music?

Here's my response, as a sample:

-tenor guitar and tenor banjo

- currently CGDA and GDAE, although I've used Chicago for solo singing accompaniment.

- jug band (using banjo in GDAE) and folk/old time - songs, not tunes (using tenor guitar in CGDA).

[Ed Goist]

Great thread! Thanks for starting it Michael.

Which instrument?
-tenor guitar
-tenor banjo
-both

Tenor guitar only. (acoustic & electric)

Which tuning?

GDAE, with gauges 42W 30W 20 13.
I also sometimes tune down the high strings one step for Blues slide in (GDGD)

Style of music?

Blues, Classic Rock, Psychedelic.

Michael, I see you play the tenor banjo tuned in octave mandolin GDAE. I find that very interesting...So, my answer to your first question may change at some point!

[Michael Eck]

Ed,

Actually, I currently play tenor banjo in both tunings, Irish for the jug band and CGDA for the duo. I'm sort of waffling between both, which is one of the reasons I'm curious to see folks' responses.

[Ed Goist]

Thanks Michael.
I am a GDAE guy all the way - Having the low G is very important for me, plus I really like having immediate access to everything that is out there in mandolin notation/tab.

[Lulu]

I'm newly obsessed with stringed instruments -- started on a ukulele in January and got my first tenor guitar a month ago. Thus:

Tenor guitar (Blueridge -- bought after reading recommendations here)
DGBE (like a baritone uke)
Beginner's folk, blues, and sing-along with the family stuff

When I first bought my guitar it was tuned CGDA and I learned lots of chords, but had a much harder time finding tabs and instructional material. (I'm learning to read music, but I'm SLOW.) I intend to get a second tenor guitar and try out the DGdg tuning that Mirek Patek recommends and see if I can follow his youtube and written instructions. (I'm open to other suggestions, though!)

[Charles E.]

Tenor Guitars tuned CGDA. Used to play Old time, Swing and Jugband.
Tenor Banjo ( Gibson trapdoor ) tuned CGDA. Used to play Dixiland.
Tenor Banjo (custom by Tim Curren ) tuned GDAE. Used to play Old Time and fiddle tunes.

[Jayyj]

Tenor guitar (electric and acoustic) and viola
Standard tuning for me is BbFCG, alternatively CGCG, CGDG or CGDA with a capo at the second fret
A kind of goth / folk / post-rock sort of affair

[Beanzy]

Tenor Guitar tuned CGDA

Play Bluegrass; American, Irish & English folk and classical (cello pieces on TG)

[Seonachan]

Tenor guitars (acoustic & electric) both currently tuned GDAD - though I have a guitar background, I'm coming to tenor from 3-stringed instruments (strumstick, cigar box guitar) tuned DAD, so GDAD is an easy transition, but I'd like to get into GDAE and CGDA eventually.

I play folk, Gaelic airs, Beatles covers, and whatever else strikes me at the time.

[rico mando]

tenor guitar cgcg usually and sometimes cgda . sometimes I like to tune down to b flat/ f b flat/ f . my electric tenor is gdae but I do not play it a lot

[JeffD]

Sold my tenor guitar. It was CGDA

I play a tenor banjo. CGDA. Old time, Irish, and noodling.

[djweiss]

Tenor Guitars (Acoustic & Electric);
FCGDA and FCGD, relatively speaking;
Country and Swing.

[Mike Snyder]

Tenor banjo and neglecting a good mandolin. GDAE on ITM, contradance stuff and lots and lots of old-time. Got the Orpheum banjo in response to a wanted ad here at the cafe.

[Handy Hummingbird]

Tenor guitar, tunes GDAE/GDAD and used for gypsy jazz, breton dance, bluegrass and irish/folk.

[wistah]

Tenor Banjo tuned CGDA. I play americana folksy stuff.

[ak_hepcat]

Plectrum banjo, CGBD for rag-timey shounding stuff
Mandolin in standard tuning for bluegrass and Irish
Tenor in CGDA (36W 24W 15 9.5) that i'm just starting to learn. Brain keeps shifting up a 5th...
but I'm really interested in using it to play swing/jazz ala Two Man Gentlemen Band

[Michael Eck]

Ah, TMGB is from right across the tracks from me, in Great Barrington, Mass. Fun stuff. I actually picked up an Epiphone archtop tenor (which I'll be putting CGDA) in that town a few weeks ago. There's a plectrum banjo I was looking at more locally but -- fingers crossed -- I may be scoring a National tenor soon (which will also likely go CGDA).

[John Flynn]

- Tenor banjo (although I plan to get a tenor guitar at some point and the answer will be the same)

- GDAE all the way, I'm a creature of habit where that's concerned

- Irish and old-time music

[Pete Martin]

Tenor guitar, CGDA, Texas style fiddle backup.

[Dolamon]

Pete - are any of your many books directly pertinent to CGDa tuning? I know how to convert and shift around on mandolin oriented music but my brain seems to be aging faster than the rest of me ...

Dion - Chicago coming from almost fifteen years of strangling a mandola.

[Paul Merlo]

I've got a tenor guitar and tune it CGDA.
I thought about tuning it GDAE like my mandolin, but I don't play it very often, or with others yet, so I left it CGDA for now.

[Richard Singleton]

Have a sixties Stella by Harmony tenor flattop and tune it CGDA.
My tenor banjo is a 1927 Gretsch Orchestrella tuned GDAE

[germano]

For what it's worth...

I play a Baroque viola, tenor banjo, mandola and cigar box tenor guitar. All in alto clef and all are tuned cgda. If you had such a selection to choose from, it would boggle you to experience that Bach sounds just fine on a tenor banjo, very old-time jazz sounds fabulous on a tenor guiter and any viola music (from exercises to sonatas/concertos) sound wonderful on a mandola. Stick with the same tuning, learn the notes on the fretboard and the world is your oyster...for me anyway, ymmv.

I'm sure this will draw many negative comments but it works for me.

germano
_____

[Martin Jonas]

Tenor guitars (one acoustic and one resonator), both tuned GDAE, used for melody playing of Irish, Scottish, Early Music, Latin, German folk and old-time tunes, and as strummed backing in anything else that catches my fancy.

Martin

[Jayyj]

For what it's worth...

I play a Baroque viola, tenor banjo, mandola and cigar box tenor guitar. All in alto clef and all are tuned cgda. If you had such a selection to choose from, it would boggle you to experience that Bach sounds just fine on a tenor banjo, very old-time jazz sounds fabulous on a tenor guiter and any viola music (from exercises to sonatas/concertos) sound wonderful on a mandola. Stick with the same tuning, learn the notes on the fretboard and the world is your oyster...for me anyway, ymmv.

I'm sure this will draw many negative comments but it works for me.

germano
_____

Ah, this is way too friendly a place for negative comments!

As far as classical music on tenor is concerned, I've spent many an hour over the last year or so working on the Bach D Minor Partita on mandolin - but I can't imagine being able to manage large sections of it on a tenor scale length. Even on viola the chordal parts are too much for me, although I'm assured more talented (or perhaps just larger handed!) violists can turn in a decent version.

Although thinking about it, a tenor in EBGD tuning would be great for Renaissance guitar music...