For most conventional acoustic and electric guitars, there are six strings. Each string, when strummed or picked openly, releases a unique audio frequency that identifies the note to tuners and, on a more advanced level, the human ear. While there are practically unlimited possibilities in regard to guitar tuning, a large majority of guitarists use one of two tunings, each of which are relative to the standard tuning of a guitar.
Standard tuning is the most popular tuning among acoustic and electric guitar players. On a guitar set in standard tuning, the strings going from bass to treble are E, A, D, G, B and E. Their corresponding Hertz (Hz) frequencies are 82, 110, 147, 196, 247 and 300 Hz. Guitars tuned to standard should be done so using a 440 Hz tuning fork.
E-flat tuning is all strings having their open note values reduced by one half note; the new sequence of notes will now be Eb, G#, C#, F#, Bb and Eb. To a tuning fork set to 440 Hz, the Hz of each note is 77, 103, 138, 185, 233 and 11 Hz.
Drop D Tuning
Drop D tuning refers to all six guitar strings being tuned one full step down. Using a tuning fork of 440 Hz, the frequencies of notes D, G, C, F, A and D, and their corresponding Hz frequencies are 73, 98, 130, 174, 220 and 293.