Learning Guitar Harmonics – A Professional Guide

You have to know first how the sound of a harmonic Guitar will be. As the player does not press down on a string, the sound produced for a harmonic will be ringing full tone unlike what he or she gets when plucking a note or strumming a chord. There is no sharpness and it will be like a single chime of a doorbell. Hence, the harmonics for Guitar are not used frequently. They are used behind other instruments to add colour. Those who are not familiar with Guitars may not be able to know where the harmonic is coming from as it is an artificial tone.

The location of the Guitar harmonics is specific. The frets for producing Guitar harmonics are the fifth, seventh and twelfth. There are also some harmonics which can be produced by plucking over or near the sound hole.

Touch and timing are most important. To learn how to produce the tone, you should start by using Guitar – tuning harmonics. This does not require a perfect technic but a good ear is enough. Over the twelfth fret, you place your finger over the fret, taking care not to push the string down and as if just your skin touches the string and ten simultaneously pluck the string and remove the finger involving split second – timing. It is really a difficult thing, but if you start learning by Guitar tuning harmonics, you can follow this all the way down the six strings and create single harmonic tones you use to your Guitar.

Artificial harmonics for Guitar can be produced anywhere on the fret board but they are limited in tone and volume. It requires a different technic altogether to produce artificial harmonics. Beginners will find it is very difficult to execute the technic. But learning the true harmonics or the artificial harmonics can be easy with serious and prolonged practice.