Natural harmonics

A bass string can give you notes without pressing a fret at all. These notes are natural harmonics, and they reveal what is inside every note you play.

The harmonic series

A vibrating string does not move in just one way. It vibrates as a whole and, at the same time, in halves, thirds, quarters and so on. The vibration of the whole string is the fundamental; the extra vibrations are overtones. Together they form the harmonic series, and they give the bass its tone.

Playing a natural harmonic

To play a natural harmonic, touch the string lightly, without pressing it down to the fret, directly over a point that divides the string into equal parts. That point is a node. Then pluck. Your finger silences the fundamental, and one harmonic remains.

Touch the string right over the fret wire, not between frets. Frets are counted from the nut, as usual.

Where they are and what they give

The 5th harmonic sits just before frets 4, 9 and 16. The 6th harmonic’s first node is just past fret 3, and its last one, at about 31, is off the fingerboard.

The table works on every string; only the notes change:

• A string: A2, E3, A3, C♯4, E4;
• D string: D3, A3, D4, F♯4, A4;
• G string: G3, D4, G4, B4, D5.

Pure, not tempered

Harmonics give pure intervals, not the equal-tempered ones of your frets (lesson 1.4). The difference is measured in cents: a cent is one hundredth of an equal-tempered half step.

• The 3rd and 6th harmonics, the fifths, are about 2 cents sharp of the equal-tempered note.
• The 5th harmonic, the major third, is about 14 cents flat.

This is why tuning with harmonics is only approximate, as lesson 0.2 warned.