Hi! This is Brandon Sparks, guitar teacher at Rhythm Garden Music Studio (and husband to Miss Morgan). Starting with this post, I’ll be sharing tips, tricks, and useful knowledge pertaining to guitar lessons and music in general. Feel free to leave me feedback if you’d like to see a specific topic covered here in the future.
I’d like to start out this feature by covering a topic that just about every guitarist has wondered about at some point: changing your guitar strings. When do you know it’s time to get rid of the old rusty strings on your guitar and put on a shiny new set? How often should I have to change the strings? What makes guitar strings wear out in the first place? Keep reading to find out.
Changing the strings on your guitar regularly is one of the simplest parts of maintaining your instrument, yet it’s one of the most neglected tasks you’re likely to see among guitarists. It’s important to keep fresh strings on your guitar for a number of reasons. First and foremost, fresh strings sound better than old, worn-out ones – the tone quality of a fresh set of strings will almost always be brighter and richer than that of an old set, which will sound dull and lifeless by comparison. New strings will also be easier to tune and more likely to stay in tune than old strings – the longer a string is stretched out to the full tension required on a guitar neck, the more elasticity it loses, which basically means that it will be harder to get the string to stay at the correct pitch. This loss of tension as a string gets older will also make it more likely to break – and nobody wants to break a guitar string in the middle of a lesson or a jam session.
There are a number of things that contribute to guitar strings going bad. One is the constant amount of tension on the string, mentioned above – the longer a string is stretched out on the guitar neck, the more likely it is to become brittle and break, and the harder it is to keep in tune. Wear and tear from your guitar pick and your fingers – both from finger-picking and from fretting with your left hand – will also contribute to the normal wear on a string. And this isn’t simply from the expected wear of pressing down on the string in the same few places over and over again. The natural oils and sweat that come from human skin has a detrimental effect on guitar strings over time, tarnishing the metal and dulling the tone of the string – so even if you have the lightest touch in the world, your strings will eventually lose their shine and their tone. Finally, the environment the guitar is kept in will affect the life of the strings. If the guitar is kept in an overly humid environment, the strings will be more likely to tarnish and possibly even rust over time as opposed to a reasonably dry (though definitely not too dry) environment.
So is it time for a new set of strings on your guitar? The easiest way to tell is to take a look at them, especially the first and second strings (high E and B). If the metal of the strings is tarnished and black-looking instead of shiny, that’s a good indication that you’re due for a new set. If you’ve been playing guitar for a while and have developed a good ear for your tone, you can also take a listen to your strings to tell if they need to be changed – an old set will be very dull and flat tone-wise, and will be much more likely to have intonation issues. Finally, if you need a new set of strings, but you’ve never changed them yourself before, or simply don’t feel 100% comfortable doing it yourself quite yet, always have an experienced and trustworthy guitar technician change the strings for you – a good guitar tech should have no trouble restringing your instrument and making sure it’s playing at its best.
