To try and get the point across about how pinch harmonics work when you are learning to play the guitar, initially How to Learn to Play Guitar Fast will give you a brief introduction to all types of harmonics.

Pinch harmonics can really help you, if you are anything like me and you really want to add some expression to your guitar playing skills. At first though we need to begin by sharing with you some information on how guitar strings actually work.

In a nutshell, a guitar string vibrates between the nut and the bridge. You can see the string vibrating similarly to a sine wave for yourself if you look closely. This explanation and method may not be absolutely technically, perfectly correct, but it works for me.

Naturally occurring harmonics begin just above the fifth fret, the seventh fret and the twelfth fret wires.  If you take a few seconds out in a well lit area, you’ll be able to see the spots where the vibration along the string actually seems to be stopped. Lightly touch a vibrating, ringing guitar string, one of the ones detailed above, with your hand, and you’ll notice that at these points you will get a harmonic natural chime.

Tap harmonics is nothing more than simply fretting a string and moving the natural harmonic spot up accordingly. To give you an example, let’s try this:  Start with a fret of the low E string at the third fret and then pluck the string, your ‘natural harmonics’  would be no longer at the fifth, seventh and twelfth frets.  You would ‘tap’ the string above the eighth, tenth and fifteenth fret wire to sound the harmonic.  This is how tap harmonics got its name.

So let’s explore the nuts and bolts of this a little more deeply, and go into the all-powerful pinch harmonic in a little bit more detail.

In essence, in order to carry out a pinch harmonic, you pinch the string between your pick and the side of your thumb that is holding the pick.

This is the methodology I use to do them, I might add with some awesome success!

When you strike the guitar string, let your thumb ‘sound’ the guitar harmonic that you are looking for. You’ll soon be able to pick up the gist of it for yourself with some practice and a wee bit of trial / error finding the right positions above the pickups.

Possibly one of the most best ways to learn the placement technique is by cranking up the distortion which will make it a whole lot easier to sound them, followed by putting your fret hand on the low E or, for that matter, the A guitar string on the fifth or seventh fret, in the same way as if you were playing the A or D notes.

If you like you could begin with your guitar pick in the center of the neck & bridge pickups and pinch the guitar string, so that when your pick sounds it, your thumb then immediately touches the string.  With a little time and a bit of practice, this should then sound like the pinch harmonic.

To find those perfect sweet locations it might help you if you move your hand slightly lower or higher on the guitar string. You should just keep on trying different areas until you feel that you are getting it just about right and correct for you, the perfect guitar sound that you are searching for.

When you have finally located these sweet spots that give you the perfect guitar sound that you are after, simply make a note of where they are so that you can use this guitar technique to take full advantage of these locations in the future. If you move your fret hand lower or higher on the neck as the case may be, the location points where you can hit the guitar sound harmonics will move slightly.  In time you’ll find out that this falls in line with the way in which a tap harmonic works, and this might be worth keeping in mind for reference in the future.

With further time and practice you’ll be finding more and more of these guitar sweet spots. Eventually you will reach the moment when it will come perfectly natural to you. Then you will be able to experiment at will as you desire.

As every guitar will sound a little different, you can try this same tip on various guitars. Perhaps your friends or family members will let you have a go on theirs and see what guitar tonal differences you can create. It can be a lot of fun, as well as encouraging, if you are in a group of friends learning to play the guitar together.

In that case, you will all discover that different neck lengths, bridge placements, guitar shapes, guitar tolerances and even guitar materials will all produce slightly different and, in some cases, very varied guitar sound effects.

It is really important to remember that it does take time and practice, so just keep at it until you get the sound that you want. That way, before too long, in combination with other guitar learning skills that you are practicing, you’ll be able to create some inspirational guitar tonal sounds and effects.  As with anything new, it can initially seem daunting – it’s just like driving a car or riding a bicycle for the first time. Then suddenly, something will click inside you and you’ll know that you’ve got it – awesome!

When you reach this point, you might want to try with a clean, new sound by adding bends etc. This will increase your guitar sound repertoire exponentially and then the sky’s the limit!

All of us at How to Learn to Play Guitar Fast wish you the very best of luck in trying out your new skills at guitar playing.

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