New Standard Tuning - History

History

A guitar tuning, the new standard tuning (NST) was introduced by Robert Fripp of King Crimson. Fripp has stated that the original version of NST "flew by" while he was sweating in a sauna in September 1983. Fripp began using the tuning in 1985 before beginning his Guitar Craft seminars, which have taught the tuning to three thousand guitarists.

The tuning is (from low to high): CGDAEG, and can be remembered by the mnemonic "California Guitarists Drop Acid Every Gig", according to the program booklet sold at the UK end of the Double Trio tour of King Crimson. The original version of NST was all fifths tuning. However, in the 1980s, Fripp never attained the all fifth's high B. While he could attain A, the string's lifetime distribution was too short. Experimenting with a G string, Fripp succeeded. "Originally, seen in 5ths. all the way, the top string would not go to B. so, as on a tenor banjo, I adopted an A on the first string. These kept breaking, so G was adopted." In 2012, Fripp suggested that Guitar Circle members experiment with an A String (0.007) from Octave4Plus of Gary Goodman; if successful, the experiment could lead to "the NST 1.2", CGDAE-A, according to Fripp. In 2010, Fripp suggested renaming the tuning as "Guitar Craft Standard Tuning or C Pentatonic tuning".