Why so many older songs aren’t at A440—and how to tune your guitar to play along
If you’ve ever tried jamming with a favorite recording from the 60s, 70s, or 80s and discovered your perfectly tuned guitar suddenly sounds “wrong,” you’re not crazy—and your intonation probably isn’t the culprit. Many older (and even some modern) recordings don’t sit exactly at today’s common standard of A=440 Hz. A chorus might feel slightly sharp, a riff a touch flat, or the whole track may drift over time. The fix is simple: detune (or retune) to the track, not the other way around.
Why the pitch is off in the first place
Tape speed and varispeed. Analog tape machines rarely ran perfectly at spec. Small speed differences shift pitch: a 1% speed error moves pitch by about 17 cents (roughly one-sixth of a semitone), enough to clash with a well-tuned guitar. Engineers also intentionally used varispeed for vibe—brighten a song by running it a little fast (sharper pitch), or deepen it by running slow (flatter).
Vinyl and turntables. Pressing and playback add their own wobble. A turntable that’s off by ~1% (e.g., 33⅓ vs ~33.0 rpm) will shift pitch ~17 cents. Wow and flutter can make the pitch gently drift during sustained notes.
Different reference standards. A=440 Hz became widely adopted only over time. Some orchestras and sessions preferred A=441–445 (a few cents sharp) or A=435 (about 20 cents flat). If a backing track was cut with a non-440 reference, today’s “standard” guitar will feel out.
Edits and tape splices. Comped takes from machines calibrated on different days—or bounced through gear with slightly different speeds—can leave tiny pitch mismatches between sections.
The practical takeaway
When you play along with any recording, the “correct” pitch is whatever the recording says it is. So you either (A) retune your guitar to the track, or (B) shift the track so it matches your guitar. While both are valid, detuning your guitar means that you’ll have to retune it again for the next song you want to play—and this need to constantly detune and retune your guitar is very inconvenient.
Song Surgeon solves this problem. It can automatically detect the tuning of a song, and if incorrect, allows you to “retune” the song to A440 or any other pitch you want or need. The brief video below describes this in more detail.