Russian guitar usually differs from the wood in the rest of the neck. The neck joint or heel is the point at which the neck is attached to the body of the guitar. The fingerboard is made of hardwood (ebony or rosewood are common), fitted with metal frets of brass or steel. Fret spacing almost always follows the western twelve tone equal temperament (12-tet) system. The surface of the fingerboard may be flat or curved slightly ("radiused"), although the curve on the Russian guitar is usually somewhat less than that of an equivalent western 6-string guitar. Inlayed position markers are common, and
Guitar However, between the second and third strings, an irregularity occurs: The "4th"-fret note on the third string is equivalent to the open second string. Standard tuning has evolved to provide a good compromise between simple fingering for many chords and the ability to play common scales with reasonable left-hand movement. There are also a variety of commonly used alternative tunings, for example, the classes of "open", "regular", and "dropped" tunings. "Open tuning" refers to a guitar tuned so that strumming the open strings produces a chord, typically a major chord. The base chord consists of at least 3 notes and