Octave twelve Octave twelve An octave twelve is a type of 12-string guitar fitted with a short-scale neck and a small solid body. It is tuned one octave higher than a standard guitar giving it the tonal range of a mandolin and enabling a guitarist to achieve a mandolin sound without learning mandolin fingering. The effect is similar to that of capoing a standard 12-string guitar at its twelfth fret. However, unlike a standard 12-string guitar, the courses of strings tuned in unison, rather than in octaves. The octave twelve was invented by engineers at Vox, which sold the octave twelve as
Eight-string guitar slew of new age progressive metal and djent artists. Seeking a guitar tuning that would facilitate jazz improvisation, Ralph Patt invented major-thirds tuning in 1963. Patt's tuning is a regular tuning, in the sense that all of the intervals between its successive open strings are major thirds; in contrast, standard guitar tuning has one major-third amid four fourths. Seven-string guitars are needed for major-thirds tuning to have the E-e' range of the standard tuning. Having an eight-string instrument allowed Patt's guitar to have G (equivalently A) as its open note. Patt purchased six-string archtop hollow-body guitars that were then modified