Dividing
the bass string into 3 equal parts
Now play the harmonic at the 7th fret. What is happening here
is that the string is ringing in 3 equal parts. There are 2 nodes,
one where you touched the string at the 7th fret, and another
at the 19 fret.
If you go to the 19th fret you will notice that the harmonic
is exactly the same at the 7th. After you play the harmonic at
the 7th fret, try touching the string at the 19th fret. You will
notice that nothing happens. This is because the string is not
ringing at that point. But if you touch the string in at any point
other that the 7th or 19th frets, the string will stop ringing.
Watch this video that shows playing the natural harmonics at
the 7th and the 19th frets.
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Dividing
the bass string into 4 equal parts
Next play the harmonic at the 5th fret. In this
case the string is ringing in 4 equal parts. When you played the
harmonics at the 7th and 19th frets, you got the same exact harmonic
at both of these nodes. In this case, only the 5th fret and the
24th fret will sound exactly the same, and the 12th fret will
sound an octave
lower. So even though the 12th fret is a node, and is a part of
the string that is not ringing, you can not get the same harmonic
as the 5th fret to ring there. A little confusing, I know. It
all has to do with physics, and I don't want to get to much into
that in this lesson.
Note that most
bass guitars do not have 24 frets, but the node is where that
fret would be.
| Physics
side note: |
| If you take any string at the same tension,
and make it half the length, you will raise it by one octave.
As you keep dividing the string in half, the next octave up
is a shorter and shorter distance each time. Playing a harmonic
at the 12th fret divides the string in half, so the note that
sounds is an octave higher that the open string. Playing a
harmonic at the 5th or 24th fret divides the string in half
yet again, so the notes sound an octave higher than the 12th
fret harmonic, This is also why the frets get closer together
as you move toward the bridge. It takes less and less distance
to get to the next higher note. |
Page 3, how harmonics work
Page 5, Dividing the bass string
into 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 parts 
|
