How to tune a sitar, string by string
A sitar has two kinds of strings, and they're tuned for different reasons. The seven playing strings are tuned to a fixed pattern around your tonic, Sa, and stay that way. The eleven to thirteen sympathetic strings (the taraf) are retuned to the notes of each raga you play. Get the first group right once and it mostly holds; the second group is the one you'll keep coming back to.
The tuner below is the one from Sitarpedia's Practice page. It listens through your microphone, and in String by string mode it walks you through every string on this page in order.
Loading tuner…
Before you start
- Pick your Sa. Hindustani music has no fixed concert pitch. Sitars are usually tuned with Sa somewhere between C and D; C# is common and is what the table below uses. Choose a Sa your instrument is comfortable at and stick with it, so the strings settle.
- Quiet room, one string at a time. Pluck firmly and let the string ring. Damp the others with your hand so the tuner hears one note.
- Coarse with the pegs, fine with the beads. The wooden pegs (khunti) at the head do the big moves — turn them while pressing gently inward so they grip. The small beads (manka) on the main strings near the bottom of the gourd slide a little along the string for the last few cents.
The seven playing strings
This is the most common layout, the one associated with Ravi Shankar and used on most sitars with bass strings. Sa = C# here:
| # | String | Tuned to | Note (Sa = C#) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Baj tar (main melody string) | Ma, middle octave | F# |
| 2 | Jor | Sa, middle octave | C# |
| 3 | Pancham | Pa, lower octave | G# |
| 4 | Kharaj | Sa, lower octave | C# |
| 5 | Pancham chikari | Pa, middle octave | G# |
| 6 | Badi chikari | Sa, upper octave | C# |
| 7 | Chhoti chikari | Sa, two octaves up | C# |
Notice that everything except the main string is Sa or Pa. The main string sits on Ma, a fourth above Sa, which is why the melody you fret on it never clashes with the drone around it.
The order that works:
- Jor (2) to Sa with the tuner. This is your reference for everything else.
- Kharaj (4) an octave below the jor. Pluck them together: when they're in tune the beating — the slow "wah-wah" between two close notes — stops.
- Pancham (3) to Pa below. Check it against the kharaj; a pure fifth sounds open and still.
- Baj tar (1) to Ma. Then fret Sa on it and compare with the open jor — they should match exactly. This check matters more than the tuner reading, because it's the note you'll play on most.
- The three chikari (5–7), the short strings at the side: Pa, then Sa, then high Sa. Strum all three together with the jor; it should sound like one ringing chord, not three notes.
Go back over the set once more. Bringing one string up to tension pulls the neck very slightly and lets the others down, so a second pass is normal, and on new strings a third is too.
If your sitar has no bass strings (a Vilayat Khan style instrument), it uses a different layout and the main string, jor and chikari are tuned to match it — ask whoever set the instrument up for the pattern, and use the tuner's Any note mode.
The sympathetic strings (taraf)
The taraf run under the frets and are never plucked while you play. They ring on their own when you play a note they're tuned to, which is the sitar's shimmer. So they're tuned to the raga's own notes, roughly from Sa upward into the next octave.
For Yaman, with its raised Ma, that's Sa Re Ga tivra-Ma Pa Dha Ni and on up. For Bhairav the same strings move: Re and Dha drop to komal, and Ma comes back to shuddha. Choose a raga in the Taraf for menu above and the tuner lists the target for each of the twelve taraf it tunes.
How to tune them:
- The taraf pegs run down the side of the neck. Pluck each taraf gently with a fingernail near the lower bridge.
- Tune it with the tuner, lowest first.
- Then do the sympathy check, which is how players actually confirm a taraf: play that note on the main string and listen for its taraf to bloom underneath. A taraf that's slightly off stays quiet. When it's right, you'll hear it ring after you stop the main string.
Retune the taraf whenever you change raga. A taraf set for Yaman will hum against a Bhairav phrase instead of supporting it.
Why it won't stay in tune
- New strings stretch. Expect to retune every session for the first week or two. The restringing guide covers how to settle them faster.
- The room changed. Humidity and temperature move a wooden neck. Tune where you play, after the instrument has been out of its case for a few minutes.
- A peg is slipping. If one string drops every time, the peg needs fitting — the maintenance guide says when that's a job for a technician.
Tune by ear, eventually
The tuner gets you to the right notes; your ear keeps you there. Tick Tune by ear first in the tuner and it will play the target, ask you to hum it, then let you decide whether your string is lower or higher before showing the reading. A few weeks of that and you'll hear a string drift before any tuner tells you.