DATE: Mon, 30 Nov 1992 17:08:46 CST From: WY~egacy.Calvin.EDU Subject: re mharrison's beginner questions
Hi mharrison, I'm Steve Wykstra. Who are you, really?
By all means, have fun playing around with it. Learning to play tunes intuitively, so you can play regular harp as easy as you can whistle, comes just that way. Bending won't come that way unless you work on it--find someone who can do it, maybe, and get some tips. Each hole bends somewhat differently, and on some harps, some reeds are initially somewhat stiff, and should be broken in gradually. On a C-harp, the number 1 draw hole can be bent from a D to a Db, without as much use of the diaphragm (for a power- vaccuum) as the other holes. Try drawing, and burrowing the tip of your tongue down and backwards, into that fleshy pocket where the base of your tongue connects to the bottom of your mouth. At the same time, draw a bit harder. Tell me if you can't get a real bend that way. On a piano, compare the sound of the bent note to a Db--duplicate that D-to-Db interval on your harp. Get it down a fully semi-tone, all the way to Db, not just part way.
One problem with Gindick is that he is a sloppy bender; he is content to get any bent sound, without really mastering PRECISE bending--or, in his first booklet (the "for the Musically Hopeless" one) even letting the amateur know there is such a thing. I've seen players who've fooled around years who can't bend to a precise note, and don't even know what is available. To me, that is silly, and a degradation of the harp. Can you imagine a sax player or guitarist or pianist not caring about exactly what his axe can do? In a way, harp is TOO easy: you can make music just blowing and sucking, and so never get further, into the inner reaches of the instrument. Knowing exactly what notes are available in each hole, by precision bending, and knowing positions--at least the first five positions--is essential for the serious player, even if you are just going to play hymns in church. This needn't come all at once; but you must keep it on the horizon, know its there, and master the harp with your mind as well as your mouth. It will NOT come JUST by playing around, though that is the essential beginning. My opinion; others have theirs, I guess.
Don't wait til you've mastered Gindick to perfection; Gindick is too imperfect to be mastered to perfection--a one-eyed giant in the valley of the blind. Get more reliable stuff, even if it doesn't fall into place right away: it will give your a horizon to take your bearings from.
4) Do they break? Wear out? How much use do you get out of one? You'll find out.
5) Are any keys prevalent for particular types of music? In blues, an awful lot is in E--perhaps 30-40%; to play this, an A harp is used. You can also play nice blues in E on your C harp, in 5th position; This is really simple, mh, and you shouldn't be daunted by it. It's not, however, the place to begin right now, I'd say. In gospel and hymns, Eb is a very common key.
Here's a good beginning exercise to undauntify the idea of positions. Take your new C harp, and try to find "House of the Rising Son" starting on draw6. The first notes are roughly "There (6draw) is (6draw) a (7draw) house (7blow)" and so on: find it by ear. "House" is a minor key tune, and you are playing it in "4th position," using the mid-upper register of your harp to play the thing in A minor. If it helps, play in on piano, and find the exact same notes on your harp. You can play the Christman hymn "O Come O Come Emmanuel" in the exact same way in A minor, if you know it.
6) Borah Minevich of the Harmonica Rascals: sure we've heard of them. I don't know if they are in print, but you can find their albums through many used record dealers--there's a famous place in Princeton NJ I got their stuff from.
Hope this is of some small use to you, mh. Hope to hear a progress report, and learning your first name. (Or is there some way to find this out automatically? .
