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From: James Hanson
Date: Wed, 04 Oct 1995 01:40:49 -0400
Subject: Re: Simple Tricks

regarding "know any simple tricks?"

Here are my 0.02 - maybe worth less than that since I haven't played in front of enough audiences to have a lot of experience on "what they like".

But I think that you do need to know your audience: are you playing at a blues club? a nursery school? church? a retirement home? Different audiences which might appreciate different things!

For the blues venue (which is what most of us aspire to (bad pun)) - if you want relatively simple but effective playing, I suggest listening to a lot of Jimmy Reed and Sonny Boy Williamson II. There are probably other similar artists as well who I might not be familiar with. Trying to sound
like Little Walter or Big Walter is great, but definitely not as easy!

Jimmy Reed's harp "solos" were quite simple: not many notes, not usually fast, but oh so perfect. Not always as easy to play as they sound, however: the "tone quality" may be even more exposed than in a fast passage. While Sonny Boy was a virtuoso at the "acoustic blues style" and a great showman (and a gifted singer and songwriter to boot) - much of the most effective harp that he played was very simple: listen to the opening of "Love in Vain" for example.

I like to listen carefully to these recordings and play along, not trying to exactly imitate their playing, but to capture the feel. Usually when I play back a tape of my "version" of a Jimmy Reed or Sonny Boy song, I realize I'm still playing too many notes...

For most other venues, melodies are probably the simplest "tricks": learn a few standard melodies: a number of them were "published" on Harp-L in the last six weeks - things like "Red River Valley", etc. With most American audiences - who would be familiar with the songs - it's hard to go wrong. (If you're in another country/culture, the idea would be the same but the songs different.)

J.Hanson
simple is as simple does (or so my mama said....)