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From: Fred_Syl
Date: Mon, 10 Jan 2000 20:17:21 -0600
Subject: A Huang and a Hohner

Well now....there, there.... 10 days without harp-l wasn't so bad now,
was it? Kind of reminds me of a line from a Joni Mitchell song. I wish
I could say I spent all my harp-l(ess) time practicing, but I did want
to relate the following.

Received an early birthday present ordered from one of our well-known
mail order houses: one each of a new Huang Star Performer in C and
Hohner Special 20 in C. I already had a HSP-C that has lately become
one of my favorite harps. Really bends well and very responsive. I was
worried that I would blow it out soon since I've been using it alot, so
wanted a back-up. As to the S20-C, I really needed a second one of
those too, since the original is probably my most used harp, and it had
recently graduated from back-up to first string itself.

So I open these two babies up and start to play - Yikes! The Huang is
quite leaky & hard to bend without gobs of air whooshing all over the
place. Open it up and gap it some, but it doesn't really come around.
Notice that the tip of the 3draw is really bad - not parallel to the
plate but kind of twisted. May have to try to hammer it out but that
could be tough. I guess a microporing may be in order, but I'm pretty
sure I didn't do that on the first one. So now I've got one really
great HSP-C and one really bad one. I'm about to chalk it up to the
price you pay for inexpensive harps, but I'd sure like a second one as
good as the first, without buying a dozen.

As to the S20 (HM of course), blew on that and -WOW - I've never had a
S20 (got about 6) that was so perfect out of the box. I've almost
always had to do at least a little gap-tweaking on the S20's. But this
one, all bends are smooth as butter (easily equal to an LO), and great
tone, and fantastically responsive (started to wonder if they'd slipped
in a Filisko by mistake)!

So, harp gurus, here's the questions:
- - Should I try another Huang or are the chances too slim (I've got an A
& D back-ordered, so I may just wait till I get those)?
- - Anyone notice a deterioration in Huangs quality lately (my original
one is ~ 4 years old)?
- - Anyone notice an increase in Hohner (S20) quality lately (my last S20
purchase was ~ 3 years ago).

Well thought I'd relate this to the list - may have to put a lock on
that Special 20 to keep me from playing it until the occasion demands.

Anyway, welcome back everybody! Anyone know when our next 10-day
enforced sabbatical is scheduled? Tales of how you survived without
harp-l? (And here I bought all these canned goods, bottled water and
candles, and what I really needed was printouts of the last 5 years
worth of digests to survive Y2K.)

Fred