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Date: Tue, 16 Jul 2002 09:13:07 -0700 (PDT)
From: Winslow Yerxa
Subject: Re: cheap harps and customizing


>> Did Little Walter play a Filisko? How about Big
>>Walter or Sonny Boy? Who out of the old heroes did?
>>No disrespect to the customizers,


Tinus writes:


>First of all let me say I don't think you should buy
>a bag full of custom harmonicas. I think you should
>be able to work on your own instrument. You know how
>you want to it to play and I feel that my own harps
>will always feel better than somebody elses (I have
>played through some custom harps that I hated)


I work on my own harps, but my skill level doesn't
allow me to get my harps *exactly the way I'd like
them to be. That's where the wizards come in.


>Second, I think one harp is enough :-)


Why?


>Third, I am afraid that things aren't what they used
>to be. I have no experience with older harmonicas but
>I do think that it is quite possible that handmade
>marinebands nowadays are a little different from the
>marinebands 50 years ago.


I have a pre-war Marine Band in G that is amazing for
an out-of-box harp. Airtight, responsive, bends well
and even overblows reasonably well in the middle
holes. Far better than any new stock harps I've ever
bought.


>finaly, I can't imagine that people like the Walters
>and Sonny Boys didn't work on their harmonicas. I
>can't imagine them not adjusting gaps.


A few months ago, Joe Filisko expressed a similar
opinion about some of the pre-war player, but not
specifically about SBW or L/BW. He noted that on
those old recordings their harmonicas were always in
tune. Joe felt that this was more than just the higher
quality of production in those days. He felt that at
least some of these players must have worked on their
instruments.

I can't speak about Little Walter or Sonny Boy, but in
the one brief conversation I had with Walter Horton
(about 1969), he indicated that he was familiar with
re-tuning harmonicas, so the concept of maintaining
and improving harmonicas cannot have been alien to
him. How much of it he did I have no idea.

Winslow Yerxa

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