Harmonica in key of A
Thu, 03/26/2020 - 09:11
I just bought Hohner's marine band in key of A. So a lot of instructors reccomend, especially to the newbies like me harmonicas in key of C. Also the majority of them actually plays in that key most of the time. Is it still ok try to learn with an A instead of C, or i should definitely switch to C?
Thank you!
Hello tokidokisan63.
The A harmonica is the most common key of harmonica used for blues playing. So, you're good with that.
The only reason why the C harmonica is commonly used in beginning instruction is that the key of C doesn't have any sharps or flats to deal with when trying to teach a student about the understanding of music (specifically learning how to read music and understand scales). In our world, reading music is not common, we commonly use TAB (tablature, which demonstrates the holes of the harmonica to play). So, again, we're good.
For the reasons mentioned above (reading/scales), the cheap harmonicas out there are almost exclusively produced in the key of C. So, this is another reason why teachers commonly choose the C harmonica. I choose the A, because it's the most common blues harmonica key, and it's in the middle of the more common low keys of harmonicas that we prefer to play in the blues.
Which harmonica you learn on at first really doesn't matter (as long as it's not a super high-keyed, or very lo- keyed, harmonica... they bring their own challenges). Since we like the lower-keyed harmonicas, and the A harmonica is used a lot in the blues, all my teaching on the site for the first three levels is on the A harmonica. So, you're good all around to use your A harmonica.