Newbie question
Hello.
I am a beginner with a good knowledge of musical theory and I have recently bouhgt a harmonica. I am here since I am entitled to a month free trial, which I think is great.
The problem is that I am not really committed (yet, at least). I have played different instruments, but now I just tentatively strum chords on my guitar. It's easy to master and quite enough to sing along.And this is what I though playing the harmonica could be. But I got blocked soon by tone... blocking. It is not so easy :)... But still; let me see if I can put my question clearly...
Is it possible to play the harmonica "the easy way", just producing a series of chords... Or is an instrument that is mainly played tone by tone... Because I don't have the patience or the commitment to learn songs by hart... I just wanted to mess around with this beautiful instrument.
I don't know if I made myself clear... Thanks anyway!
Tom
Thanks for your comment... A new world for me...
You can play single notes by simply narrowing your li opening - variously called puckering, lip blocking, and pursing. The key thing, though, is to make the opening in your lips bigger - much bigger - than the hole in the harmonica so that air can flow freely and your lips make enough contact to seal against leaks.
Sure, you can play everything with 2 or more holes in your mouth -most combinations harmonize nicely. But those harmonies don't always fit the song.
The advantage of tongue blocking is that you can alternate chords and single notes at will simply by moving your tongue a small amount. My personal journey began as someone who didn't see the point of tongue blocking and simply puckered. After awhile I started to notice some of the cool posibilities and effects that tongue blocking offered a dns tarted to integrate it into my playing. Over a long time I moved from being a 90% pcuker player to a 90% tongue blocker.