Ask Instructor David Barrett

I'm a big fan of Joe's after attending his Saturday seminar in San Jose last April and getting thje opportunity to ask him a question. Joe's recommended hold with the 90 degree left index finger bend is a bit different from yours though yours is not as extreme as the hold Joe warns against. Your hold has the relaxed looking left arm that Joe advocates. Wondering if you've discussed this at any time in the past?

Hi David

When moving quicky from the 4 draw to the 2 draw, it's hard to keep a slight 3 draw from creeping in.  I see two ways to deal with this: apnea or taking the harmonica out of your mouth during the move.  Do you have a preferred method?

Really enjoying the Joe T. videos as they confirm we all mostly have the same issues and if one of us can do it then most any of us can do it.

As is often the case, I'm just a bit confused by video order. Joe's Pulls video and Solo Study 2 Ex 2.1 and 2.2 are sandwiched between Temperature and basic bending both from LOA 2. As best I can tell pulls aren't introduced until LOA 4 with LOA 2 being restricted to tongue lifts. Should I wait until reaching LOA 4 or is this appropriate for LOA 2? Thanks!

On a video somewhere deep in the site I heard you mention your Kalamazoo Model One originally belonged to your grandmother. Very fortuitous as they're great harp amps. On the video the amp has an original 10 inch CTS speaker just like the one in my amp. My question, and it's purely out of idle curiousity, concerns Jam Tracks & Soloing Concepts 3 where you mention Mitch Kashmar played through your Kalamazoo Model One with a 10 inch Jensen that replaced the original 8 inch speaker. Is this the same amp? How many speaker changes has it had?

Minor - cant seem to get session 4 video to play on my IPad. I'll try on my Mac ater and see if that works and get back to you.

Major - great videos on jamming. David does and excellent jon with super information on several aspects of jam sessions. 

Thanks to both of you for these!!

Minor - cant seem to get session 4 video to play on my IPad. I'll try on my Mac ater and see if that works and get back to you.

Major - great videos on jamming. David does and excellent jon with super information on several aspects of jam sessions. 

Thanks to both of you for these!!

I've been messing around on mostly C harmonicas. Just started lessons on this site and learning tongue blocking on the A harmonica. I seem to go through stages where I cannot get any notes correct; either strained or not at all. Can go back to my C harmoncia and play.I've tried dropping the tongue and holding the harp softly to my mouth\, breathing softly (and through the harp) and dropping the jaw and i still struggle.

Even when I pucker on the 5 draw hole it comes out very strained.

Sometimes maybe when i am tired or had a beer!

Joe's lessons were a great deal of help to me in LOA 1. I'm working on LOA 2 and thought I'd check out Joe working on Solo Harmonica Study 2 Ex 1.1 to 1.6 as that's the recommended study for LOA 2. But Joe's lessons seem to start with Ex 2.1. Are there any videos of Joe working with you on the LOA 2 Solo Harmonica material? Thanks!

Two posts this morning can only mean I'm really into this! I started Solo Study 2 this morning Ex. 1.1 to 1.4. Noticed the general use of 3+ instead of 2 except for the last note in example J. Is this because beginners have trouble with 2 or is it because you believe the use of 3+ is more appropriate in this type of playing? Thanks!

Looking at your Improvising book I noticed the list of instrumentals recommended for study near the back of the book. I have several of the songs on CD and all but one of the remainder are available for free on Grooveshark which works fine if your computer ot tablet is connected to external speakers to give a bit of volume and bottom end. Going through the list of instrumentals I didn't notice any that are rhumba based. Can you recommend one for study?