Ask Instructor David Barrett

I am new to your site and I am enjoying what you have created for us.

I am elderly and I am having a small problem with understanding

1. positioning of the hold of the Harmonica, which side of face would the Harmonica be laying across and

2. the orientation of what you mean with where the tongue is pointing for tongue blocking. Is it moving the tip or the base of the tongue which would move the front part of the tongue.

I am holding the harmonica in my left hand as was instructed in your earlier lessons and I can isolate one hole with correct blocking. continue reading...

Dr. Dave, I've always had a problem choosing the key of a song, so I was thrilled when you posted the "how to" section during the intermeadiate lessons with Ryan. So I watched them a couple times took note and the first song I tried was Carey Bell "lonesome stranger"

Here's what happened:
I liked Method 3 so I used my "C" harp played each note and determined that "D" matched best so in 2nd position that would be a "G" harp. I played along to it and I thought it sounded pretty good, I needed work on matching the song but it seemed I was matching it ok. continue reading...

Everyone and teacher David, continue reading...

Greetings! David, I recently purchased a couple more of the Masterclass Series books; I was informed on the web page that materials were no longer offered at this site, and, was directed to Amazon, etc; Amazon is where I purchased them. Along with the purchase, you would usually offer a "Free Gift" from that section of the site and I was wondering if that gratuity is still applicable to the Amazon purchases? continue reading...

Hi Dave,

In the video for chorus 3 you say that a lot of sax players transcribed would be hitting the 3 draw whole step bend. Did you mean the half step bend?

-Taylor

david i have a friend that personally new jerry mccain and has written a book called the life and times of jerry boogie mccain that jerry asked him to write so its sort of an autobiography he finished the book this year im not sure if he sent them to book stores or not but i can get some copies if your into reading some blues history just shoot me an email and ill get you one jbth12@gmail.com thanks

hey David, is any lesson of how accompaniment the song their have a singer, were i get the licks or is any trick to create him, i think any good musician can do it naturally, but i cant! thankss

Just finishing Music theory study 4 and am really enjoying. This takes a lot of the mystery out of what to play and when. and maybe.... I'll not appear to be just an outsider when others are discussing music.

My question. I am taking the time to really get to where I can play examples 1.8, 1.14, and 1.19 using the music for memory cues for now. While I have the techniques down that are allowing to play all 3, I found, I had to spend several days on each before I could play comfortably through the entire piece. (still working on 1.19) continue reading...

Hi -

In Joe Filisko's videos about types of sound, he's demonstrating tongue position using a small plastic dummy mouhpiece with hole positions cut out, which allows tongue position over the holes to be seen.

Do you think this is a helpful tool, adding visual feedback to the sound & touch we normally have to rely on?

If so, do you know where I can get one?

thanks
Jeremy

Hi Dave

I remember looking at one of your Videos about recording tunes. You talked about a device that you referred to as the industry standard and which could be purchased for about $300 dollars. I have searched through all of the videos I would have looked at. However, I can't find that Video again.

I did a search of forum topics and found you talking about a device called Tascam DR-08.
.
Could you let me know what the first device was and how it compares with the Tascam item.

Thanks in advance.