Tip of the Day

We work very hard as blues harmonica players to develop an air-tight cup to achieve a dark and bassy tone. A common issue though with an overly tight cup is a sound, that when placed into context with a band, is often too dark and muted. The next time you perform live or record in the studio, try relaxing your hands a tad to allow just a little bit of your cup to leak. You'll still achieve good volume, tone and bass, but some of the muted nature of your cup will decrease and the higher frequencies responsible for making your playing cut through and be heard better are increased.

For those that read the paper and watched the footage (http://youtu.be/I5kogDrivvQ) of me bending on the harmonica in the MRI last week, here's the story (four part video series) of the bending study with Peter Egbert MD http://youtu.be/I5ZjNUWnhgk

If you would like to see actual images of the tongue in the bending process (draw and blow bending, with both tongue block and pucker embouchures), read my paper on the bending process with visualizations from the MRI Bending Study I did at Stanford University with Peter R. Egbert, Lewis K. Shin, Thomas D. Rossing and Andrew Holbrook.

Bending Process on the 10-Hole Diatonic Harmonica with the Visual Aid of Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) by David Barrett
https://www.bluesharmonica.com/sites/bluesharmonica.com/files/mri_bendin...

Some nice Junior Wells playing at the 27 minute mark...

Chicago Blues Documentary (1972)
http://youtu.be/EzAySaWy9sc?list=PLqCjLhOxHNnLzDFIHOc0F4E5oT-R-HR1c

Some very early footage in this "BLUES MASTERS: The Essential History of the Blues"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Q0D8iMYL9Q&index=140&list=PLqCjLhOxHNnL...

A reminder to all students that tremolos and flutters should not be locked to a specific rhythm. It's common to receive submissions where the student is playing all of these at the triplet rhythm (three pieces of the tremolo or flutter per beat). This is mechanical sounding... they should float. A general rule of the thumb is to have them be slightly faster than the triplet. This floating quality is what makes your music sound smooth, and when coupled with dynamics, emotional.

Gary Smith, Aki Kumar and I were in the studio this last weekend and I was commiserating with Kid in regards to being anxious of being able to "bring it" for the recording. He quoted this phrase and thought I would share it with you...

"The greater the artist, the greater the doubt. Perfect confidence is granted to the less talented as a consolation prize." Robert Hughes

Margie Goldsmith for Harmonica Happenings (SPAH, Fall 2014, Vol. 48 No. 4): "What advice do you have for advanced players? What's the most important thing to for them to learn?"

Paul Oscher: "Don't try to play better than your peers just try to play better that yourself"

Tip of the Day: "Happy Holidays from Hohner! We have a free offer for you running till the end of the month. Simply purchase any of our most popular harmonicas (Marine Band, Special 20, Crossover, Thunderbird, Golden Melody, Rocket, Blues Harp, Big River or Blue Midnight) and receive a free 7 piece harp case! $40 retail value! Just bought one of these harps in November? No problem! you can still get the Free gift. Print out this coupon and send it in with a copy of your receipt and we will get it going! continue reading...

In this video snippet (Recording Study 2) I show you how to record to a study song jam track and reference it with the original track to check your rhythm: https://www.facebook.com/bluesharmonica