Re: [Harp-L] Re: Not so standard harmonica songs




mlpratt writes:


"Non-standard" becomes a personal experience.  If you've never heard a
particular song played on the harp, you may think it is non-standard.  But
to the millions of people who have heard it before, it's quite standard.

Somehow this comment made me think of Pat Ramsey's band covering the Little Feat song Skin it Back. I heard them play that close to 20 years ago in Tallahassee Florida. Pat played the Bill Payne keyboard line on harmonica. I was blown away because until that moment I hadn't conceptually grasped that this kind of playing was at all doable on harp. While I certainly don't listen to every single band in America that employs harmonica I haven't heard anyone else cover this song since then. I'm thinking the broad differentiation here is many many bands cover Juke. We're all used to hearing blues on a harmonica. In fact it's the expectation. If you tell someone you play harmonica what they expect you play is blues or to a lesser extent something folky. What I find so fun about this thread is seeing what people do play using harmonica for lead. It gives me ideas about what might be possible and directions others have chosen. I guess you could do the same with arrangements and blues tunes but the difficulty would be in communication sans sound files. fjm





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