[Harp-L] Harmonica/harp player & Popper

[martin oldsberg <martinoldsberg@xxxxxxxxx>]

The value of the distinction harmonica/harp player escapes me, unless you compare, say, a chromatic classical musician with a blues harp player; but that was not the issue here.
    
    However, John Popper was: and it appears that every time someone says something about him this has to be framed with some kind of "excuse". This is a hamonica forum and debating the merits of John Popper must be a perpectly legitimate topic. I cannot see why he has been placed under some kind of stigma? "The harmonica player whose name I dare not mention ..." and such alike phrasings has been seen here, why?
    
    Also, a while back somebody claimed to have been able to learn the harp parts to Cream´s "Train time" in "a week" ... This person was then chastized for being a braggart. The harp parts to "Train time" takes about the same time to learn as the duration of the song, for a reasonably seasoned player (5 min?); for a beginner a week might even seem a bit long. Jack Bruce, great musician; midlevel (if that) harp player. Admittedly, I haven´t listened to Cream for a long while but when I did, harp in hand, nothing, repeat: nothing, was complicated from the harmonica perspective. 
   Should I be ashamed for thinking this? There are probably several hundred people on this list that can play Jack Bruce´s stuff while doing push-ups, and we just have to accept the fact that not everyone who has blown a note on a record is a towering genius, they can still be all right and maybe have played exactly the right thing.
    
    This demand for a suffocating politeness, or political correctness if one wants to put that twist on it, is just as ridiculous as those "flamers" whose world appears to be crumbling when somebody expresses an opinion radically divergent from theirs. (I know, I received somthing akin to threats of violence in my mailbox some years ago, when I had ideas about a certain harmonica performance.)  Opinions can be debated, even in relatively harsh terms, without this being an infringment on someones "personality" -- and moreover, there is a moderator here to watch over things.
   
    I personally don´t care at all for Blues Traveler´s music, but when I heard JP for the first time I thought "Jeez, I gotta learn that!". There is something intrinsically fascinating in speed in a musical performance, but it wears thin mighty fast. Popper seems to be evidence for this, but he certainly came up with something extra, possibly original (Sugar Blue perhaps), and a style that has severe limitations (listen to him slaughtering "Imagine" on the live album -- admittedly this pathetic tune should be better left unplayed, but if you go at it, don´t follow Popper´s example ...), but also this arresting quality "What!!", that a least for me is not worth the four hours a day practise time for I don´t know how many years it takes to master it. Still, more interesting than some universally applauded players in the blues genre, let them be un-named, for the sake of peace. 
   
     Ohh, this was long and sorry for the heavy handed prose, but this was off the cuff.
      /Martin

 
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