[Harp-L] New harmonica tracks

[David Fertig <drfertig@xxxxxxxxx>]

Richard, 

I listened to your four solos, and my first suggestion is based upon the sense I get you are using your mouth to shape the sound.  

Perhaps you are not opening your throat and letting the sound bounce around your winwdways and below, pushing the air (and sound?) from the bottom of your lungs.  

It seems to me when one uses ones mouth/oral cavity as the main sound-shaping/sourcing site, it is usually thinner in tone and less subtle in tune variance (bending.)  I suggest trying to open your throat, keep your mouth as wide and neutral a cavity as is comfortable, and let the wind come up from your diaphragm or below.   

-Dave Fertig

Dear colleagues in harmonicology

My condolences for the loss of Pat Ramsey and the hurt it has caused.

I've just recorded and put up 4 new improvised solo harmonica tracks at the
following address

http://www.last.fm/music/Richard+Hammersley/Solo+Harp

I would appreciate any feedback about technique because having been on this
list six months I think the approach I have developed is asethetically deviant
in that I seem to be seeking a sound that is different from what a lot of people
want to hear on the harmonica.   So I can't tell whether the end result is
good in harmonica playing terms or not. This is kind of a weird feeling, because
BEFORE I subscribed to harp-l I thought, all innocent of overblows etc, that I
was pretty good if too bone idle to learn a tune all the way through.

Harmonicas used were Suzuki MR350v, Hohner XB40 and a Hering 1923 vintage harp.
These are all harps that I find so amazing in their own ways to play that I
don't (yet) feel the need for customized instruments. I grew up on frankly
weak Hohner echo super vampers, if you could grind a tone out of them (even
after soaking them in beer) you were doing well.

Global love and peace

Richard

Richard Hammersley
Grantshouse, Scottish Borders