Re: [Harp-L] Any site showing what Harp Charlie McCoy played on each of his recordings? Diatonic mostly?

[Joseph Leone <3n037@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

I could add a few things here Mel. Firstly: Back in the day, we used to use a Piccolo or Vest Pocket harp on tunes where we wanted to work the upper octave but STILL wanted the same note layout as the lower octave so as to be able to do the SAME types of bends. Secondly: There are times when one needed to use a second harp to do certain bridges, (as in 'Londonderry Aire'), or even small sections (like on the tune 'Night Life'). 

By tuning up the #5 draw reed, a lot of this nonsense was precluded. You can now play Danny Boy on 2 harps (with key modulation), instead of the usual (with key modulation) 4 harps. It also opens up a HUGE number of tunes that heretofore had required as much as several harps to do a piece. See every tune has certain critical notes. They virtually MAKE the tune. If you can't hit these notes, don't do the tune.

At a spah a few years ago, several of us did the tune 'Have you met Miss Jones'. And even though I am basically a chromatic player, I was chosen to play diatonic on that one. I had to use THREE harps. That's because of the double keyed bridge. One harp was used for only ONE note. But that note was critical. A must have note. No way was I going to miss that note..not fair to the audience. And the audience is EVERYTHING. Otherwise, why even bother being there. 

Manys the time I have heard a player pull out a can of 'Snowjoberall' and spray the audience with a plethora of other notes to take everyone's attention off of the fact that the original..written..critical note wasn't hit. A really proficient player (like a Charlie or a Don Les) can get away with that.  Some can't. lolol

smo-joe 

On Apr 20, 2013, at 3:07 PM, Mel_3 wrote:

> Thanks Guys !
> 
> 
> On Sat, Apr 20, 2013 at 11:05 AM, Rick Dempster <rick.dempster@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Charlie played mostly straight out-of-box harps in second, and occasionally first postion. At some stage he adopted the 'SmokeyJoe' raised draw 5. But generally, just second on standard harp.
> 
> 
> On 20 April 2013 06:04, Joseph Leone <3n037@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> 
> On Apr 19, 2013, at 2:19 PM, Mel_3 wrote:
> 
> > Is there any site that tells what harp Charlie McCoy played on each of his
> > recordings?
> 
> Charley's own site gives this information. (At least it once did)
> >
> > And, doe she mostly play Diatonic? Or Chromatic?
> 
> He is about 95.9% diatonic, but lately has been playing more chromatic.
> >
> > Also, is there a special tuning he often uses?
> 
> a. He uses a chromatic tuned in the keys of the tunes.
> b. He commonly uses country tuned diatonics.
> 
> smo-joe
> 
> >
> > Thanks for any info.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Rick Dempster
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