Robert Laughlin wrote:
I wonder if anyone has ever gone to the trouble of compiling a list of the
various preferred gear collection of working or non-working harpists?
It would be nice to compare, at a glance, who uses which harps, how many artists use customized vs stock harps. Which artists are company shills,,er,,I mean, sponsored by a particular company,,hehe.
I mean, realistically, at least here on harp-l, it seems that several of
the members are also reps for particular companies, so one has to take that
into account when deciding on whose advice to take, in making brand or
model choices.
At one time I ran a feature on my site called the Pro Pages, which (among other things) listed the gear choices of prominent players. You can see what ran on those pages here:
http://www.hunterharp.com/propage1/
As you'll see on those pages, pros, like everybody else, use a wide range of gear. At this point in time, harmonica players are interested in lots of different musical styles, and gear choices have never been more numerous, less expensive, or of higher quality, so it's no surprise that if you sample three pros, you'll find more than three different setups.
And that brings us to the bigger issue: the implication in this post that pro harp players are shills for gear makers. The short answer to that implication is that it's all wrong. When a pro harp player recommends a harp or an amp, it's not at all the same as J Lo appearing in a cosmetics ad. J Lo doesn't have to rely on those cosmetics to get her through a performance; the harp player does. If a piece of gear isn't effective, a pro won't keep using it. When the pro discovers something that works better for him, he'll switch. The switch is very rarely about which manufacturer is dangling the best deal; it's about what gear is inspiring the pro to great performances. Pros who have a lot of intellectual curiosity, like Charlie Musselwhite, tend to try lots of different gear over the years. Why not? When the gear is getting better all the time, you might as well try it.
FYI, I make my own gear choices pretty plain on my site, and I am not sponsored by anyone. Every piece of gear I use on stage and in studio was purchased with my own money. I use the stuff because it inspires me, and I make the Digitech RP sounds I developed for my own use available to others in the hope that those sounds will inspire them too.
In the end, regardless of what a given pro is using, the gear you want is the gear that makes a sound that inspires you, whatever that sound is.
Regards, Richard Hunter
author, "Jazz Harp" (Oak Publications, NYC)
Latest mp3s and harmonica blog at http://hunterharp.com
Vids at http://www.youtube.com/user/lightninrick
Twitter: lightninrick
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