Re: [Harp-L] Hook, groove, etc.

[Richard Hunter <turtlehill@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

"Robert Laughlin" wrote:
<I just hope that the "L" doesn't become merely a place to hawk one's wares. 

Robert, perhaps you ought to ask yourself where else in the world harmonica players can find out about all the "wares" that are available to them.  At this point in time there are only a few independent publications in the world devoted to harmonica players (at least to English-speaking ones), such as the National Harmonica League's monthly issues, published in the UK; like the NHL journal, the vast majority of these are distributed mostly to relatively small, regional audiences. (Various vendors, such as Hohner and Seydel, publish regular and informative bulletins to harmonica players, but of course those vendors are not "independent" in this sense.)  In other words, there are practically zero places where people offering goods and services tailored to harmonica players can inform those players of offerings that are likely to be of interest.  Many of the vendors offering such goods and services are small shops for whom the shotgun advertising approaches offered by traditional media are ineffective and prohibitively expensive.  If not for Harp-L, most players would never hear about most of these vendors and the tools they offer.  That would be a bad thing for everyone involved, full stop. 

The Harp-L list has always had a mix of advice on the art of playing the harmonica and notices about various tools for harmonica players: amps, mics, FX, books, records, videos, etc., etc.  That's a good thing, not a bad thing.  Just about all of the people offering tools for harp players also post regularly on topics unrelated to their offerings.  I've never seen anyone try to dominate bandwidth on the list with advertising.  I'm sure that doing so is a violation of the list rules, and I know for a fact that posts are vetted to ensure that the rules are followed.

I think the balance is well-established at this point, and I think it's a good balance that's in no danger of being overturned. If you disagree, my bet is that there are a few lists out there that prohibit any contributions from vendors, and others on this list can tell you where to find them. (I can't, because I don't know where they are; I've been pretty happy with Harp-l for a long time.) You might want to try one or more of those lists to see whether they give you more of what you're looking for, keeping in mind that there's nothing to stop you from subscribing to more than one list.

It's a shame that harmonica players can't access high-quality monthly publications like the ones devoted to bass, keyboards, guitar (ESPECIALLY guitar!), and so on that offer readers a mix of how-to, advertising, and objective reviews.  Efforts to create such publications (including the American Harmonica Newsletter and HIP) have been unsustainable, for reasons that are unclear to me.  In the meantime, I think it's a service to the membership of Harp-L to make airtime available to the people who supply harp players with tools, and I've personally benefited from that airtime not only as a vendor but as a buyer.  

Regards, Richard Hunter

author, "Jazz Harp" (Oak Publications, NYC)
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