Re: Fwd: Re: Re: Harmonica range - and tremolo harp bending

["Winslow Yerxa" <winslowyerxa@xxxxxxxxx>]

- --- In harp-l-archives@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, Joe Mahan <joe.mahan@xxxx> 
wrote:

I wrote:

>Since tremolo reeds are very thin and easily blown out, maybe it is a
>form of insurance.

And that was just an inaccurate paraphrase of the page I cited


>http://perso.wanadoo.fr/bruno.kowalczyk/anglais/faqgb.htm

which to be precise states:

"Most importantly, the reeds of a tremolo are smaller, softer, and 
therefore more delicate than those of a blues harp. "

Winslow replied:


>Thin and easily blown out? How do you know this? have you measured
>them? I'd believe this coming from someone who had done so.

And I must admit that I have never measured the thickness of any 
reeds, and 
that  "more delicate" does not necessarily mean "easily blown out". ( 
But 
it probably does.)



>As to bending damaging reeds, that's another bit of lore with a less
>than factual basis. I find that the reeds I blow out are the ones I
>DON'T bend but play loudly enough to trigger stress fractures -
>usually trying to play loudly acoustically in the middle of 60-odd
>fiddlers. Bending done properly isn't all that stressful to reeds.
>What stresses them is playing them with too much force and/or the
>wrong oral cavity resonance. Many players have poor bending technique
>and rely on excessive force when bending, so, yeah, their bending
>technique blows out reeds. But that's more the player than anything
>else.

I agree with the above. But I also think the risk of damage (esp. 
when 
bending single reeds on tremolos) is high for many players, because 
bending 
with too much force or the wrong oral cavity resonance is probably a 
common 
practice. I also agree with the statement on the cited page, "that 
bent 
notes on a tremolo sound a bit nasal, are not as loud as unbent 
notes ".

I think that perhaps the best way for most players to accomplish 
single-reed bends would be to use your discrete comb and regular ten-
hole 
reedplates. Do you think they are going to get a good feel for how a 
single-reed bend sounds by trying it on a tremolo? (That's an honest 
question, not a jab, I haven't yet tried your discrete comb, but I 
know how 
my bends sound on a tremolo...)

>The top-bottom punches in low-pitched reeds on some tremolo and
>octave models seems to be to allow for the reeds to speak without
>really wide gaps. I remember Cham-Ber Huang specifically telling me
>this for his octave double reed models. Heavily-weighted reeds need
>more air moving underneath them to get them to budge than reeds with
>less wieght on the tips, and having a common airspace for a pair of
>reeds always makes it possible to gap lower. I tried blocking off the
>punch on the lower holes on one of his octave models and finding the
>reeds starting to choke at much lower pressures. The same is true for
>both double-reed harps and for single-reed harps with a blow and draw
>in the same hole. Two slots can absorb more force than one.
>
>Perhaps this is the reason for the center-range punches on Hohner
>Echos (my earlier sloppy-player rationale could be another reason).

I would hate to see the sloppy-player rationale become another bit of 
"unfounded lore". (Unless of course it can be founded in fact.)
Maybe we'll hear from someone who has a sound technical reason for 
the 
coupling of the chambers.

I think Rick Epping is currently finding out the hard way how 
difficult it 
is to market real innovations for "sloppy players"
  :)
Joe



- --- End forwarded message ---


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