On Nov 14, 2004, at 4:17 PM, Pierre wrote:
One thing that should help is to make sure the hard is deep in your
mouth, pucker like a chimpazee and set the harp deep in your mouth.
OK, here's where I am getting confused. On the one hand we have tongue
block players. These are guys who barely touch the harp to the lips and
work their sounds off of the right (and left) side of their tongue tip.
Then there is the pucker player who purses their lips like sipping
through a soda straw and directs the air to only the hole(s) they want.
Sooo, how DOES one stick a harp DEEP in their mouth and play pucker
style? OR, how DOES one place a harp deep in their mouth and play tongue
block style? I'm sure glad I tossed all of mine in the trash yesterday,
as the constant adjusting and re-adjusting embochure has already driven
me crazy.
smokey-joe
"Tongue-block" is a very appropriate expression for the action in question.
"Pucker" is the very opposite - it's a useless word that seems to cause
nothing but confusion. To me, "pucker" means the facial expression of
George Bush as depicted by one of the UK's political cartoonists, for
example:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/cartoons/stevebell/0,7371,1286268,00.html
(selected, I hasten to add, for pucker illustration only and NOT for any
political allusions!). As I don't tongue-block, and am presumably
therefore a puckerer, I can categorically state that my mouth-shape is
nothing like the one (exaggeratedly) depicted in the cartoon. The harp is
deep in my mouth and my lips are relaxed. My mouth-opening covers four to
five holes (I use a mirror to observe this, having "frozen" in the middle
of playing and removed the harp), yet I play a single note. My tongue is
down and out of the way. I have no idea how the air is channelled down
(or up) one hole only, but it is. "Puckering" seems to imply some tension
in the circular muscles around the mouth, which I think would be bad news
for harmonica-playing. I wish we had another word for it - even
"non-tongue-blocking" would be better!
Steve
Ps. WHAT did you throw in the trash???
http://mysite.wanadoo-members.co.uk/trad_irish_harmonica
Steve's CD of mostly traditional Irish, "Blowing Through The Reeds," is
now available! Hear clips at http://www.gjk2.com/steveshaw/cd.htm
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