RE: [Harp-L] OB, CX or XB?

["Bret Littlehales" <blittlehales@xxxxxxxxx>]

Chris wrote:
<Sheer stubborness? Naw, more like enlightenment. Ever notice that
<musicans with odd instruments are usually terrible? Like a 7 or 8
<string guitar - yes I know there are exceptions but I think they
<choose these things because they are not good enough to do what they
<want on a regular instrument. 

That's simply not true. Big Joe Williams played an eight or nine
string guitar and he was terrific. If you'd said, "saw players," I
might be more inclined to agree. But maybe not.

<Like I said there are always
<exceptions but show me a drummer with a shiny new drum set and I'll
<show you one of the a mediocre drummer. I'll take the guy drumming on
<a cardboard box before the dude with three bass drums and a million
<toms and cymbals.

Wait- didn't you just say that musicians w/ unusual instruments don't
cut it? You don't think a guy drumming on a cardboard box is more
unusual than someone on a shiny new kit? And then there's the
hyperbolic three bass drum kit-- the ideal musical straw man. Is there
a a drummer anywhere who uses three bass drums? 

<I tend to think the same thing about alter tuned harps and XBs. Of
<course there are exceptions but even Rosco could out play anybody
<with an alter-tuned harp.

Of course I have to ask, "Who's Rosco?" Maybe Rosco is the tricky 7-
string- guitar- playing- three- bass- drum- hitting- faux- musician we
should be viewing cautiously. 

I don't know many alter-harp players, it's true, but the ones I know,
like Al Wilson, with that beautiful altered solo on "On the Road
Again" (solder on the reeds, btw), Pierre Beauregard and Magic Dick,
not to mention all the chromatic harmonica orchestra guys, Charlie
McCoy are all pretty good players. Plus Brendan Power, Pat Missin...
Roscos all?

Rosco- yeesh.

Besides, chromaticism isn't the be-all or end all in music. If it
were, people would be playing songs on those circular pitch pipes. Now
that's an instrument to beware of. 

Bret