[Harp-L] Overblowing, or, the Case of the Missing Notes in the Diatonic Harp

[scott gold <mwmgum@xxxxxxx>]

harp-l-ers,

hafa adai from sunny guam.

sitting here in the middle of the pacific, i began reading what struck me 
at first as quite a ridiculous argument the virtues or lack thereof of 
overblows.......somehow, though, as is not infrequently and thankfully the 
case with this list, the thread got more and more interesting  - and now i 
find myself chining in on a sunday after sundown......


on the desire of the diatonic player to play chromatically, or, hey, were 
did all my black keys go?

when i play the diatonic, i am often acutely aware of it's limitation in 
available notes.  i am also even more painfully made aware of my own 
limitations.   when i was a kid many years ago, i basically gave up the 
harp for my first instrument - piano b/c i thought the harp too 
limited.  it wasn't really the harp that was limited, rather it was my lack 
of skill and imagination that was lacking.

the reasons why one would want to play the missing notes on a diatonic are 
many and varied.  the argument that you don't need them in blues is really 
not an accurate statement.  after all, all the other blues musicians get to 
use them - guitarists, bassists, keyboardists, etc..  you wouldn't require 
a piano player to play with only the white keys would you?  to me, if you 
can bend down, why can't you bend up?  the most obvious missing note for 
the blues player is the minor 7th on the IV-chord - or an OB on the 
6-hole.  wish i could........

through harp-l, i have discovered many fascinating ways to achieve the 
missing notes - the Discreet Comb (thanks, Winslow), the XB-40 (thanks, 
Rick E.), alternately tuned harps (thanks, Pat M. for the Temptation 
harps!), the Overdrive harp (no thanks, Suzuki - that's sheer madness!), 
valved harps (thanks for real this time, Suzuki) and OB'ing (thanks, Harp-l 
- i didn't know what one was 8 years ago -- and thank you, Tim M., for 
setting one up for me).

the fact that we know of very few excellent harp players that can OB well 
is a sad fact, but let's not forget, OB'ing is still basically in it's 
infancy.  very few folks who pick up a harp today - or have played for 20 
years are even aware of their existence, let alone have learned how to play 
them.  Howard Levy - i've seen him live, i've seen him lecture, i have some 
of his CD's.  he is the most convincing OB-er i've heard - putting it 
mildly.  Howard Levy's first recording or two, though, while quite amazing, 
are not all that successful.  but over the years, his playing has improved, 
and the technology of the harps used have likewise greatly improved.  i 
KNOW in the future, there will be other players who will eventually make 
the scene who will play the diatonic harp chromatically with the fluency 
that he does.  as Robert. Bonfiglio well points out - the more that 
individuals achieve, the more that is possible for future players to 
accomplish and even surpass their predecessors.

as to why folks go through all the trouble trying to play a square 
instrument through a round hole, my feeling is that it's simply out of 
desire.  the diatonic has a unique sound - so does the chromatic.  while 
playing a chromatically challenging song on the chrom is far easier for 
most people than to play the same tune on a diatonic, the sound is 
different - the attraction to play chromatically (i.e., more complex tunes) 
on the diatonic is absolutely there.


on over-extending the blow on the harp, or, altered tunes (songs)  - or, 
you think OB's are hard, have you tried bending the 3-hole correctly lately ?

on most instruments, different notes are produced with differing 
timbres.  the harmonica's notes do sound different from one another - and 
this is both a blessing and a curse.  it's what makes it so expressive on 
the one hand, but it's also what makes it so damned hard to control.  blow 
notes sound different than draw notes.  valved notes sound not the same as 
non-valved notes.  bends sound differently than non-bent notes, and OB's 
sound of a different character than anything else.  the reason why bends 
work on a diatonic in blues for most cases is that exceptional notes in the 
tunes that are expressed with bends are acceptable.   OB'ing the tonic is 
not typically an advantageous move whereas OB'ing a passing tone can come 
out okay in the mouth of a good player.

but forget OB's for a moment.  do you have your normal bends down 
pat?  even the best players can't always pass muster.  in my first example, 
let's take a look at one of my favorite harp players, Charlie Musselwhite, 
one the biggest names in the harp world and who uses positions other than 
1st, 2nd, or 3rd, an extremely versatile player who has been attempting to 
extend his repertoire and has really don well.  one of his most famous 
renditions is of Christo Redemptor.  it's a great song, and is beautiful in 
3rd position.  but listen to it on Stand Back (1967).  that first deep bend 
is simply off - it is not nailed.  almost anyone - harp player or non-harp 
player, musician or no, can hear that significant note (deep bend on the 
3-hole) is not played correctly. and it hurts a bit.

but, if you had said to him in 1967 to drop trying to play that song b/c 
he'd never be able to do it, you'd have been wrong.  listen to Charlie's 
remake of that tune on Tennessee Woman (1969?) we can hear a much-improved 
control of the aforementioned bends - and a much more satisfying cut overall.

okay, now listen to Chicken Shack - also from Stand Back.  uh-oh......not 
only off on the bends, but the tune as well.  note well, Little Walter's 
version is also not correct - Jimmy Smith and Stanley Turrentine play it 
easily - because it is an easy tune on most instruments, but a bear on the 
short harp. going to the V and then the IV and turnaround is quite 
cumbersome and you need OB's (or some other equipment) to get there.  or 
you are simply not playing the head right.

in fact there is a long tradition of harp players altering a tune's melody 
to make a song playable.  sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.  Little 
Willie Anderson - his rendition of Lester Leaps in really grooves, 
but......he altered the song to be playable (for him) on the 
diatonic.  still, it works for me - especially in the context that he plays 
it in.

okay, another example is Jerry Portnoy - another very accomplished player - 
and a self-professed non-OB'er.  check out Down In the Mood Room, 
though.  many have praised this recording -- and i, too, like a lot of it 
myself.  that said, Jerry cannot perfectly nail every deep bend.  for 
example,  Doodlin' is not that difficult melody on most instruments, but it 
presents problems for a very excellent player like 
Portnoy.  ditto  Canadian Sunset, an otherwise beautifully done rendition, 
but contains some annoying trouble on the bridge.  similarly complicated by 
the pesky bridge in  Lullaby of Birdland.  the listening to these tunes are 
negatively affected, unfortunately but the off-notes.  note well that in 
his solos on these songs, Jerry avoids the problematic bends and pushes 
forth acceptably.  other tunes are standard blues that fit into the style 
and the bends are where they need to be.

the fact is that even some of the most excellent well-known players can 
sometimes get tripped up with relatively simple (on other instruments) 
tunes b/c of the lack of note sets readily and easily available.  it shows 
you how hard it is to play the harmonica excellently.   therefore, i think 
David F. makes a good point about cherry-picking jazz tunes - or any tune 
for that matter.   i am sure that if Portnoy had chosen The Preacher, for 
example, - he could have played it perfectly well with no errors.  even i 
can handle the melody at my amateur level.   Gary Primach sails through 
diatonically with a jazz tune such as Red Top on Mr. Freeze with no errors 
on my bend-o-meter, but wisely opts for a chrom on Caravan on Travelin' 
Mood . his Poodle Bites has jazz-elements, but he handles it convincingly 
with a diatonic.  but if you choose the wrong tune with the wrong bend at 
the wrong place, you might clear out the whole dance hall!

back  to OB'ing.  despite the claims of some who say OB'ing is just as easy 
as standard bending, theoretically they are correct, but the problems do 
intensify.  i wish i had known about OB'ing when i was a kid.  i can now 
OB, but cannot utilize them (yet?) convincingly a song or solo.  when 
Dennis Gruenling's Jump Time came out, i was interested in his tune Take a 
Step because it had a Juke-like riff.  i quickly detected what i thought to 
be an OB on the 6-hole.  i believe this to be quite an easy OB for the 
average OB-er.  alas, i just can't handle it.  so, i opted to play the 
6-draw twice in a row instead, thereby saving my skin with an acceptable 
substitution, but a bit saddened by my lack of abilities.....

anyway, overblows - it give us mortals something to live for - we can 
always dream.

waiting for the green flash,

sg
tumon bay, guam