Re: [Harp-L] gear question

["Bob Maglinte" <bbqbob917@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Smith, Richard" <rismith@xxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <harp-l@xxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Friday, March 04, 2005 10:19 AM
Subject: [Harp-L] gear question


> I have a question for the "gear literate" folks out there.
> My harp amp is a Fender Deluxe Reverb, which at 22 watts
> with one 12" speaker, is great for small bars/clubs.
> But with an outdoor jam coming up in May, I'm concerned
> that it might not loud enough for the great outdoors.
> I'm wondering about 2 possibilities.
>
> I have a Red Knob Champ 12 (12 watts) with a 12" speaker:
> can I connect the two amps together somehow, so I have
> more power, with two 12" speakers?
>
> As for the 2nd possibility, I was at the music store, and
> I saw a Fender Hot Rod Deville which had a paper on top
> showing how to get different sounds from the amp.  One of
> the things it pictured was plugging your instrument into
> the #1 input of one channel, then running a jumper from
> the #2 input of that channel into one of theinputs of the
> other channel.  Since my Deluxe Reverb has 2 channels
> with 2 inputs each, would this work for me?
>
> I'm concerned about damaging my amp by experimenting
> without knowledge.  Thanks.
>
> Richard J. Smith
> Wormleysburg, PA

Hi Richard,
Asimploer solution would be just to place the amp on a chair and mike the 
amp thru the PA and make sure that you DO NOT put the amp into the monitors 
or ytou'll have non stop feedback hell. A Hot Rod DeVille is a 50 watt amp, 
and many of the extra drive and gain is the LAST thing you want for harp 
which would make feedback issues MUCH worse, and you what you'd want to do 
is turn the bright switch OFF, which if you turn it on, would make the amp 
WAY too trebly (this is fine for guitar but NOT for harp), turn the master 
volume all the way up to negate the circuit, and then set the volume and 
tone controls as to taste, but KEEP THE TREBLE TURNED WAY DOWN OR TOTALLY 
ROLLED OFF!!!

Jumping the channels, IMO, thins the sound out and makes it too crunchy so 
that everything loses definition.

If you want to run the Deluxe Reverb with the Red Knobbed Champ in series, 
what you want to do is first plug your mike into the #1 input of the channel 
you want to play thru, and then get a guitar cable and plug that into the #2 
input of the channel your plugged into at one end of the cable and with the 
other into the #1 input of the Champ and then adjust everything to taste. On 
most Fender amps with more than 1 input jack, you can do this in series with 
almost as many amps as you want to put in the series, as Magic Dick used to 
do in the 70's heydey of the J. Geils band with three Twin Reverbs on stage.

Remember, most amps are NOT designed with harmonica in mind, but guitar 
players, and what works for guitar doesn't always work well for harp (yes, 
some things do, but remember, some don't).

Sincerely,
Barbeque Bob Maglinte
Boston, MA
http://www.barbequebob.com
MP3's: http://music.mp3lizard.com/barbequebob/