Re: Fw: [Harp-L] What to play off the cuff

[Nicolas Fouquet <bbhcfr@xxxxxxxx>]

Chords!! Never forget harmonica is designed to make chords as well!! 
I play few chords and try to make them sound nice. Then, I lay a tune. the tune will depends of my mood. 
Since few days, I am playing Requiems... :-(   
But I am not good at expressing my deep thoughts...
Anyway, let's go back to these chords: you can play them in Rory Mc Leod style: make them sound as soulful as possible and expressive and bring along people onto your musical trip... or play at the old Sonny Terry style and make people jump around and stomp and snap and clap!!
 
Froggy

hannon <beauxart2@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I usually play a few bars of "Taps"



----- Original Message ----- 
From: "martin oldsberg" 
To: 
Sent: Monday, May 02, 2005 2:41 PM
Subject: [Harp-L] What to play off the cuff


>
> This isn4t something that keeps me awake at night, but occasionally I 
> reflect upon what is the best thing to play when asked to perform 
> something impromptu, just a bar or two in case you have a harmonica at 
> hand and someone ask you for a sample of how it sounds. (Generally I do 
> not recommend carrying around a harmonica at all times, that seems just to 
> encourage abuse and further confirm the publics low estimate of the 
> instrument. The portability of the thing is too often confused with some 
> supposed widely felt need to listen to a harmonica every now and then. You 
> never see tuba players terrorizing pub crowds with recently acquired 
> skills.)
>
> As a diatonic player I use to opt for a blues riff of sorts. Many would 
> settle for a scale, but that4s a bit dry. (Howard Levy had an interesting 
> take on the scale theme when he performed on the Garrison Keillor show 
> (who said he couldn4t play octaves?). I4ve also seen Toots on a TV-show 
> when asked to play something on his odd instrument just rush through all 
> three octaves chromatically at lightning speed. He had heard that question 
> many times.)
>
> Your national anthem could be something, but they are generally rather 
> boring (envy the French with that great song; works reasonably well in 2 
> pos). A Beatles tune  but which one? Stardust?  one of the ten most 
> recorded songs of the last century I read someplace. (But tricky: starting 
> the refrain in 1 pos you have to pull off an overdraw on 7D; probably the 
> most difficult note on the diatonic. To risky. Starting an octave lower it 
> tends to get a bit mushy.)
>
> The point is not to show off  but still somehow show you can play.
>
> Nowadays I tend to pull off something jazzy/bluesy in 12 pos, going 
> through first two octaves in major pentatonic and wailing a bit on 6D - 
> but I think a recognizable tune is to be preferred.
>
> As I said, no big thing but it would be interesting to see some 
> suggestions. What do you chose? Oh Susannah? Love me do intro? Eine 
> kleine Nachtmusik? Rule Britannia?
>
>
>
> Cheers,
>
> Martin
>
>
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