Re: [Harp-L] teaching question



I agree with everything Dennis said.
I played pucker style for a long time. I was a pretty good player with a decent tone, used my tongue for octaves but did not do the 3 hole left side of the mouth tongue slap pucker. For years I saw the tongue block on the little sheet that came with harps and in books but it just seemed to hard and kind of silly. I didn't have the ear to hear it on record so I didn't bother.


My senior year of college I went to the National Guitar Summer Workshop and studied with Annie Raines for a week. She played a simple boogie woogie bassline puckered and then TBed and the difference was HUGE. I finally heard it and finally got it. It still took me a couple of years of watching TV with a harp in my mouth to get the hang of it and since I don't do too much bending Tbed some might say I still don't have it. But I am comfortable playing both embouchures and will use what ever fits a particular phrase best.

The few people I've taught I have told them to start TBing immediately so they don't have to relearn everything like I did. I play the same boogie woogie bassline that annie played for me puckered and then TBed and they get it too.

The same thing happened with my chromatic playing. I thought I was a bad ass chromatic player until I realized I was playing Little Walter 4 hole style not the George Smith 5 hole octave style. I pretty much had to relearn everything on that too. I even taped over the 3 middle holes just to make sure I could get my mouth over the damn thing.
Ryan



From: backbender1 <backbender1@xxxxxxxxx>
To: harp-l@xxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: [Harp-L] teaching question
Date: Wed, 9 Nov 2005 08:33:39 -0800 (PST)

Hi -

I have been teaching for over 12 years, and while I
didn't start off with TB, I wish I had, since the TB
sounds are the sounds I really wanted to make (all the
TB effects like syncopated rhythm, tongue trills,
octaves, bigger resonance for your tone,
etc...)...besides the fact that just about evry player
I know that can play both ways finds it a lot easier
to navigate on the harp while TB since you can use
your tongue as your guide.

Everyone does learn differently, but I have found over
these years that the earlier I start with the TB, the
easier it is for the student. I have had students that
never played a harp before coming to a lesson, and in
the first lesson they are TB & bending. I also have
students that have not TB for many years, and need to
work out old habits and break in new TB habits for a
long time before they can get the TB down, and that
can also be frustrating for them. I also find that a
fair amount of teachers I know either don't TB well,
or don't give the students enough credit that they
will put in the effort.

Having said all that, some students that are not very
serious will not want to put in the effort right away
to TB, but I have found in most cases, it is best for
the student - if they ultimately want to play in that
style.

Thanks for listening!

-Dennis Gruenling
www.dennisgruenling.com





__________________________________
Yahoo! FareChase: Search multiple travel sites in one click.
http://farechase.yahoo.com
_______________________________________________
Harp-L is sponsored by SPAH, http://www.spah.org
Harp-L@xxxxxxxxxx
http://harp-l.org/mailman/listinfo/harp-l

_________________________________________________________________
Don?t just search. Find. Check out the new MSN Search! http://search.msn.click-url.com/go/onm00200636ave/direct/01/






This archive was generated by a fusion of Pipermail 0.09 (Mailman edition) and MHonArc 2.6.8.