Re: Re: [Harp-L] Building better harps - How?

["Tim Moyer" <wmharps@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Vern Smith wrote:
>> I think it would be nearly impossible to start with an agenda that
>> requires us to quantify what each and every person prefers from 
>> their harmonica to the point that we can measure and reproduce it 
>> with a mechanical process.
>
> Then you despair of success before undertaking the task.  You are 
> punting on the first down.  If you cannot relate player 
> preferences to mechanical processes, then how can you improve harp 
> performance?

I'm not even in this game.  I have no problem relating player 
preferences to mechanical processes.  I simply don't feel that the 
level of effort you describe is worth the effort.  I can talk to a 
player for a few minutes to understand what they're looking for 
described in terms they understand and related that to what work I 
need to do to make an instrument suit their needs.  

>>> 5.  Our goal should be to make the optimizing of harmonica
>>> performance a science instead of an art!
>>
>> I disagree with this goal.........
>
> Because you do not think it desirable or because you do not think 
> it attainable?

I don't think it's necessary.  I don't feel as though art or 
artisanship has failed us in this endeavor.  

> But "art" isn't a machine and a harmonica is. Playing the 
> harmonica is art but optimizing it's mechanical details should not 
> be.  Music is subjective by definition but a harmonica obeys the 
> laws of physics and acoustics.

Playing a harmonica requires a level of interaction between man an 
machine that I believe is impractical (if not impossible) to 
describe entirely in scientific terms.  There are simply too many 
variables, and the influence many of them have on the player or the 
product are very highly subjective.  

At the highest end of nearly every endeavor of human performance -- 
on top of all the high science and engineering -- is art.  Take the 
set up of a performance car for an elite driver.  Certainly the 
level of engineering that goes into the design, construction and 
adjustment of the car is VERY important, but in the end it's the way 
the car "feels" to the driver that must be optimized for top 
performance.  

> "When you can measure what you are speaking about, and express it 
> in numbers, you know something about it. But when you cannot... 
> your knowledge is of a meager and unsatisfactory kind..."  William 
> Thomson, Lord Kelvin, circa 1893.

I'm not trying to discount the value of understanding in scientific 
terms how something works or techniques that can be used to improve 
its performance.  I'm simply saying that if I want to improve the 
performance of my harmonicas I'd rather invest the time learning 
from someone who is highly skilled in the artisanship, and in 
developing an infrastructure that facilitates the distribution of 
this knowledge.  

-tim

Tim Moyer
Working Man's Harps
http://www.workingmansharps.com/