Re: [Harp-L] Re:How we learned diatonic harmonica

["Vern Smith" <jevern@xxxxxxx>]

My Grandfather gave me a Marine Band from his collection of harps when I was 
about age 8, circa 1936.  He played enthusiastically but never used single 
notes via pucker or TB. I was delighted and learned to play some simple 
tunes.  Then I noticed that the harp had a frustrating defect...no "fa" and 
"la" in the lower octave and no accidentals!  I would be playing merrily 
along and suddenly the note that I wanted could not be played! At the time I 
had no contact with blues harmonica and bending never occurred to me. Then 
my ear told me that many of the chords that my Grandfather played just 
didn't sound right. ( I now know that I was expecting to hear VI7, II7 and 
IV chords that he couldn't play). I invested my time in the diatonic and I 
felt that it had betrayed me.  My childish problem was that I was expecting 
it to use it like a standard musical instrument and not as a "blues 
machine".  I quit in disgust and asked my Dad for a fiddle.  He gave me a 
guitar because he didn't want to listen to me practice fiddle.

Later I discovered the chromatic that had all the notes, including the 
"black-key" notes..  That early experience biased me against the diatonic. 
Although I have reconciled with the diatonic intellectually, I still have 
remnants of the emotional bias. Occasionally, I toy with the idea of 
learning to bend and to play blues on the diatonic...something that any 
well-rounded harmonicist should be able to do.

As early as age 16, circa 1944, I built my first foot pedal mechanism for 
playing a chromatic on a rack It was a huge, clumsy "kluge" that had a big 
slab of plywood on my chest, aluminum shoulder straps, and an automobile 
choke cable.  For the next 60 years, the problem of rack chromatic was never 
far from my mind.  I built foot pedal mechanisms using model aircraft 
push/pull cables, and pneumatic, hydraulic, and solenoid mechanisms.

When I retired in 1994, I studied music theory at a local college and 
learned to read music on the chromatic.  In 2002, I invented the 
Hands-Free-Chromatic and that is what I use now.  Although I'm not an 
accomplished performer, I love the harmonica with self-accompaniment on 
guitar.

Vern
Visit my harmonica website www.Hands-Free-Chromatic.7p.com