[Harp-L] Changing harps during a song

["Winslow Yerxa" <winslowyerxa@xxxxxxxxx>]

--- In harp-l-archives@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, fjm <mktspot@...> wrote:

> Maybe nobody talks about changing harmonicas mid song 
> but arguably one of the top 5 solos ever played an a 
> 10 hole diatonic harmonica uses 4 different harmonicas.  
> Norton Buffalo's solo on Bonnie Raitt's cover of Runaway.  
> Personally I use 2 harmonicas to play Winter Wonderland, 
> I use a special tuning for Somewhere Over the Rainbow 
> and I use natural and harmonic minor tunings a lot.  I'll 
> also use the occasional overblow.

Then there's another of the arguably top ten harmonica showpieces - 
Orange Blossom Special, where Charlie McCoy alternates between an F-
harp, played in both second and first positions, and a Bb harp played 
in first - mainly to make the chords during one of the three sections 
of this tune.

As an aside, the invention of Country tuning came about because of 
Charlie's harp switching. While preferring to play second position, 
he frequently needed the major 7th that is unavailable in the middle 
range of the harp with the techniques current in the 1960s and '70s. 
His solution was to pick up a harp tuned a fifth higher (let's say he 
was playing a tune in D on a G-harp. When an A chord came up (with 
the C# that is not part of a G scale), he would switch to a D-harp. A 
fan heard his records and told Charlie he'd figured out how Charlie 
did it - by raising draw 5. Thus was born an altenrate tuning.

Harp switching has an aspect of showmanship as well. A couple of 
years ago I was being featured in a concert on a set of fast reels. 
The low D I was playing started choking under my adrenaline-
influenced attack, so I switched to another low D with higher reed 
gaps, more or less in the middle of a phrase. This was purely for 
practical reasons, but I noticed a strong audience reaction and later 
received several comments on how cool that looked.

I also remember a short film - music videos of the late 1940s, I 
suppose - of the Harmonicats, where Jerry Murad (chromatic) is the 
barber, Don Les (bass), is a customer, and Al Fiore (chord) is - 
well, one or the other. At some slight pretext, the harmonicas come 
out and the fun begins. When the uptempo tune really gets going, 
Jerry starts alternating between two chromatics, one in each hand, 
switching between them rhythmically. I'm sure this was done purely 
for visual effect (and it was FUNNY in context!) and not for any 
musical reason - again, an effective bit of showmanship with harp 
switching.

Winslow