Re: [Harp-L] Rick, Roscoe, Chris and the rest of the family

[fjm <mktspot@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I think Ben raises some very valid issues regarding the difficulty of 
playing jazz on any harmonica.  Tinus's follow up regarding articulation 
in particular is right on the money.  This is an area where chromatic 
has an enormous advantage because it's a lot easier to articulate blow 
and draw notes on a chromatic and achieve the illusion of legato.  When 
you throw in the issues of intonation and how that intonation is arrived 
at, slide versus manipulation of the airway it's easy to see why the 
only people currently commercially successful in the jazz arena all play 
chromatic.  I certainly don't think that jazz playing on a diatonic is a 
dead end.  Ben Bouman's mention of Magic Dave's The Deb is an excellent 
example of a jazz style played successfully on a diatonic.  A lot of the 
overblow style playing is by definition experimental and ground 
breaking.  Nobody has played a diatonic harmonica like this before. 
While I've always liked the Flecktones with Howard Levy I never truly 
understood what Howard was up to until the 2000 Summit in Minneapolis. 
Seeing Trio Globo was mind blowing, overblows with a context.  It sure 
worked for me.  fjm