RE: [Harp-L] Changing the Way You Hold the Harp (long)

["James Sterett" <jsterett@xxxxxxxxx>]

whoa... what a post Michelle.  And nice thread to start Rick.  I never
gave much thought to how I've always held the harp, which happens to be
the left thumb/index finger slot style, but man I've got some work to
do.  I was looking for the photo of Phil Wiggins at
http://launch.ph.groups.yahoo.com/group/harp-l-archives/photos but
I'm not finding it.  Am I in the right spot?  and to add a little
illustration to what Michelle was saying, on the front of PT Gazell's
Pace Yourself record there's a pretty good shot of PT and his grip 
http://www.ptgazell.com/CDs.html#Pace%20Yourself

JIm.
 

>>> "MLeFree" <mlefree@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> 1/31/2007 10:15 PM >>>
drori hammer <drori_hammer@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> ...  I was at spah in dallas 2003 and was blown away by Phil Wiggins
> sound and realized that he was doing a lot of muting to get a
> good resonance. Phil - who is a GREAT harp player, as well as a
> nice guy - showed me how he holds the harp, making a sealed cup
> with some resonating space by actually keeping the right hand
> sealed to the CHEEK. kinda hard to describe, but the point is -
> it is hard to change old, basic habits, but I think this really
> helped me develope a nice acoustic sound, with a lot of
> variations in tone. Worth the effort
>   Hammer

Ditto on your assessment of Phil as a player and a gentleman, Drori! A
true
pleasure to be around, especially if you both have harps.  Of course,
it's
no small consolation if he's the only one with a harp.  8^)

The topic of hand grips is one that I've been interested in for some
time,
and that interest was amplified fer sure at SPAH. The fact that hand
effects
are not on the list of the many different aspects of playing blues harp
that
I have been concentrating on became painfully obvious at the blues jam
circles. The caliber of the players I had the audacity to sit down with
made
my lack of skill that much more obvious. Suffice it to say it was a
lesson
in humility as well as superb harpsmanship. So more recently I have
been
working on my own hand grip and hand effect techniques. It's really
paying
off in a way that has helped to pull me out of the harmonica doldrums
I'd
been in prior to SPAH. I thought I'd share a bit if what I've learned.

The SPAH jams circles are fantastic to behold, let alone to participate
in.
It's a real shame that you so rarely get a chance to see even one
great
player play acoustically. Not that I dislike amplified harp, it's just
that
acoustic harmonica is my personal favorite style to both play and to
listen
to. So, one of the things that amazed me the most at SPAH was the
opportunity to see one great player after another play acoustically in
a
circle of maybe 30-40 players. Believe me, I was taking notes.

At the beginning of my learning curve I had seen only 3-4 harp players
who
all used the thumb-forefinger type grip (in the hand that holds the
harp,
with the other hand being the "free" or "wah-wah" hand). I assumed that
that
was how one grips a harp and sorta got stuck with that grip by habit.
Since
then I've seen great players like Phil and P. T. Gazell (as well as
several
players at the SPAH jam circles) who use the "water cup" grip to
amazing
effectiveness. I've tried that grip but it seems wholly unnatural to me
plus
I am simply unable to make an effective cup. It's just not for me.

However, I realized that I could learn how to improve my own grip's
effectiveness if I understood  the water-cup grip, even if I didn't
intend
to use it directly. To my way of thinking, it boils down to two
factors: 1)
(and most importantly) is the completeness of the seal of the chamber
you
form with your cupped hands pressing against your lips/cheeks; and 2)
maximizing the size of the chamber you are able to form with your cup
and
still maintain that seal. At SPAH, Dennis Gruenling emphasized the
importance of the seal and demonstrated to a couple of us how his seal
is
completely airtight. It's important to be perfectly clear here that
I'm
talking about his acoustic grip. Everyone knows that you have to have a
near
complete seal to get the compression/distortion you want when playing
with a
mic'. I have found it really amazing how important the completeness of
the
seal is for an effective acoustic grip as well. You can ~see~ the
compression and rarification that Dennis achieves inside his grip by
looking
at his cheeks and the flesh of his hands as he plays. Whatever air goes
in
or comes out of his lungs comes through that harp, period--no leakage
around
his cheeks or his hands whatever.

As to maximizing the size of your "cup," some of us have a greater
natural
advantage than others. Walter Horton and Rice Miller both had
humongous
hands. Phil Wiggins has a pair of pretty good sized meat-hooks himself.
Our
own Warren Bee looks like he could crush baseballs barehanded. I guess
you
just do the best you can and experiment with making your cup as big as
possible without breaking that all-important seal. Whatever you do, you
have
to seek and eliminate any leak around the harp, your hands, or your
cheeks.
Each little leak diminishes the effectiveness of your seal and hence,
your
tone and the quality of your hand effects.

P.T. also uses a water-cup grip. He has a way of cocking his right
index
finger in a way that makes it almost look like it's dislocated, as it
forms
a near 90 degree angle with the back if his hand. He grasps the harp
inside
the crook in his index finger. That right index finger is all he needs
to
hold the harp. He then uses the rest of his right hand and his left
hand to
form the "water-cup" that he presses quite positively against his
cheeks. I
learned two things from P.T. that I could apply to my thumb-forefinger
grip.
One was that you should nearly always cup your harp to some degree. It
takes
away some of that harshness some listeners complain about and makes the
tone
a tad darker. P.T. holds his grip open a fraction of an inch where the
heels
of his hands come together to complete his "cup." That's also where
makes
his hands open and close to form his wah-wahs and where he places a
mic'--from underneath, right beneath that opening between the heels of
his
hands. The other cool thing that I learned from watching the master
play was
that you only need to move your hand(s) very slightly to get a nice
wah-wah
effect. No need to have your hand(s) flapping in the breeze.  P.T.'s
opening
and closing of his hands is almost imperceptible.

Back to Phil Wiggins...
I happen to have a picture of Phil's grip, owing to a similar situation
when
it was me who was quizzing him. For want of a better place, I've posted
it
on the Yahoo Groups Harp-l "Photos" page. His grip is interesting in
that
the right end of his harp is cradled in the crook of the first joint of
his
~second~ finger, not his index finger like P.T.'s. The left end of the
harp
is nestled against his left thumb. He presses that grip against his
cheeks
quite forcefully, especially at the right side as Drori says, and makes
a
seal that is, like Gruenling's, "positive." I guess that holding his
harp in
the crook of his second finger keeps the sharp edges inside his grip,
far
enough to be away from his right cheek.

One thing that seems to be a common theme with the greats I've queried
about
hand grips is the use of some surface where the hands or cheeks meet as
a
"hinge." Madcat actually shaves his beard in a pattern that leaves the
spot
where he clamps his hand against his cheeks clean shaven. That's the
site of
his imaginary "hinge," that spot where he pivots his hand against his
cheek.
Using the device of the imaginary hinge helps me control my hand
motions.

Another note on hand effects, this time from the recently passed
great,
Douglas Tate. Douglas points out in his book, "Play the Harmonica
Well"
(which every harper should have), how your hands form a Helmholtz
Resonator,
and that the size of the chamber formed can be adjusted to the base
frequency of the note being played to create a natural amplification.
It
really works if you try it. You can basically tune the size of your cup
to
the pitch of the note being played. Because of this effect, your cupped
harp
can actually be significantly louder than your uncupped harp.

Lastly a note on the importance of timing your hand motion with the
onset or
diminution of a note you play. In order to achieve maximum "wah"
effect, you
need to carefully time the opening/closing motion of your hands with
the
time at which you initiate or cut off a note. The opening of the hands
cannot be in perfect synchrony with the onset of the playing of a note.
You
just have to play with your timing to see what I mean.

So that's my take on the all-important hand grip. Hopefully they might
help
someone "grappling" with their grip. Another thing y'all might try is
putting Warren Bee's feet to the fire to extract his schweeet hand
effect
secrets... You may have better luck than me.  ;^)

Michelle



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