[Harp-L] Stevie's harmonicas

[Robert Bonfiglio <bon@xxxxxxxxxx>]

I was very close to Cham-ber and Frank Huang when Cham-ber mad the  
CBH 2016.  Frank designed a similar chromatic that had channels but  
used a cut in on the covers to keep the air from being cut off.  I  
played the proto type; made of brass it was heavy as hell. He used  
pre war 280 plates from harmonicas that were sent back for repair.   
They were all in the key of C.  This was Stevie's harmonica at least  
in about 1975 or so because I played it once at Hohner.  I do not  
recall Frank tuning a set 280 plates to B.

When I was a soloist on the song writer's hall of fame I got to talk  
with Stevie about a half an hour back stage about harmonicas.  He was  
playing Frank's harmonica there and we talked about harmonicas and  
the micropore valves I was using.

By this time in the studio, varispeed recorders were all over the  
place.  I used them all the time to change keys of some commercial or  
movie them to get it into a flat key.  I would then transpose at  
sight.  They would change the pitch back which would make the  
harmonica sound a bit tinny and the vibrato faster.  Varispeed  
recorders also accounted for the recordings coming out in the cracks  
between keys if people weren't careful in calibration.

When DAT's came out, this pitch difference was eliminated, but while  
playing "Through the Raindrops" to tracks on Canada AM live, I had a  
horrible experience.  I had tuned my  harmonica exactly to the DAT.   
We had 60 seconds during the commercial for me to come out, listen to  
the level of the tracks on the monitors and get me level.  The  
monitors played the tracks and they were a quarter tone flat.  The  
engineer had transferred my DAT to a varispeed recorder.  I  
immediately asked him if he had used a varispeed recorder and he said  
yes.  He thought I could just tune to the tracks like a violin.

I told him to speed it up a little in the last 15 seconds, but ended  
up having to play to tracks way out of tune.  Fingernails on a  
blackboard!!   I was ready to kill the guy when a lady came to me and  
said that was so beautiful.  I just said "next" and moved on.

Harmonically yours,

Robert Bonfiglio
http://www.robertbonfiglio.com