RE: [Harp-L] Creating solid notes through bending techniques

["Bradford Trainham" <bradford.trainham@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Of help to me with timbre has been to take some passage with say, a
three-double bend... And try to play it at lower and lower volumes while
sustaining the correct pitch. 
As I get better with that, for some reason, the timbre of the bent note
resembles more and more the notes around it. 
Also, playing in fifth... And particularly twelfth position, if not helping
the problem, at least gives me ample opportunity to address it. 
It seems to me that those of us who currently or who have previously spent
most of our harmonica playing time in second position almost unconsciously
make the bends on two and three darker.
If we started out, as I did on "leakier" harps, we were probably pleased to
get a sound resembling the note we sought and left the timbre for later
resolution.
But it does seem to be a common definitive characteristic of "advanced" harp
players that those bent notes have the same "shapes" as their non-bent note
neighbors.
 Brad Trainham


-----Original Message-----
From: harp-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxx [mailto:harp-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf
Of MLeFree
Sent: Friday, October 03, 2008 6:12 PM
To: harp-l@xxxxxxxxxx
Subject: RE: [Harp-L] Creating solid notes through bending techniques

Iceman, Smokey Joe and others have given some fine advice on how to hit bent
notes solidly. This is quite a germane subject for me as I have been
focusing my practice on doing just that for some time now. I like to think
that I have gotten fairly good at hitting the bends accurately enough. I
practice a number of melodies that are firmly planted in my head to achieve
proper bends (Spoonful is one of them). But my current work has been
concentrating on the tonal quality of the bent notes. Some of mine sound
pretty anemic, even though the pitch seems OK to my ear. I've been working
on getting the bent notes to sound as much like a "native" unbent note as
possible. For me, that's a toughie.  Playing a well-known simple melody
really makes the sour bent notes stick out for me, so that is what I have
been concentrating on.

Grant Dermody, in a couple of teaching sessions, quickly surmised that I was
likely failing to get my tongue out of the way. He was right enough, so I
have really been working hard on doing that. As a life-long (self-taught)
whistler, I have evidently developed some bad habits when it comes to my
tongue position. I have never become sensitized to how holding my tongue
wagging around in my mouth may diminish my whistling tone, even though it
may well do that.  Even having Grant's advice to get my tongue down and out
of the way in the forefront of my mind, I still catch myself with my tongue
pointed skyward during a bend. I know, practice, practice, practice!

My question for the masters is what can I do to improve my bent note tone?
I've begun to wonder if the tone of some of them will ever approach my tone
with unbent notes, which I am pretty happy with. Are there exercise,
concepts, or rules that can guide me in my solitary efforts to improve?

Many Thanks,

Michelle




_______________________________________________
Harp-L is sponsored by SPAH, http://www.spah.org Harp-L@xxxxxxxxxx
http://harp-l.org/mailman/listinfo/harp-l