Re: [Harp-L] Re: The beatings will continue untill tuning improves

I prefer to have the octaves perfect n tune...when I want/need the beating sound I bend either from the left or right sid of my mouth. This allows me to vary the speed/intensity of the beating.
I have all William Clarke recordings and one some he plays harps that are really out of tune, esp. on the older recordings.
But he still sounds great and I'm pretty sure that he made the beating sound the way he wanted it to sound.
On chromatic you can hear him vary the speed depending on the song ..

A good exercise on diatonic is playing 2-5 draw split and try to bend 2 down ( on a C harp) to F, so that's a wholestep bend on 2.
Or play the 3-6 draw split and bend the 3 draw to A ( on a C harp= wholestep bend).
If that's a problem, first try to play from the left side of my mouth ( while tongue-blocking...) hole 2 draw....next step is to try to control the bend playing from the left.....when that works well, simply make your embouchure a little wider and let hole 5 draw slip in while holding the bend on 2..
The same goes for 3-6,start on the 3 draw wholestep bend and slowly make the embouchure wider.

This exercise gives you a lot of control on all bends because you'll learn to use different muscles which brings the coordination on a higher level.
For practice I sometimes play a simple song or theme, starting with pucker embouchure, next is to play the same from the right side of my mouth, next from the left and last is to mix all embouchures.

I also love the sound of the tongue slaps when playing from the left side.
Normally you will hear the lower chord when you play f.i. 4 draw tongueblocked, but now you'll hear the higher chords.
Some singles get different overtones when you practise this ( at least that what think of it!!!)


Ben Bouman
www.beta-harps.com
www.harmonicainstituut.nl
www.marble-amps.com
www.harmonicaheaven.nl

----- Original Message ----- From: "Glenn and Debbie Woodhouse" <gwoodhouse40@xxxxxxx>
To: "Harp-L Harp-L" <harp-l@xxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, November 25, 2009 6:08 PM
Subject: [Harp-L] Re: The beatings will continue untill tuning improves



I'm with you Wendell, I love that Clarke beating sound. William Clarke's chromatic style has had a real influence on my diatonic playing. Wether he set the harps up that way on purpose or they just migrated to it, it is the tuning that provides the beating. I have a couple of harps that give me a similar, and pleasant beating, on select high octaves ("pleasantness is in the ear of the harpholder!"). I've been getting into doing my own tuning and I would hate to tune this out of those harps for the stuff I'm playing with my band. If I get an unpleasant beating I tune it out. I'll have to start documenting the tuning differences that provide "good" beating so that I may be able to reproduce it in the future. If I get some of this good beating tuning data next time I'm tuning harps I'll send it out to the list.



Glenn

The ColdRail Blues Band

www.ColdRail.com


> 
Message: 9
Date: Wed, 25 Nov 2009 09:25:49 -0500
From: "Wendell Jenkins" <bacon-fat@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [Harp-L] The beatings will continue untill tuning improves
To: <harp-l@xxxxxxxxxx>
Message-ID: <003801ca6ddb$3093f9f0$0200a8c0@je2>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"

I understand, when tuning a harmonica it's best to avoid beating of octaves.
But I really like the way William Clarke uses a beating effect in his stuff.
Is it the tuning, or the technique, bending one side of the octave ?


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