RE: [Harp-L] Bass amps for amplified harp

["Dennis M. Cooper" <dcooper@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

 I use a couple of different bass amp heads and cabinets.

Amp Heads:
1. An early 60's Alamo Paragon Bass head with a single 12ax7 preamp tube and
two 6L6GC power tubes. It's all-original and needs some capacitor work to
eliminate some of the floor noise, but it's a great Blues Amp.

2. A 2003 Pignose B-100V head with one 12AX7 and one 12AU7 preamp tube and
four 6L6GC power tubes. This puppy is LOUD and has a great tone for
Rock-N-Roll as well as playing standards in my one-man shows in larger
venues.

The Cabs are both sealed back single 15" units using the stock Alamo speaker
in on and an Altec Lansing full range paper-edge PA speaker in the second
rated at 300 watts.

For most of my work I just use my PA system, but it's a lot of fun to drag
one of the tube amps to a blues club once in a while an cut loose.

Best Regards,
Dennis M. Cooper

http://www.dennis-cooper.com
http://www.harmonicaBootCamp.com
http://www.reverbnation.com/denniscooper
 




-----Original Message-----
From: harp-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxx [mailto:harp-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf
Of John F. Potts
Sent: Saturday, September 19, 2009 8:18 AM
To: harp-l@xxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [Harp-L] Bass amps for amplified harp

Since the end of last year, I've been playing through a small SWR  
Baby Baby Blue bass amp,   i think it's primarily designed for  
acoustic bass.  It has a 10" speaker, a piezo tweeter (which i turn off), a
tube preamp (solid state power stage), and very sophisticated
3 band semi parametric EQ that gives me almost total control over tone
shaping.  Nice deep, dark, thick tone, with a little texture  
from the tube pre.   No reverb, but I put a delay set to slap back in  
the effects loop since i don't like to play dry. 120 watts and won't
feedback, even at relatively loud volumes.  Has a line out and an XLR out,
which i've never had to use.

I'm very happy with this amp.  I get very, very close the sound i  
hear in my head.   Really wonderful harp amp for my style of play and  
the sound i want to create.  Works well both with and without the effects
pedals I've started to use.  And I can get as loud as i need to without fear
of feedback.

Now, I assumed this amp was special because of the elaborate EQ and the tube
pre. I also happen to have a strong preference for 10"  
speakers.  But, a few months ago, due to a peculiar combination of
circumstances, I wound up playing through the second input of a bass
player's Behringer bass amp that had one 15" speaker (which the bass player
kept telling me was an EV Black Widow) and my harp sounded GREAT through
that bass rig, too.

Now, I've started to wonder if bass amps in general may be well suited for
playing amplified harp.  Certainly, a bass amp does not provide the
distorted tone that some harmonica players like to get from an overdriven
tube amp, but that's not the sound i go for anyway.  I prefer a basically
clean, dark, thick sound with some body and texture (and that I can make
respond to my mic handling and breath techniques) and my limited experience
playing through bass amps has given me just that.

Anyone else have experience playing harp through a bass rig? What do you
think?

JP
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