Re: [Harp-L] EQ pedal recomemndations

[Richard Hunter <turtlehill@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

David Brown wrote:
<Any opinions on EQ pedals well suited for harp use?  Just looking for a good
<pedal, not a fancy rack mount.


Any EQ pedal designed to work with electric guitar will work well with amped harp.  The Boss GE-7 is about $80 new and widely used, so must not suck.  The MXR M-109 is about $10 less, and offers 6 bands of EQ instead of 7.  I haven't tried the Danelectro DJ-14, another 7-band EQ, but the price is attractive at about $30 new.  

The main things to look for are:
1) quiet operation: you don't want the EQ pedal adding lots of noise to your signal.
2) Frequency bands that match up to the important frequencies for harp--roughly around 250 hZ, 500-600 hZ, 1 kHZ, 3 kHZ, 8 kHz and above.  

You can find out the former by checking user reviews at harmony-central.com.  You can find out the latter by checking the specs for the devices.

In most cases, you'll want to cut frequencies below 100 hZ (which is mostly taken up by breathing noise on the harp, and which also tends to conflict with the bass), boost around 250 hZ, and cut the frequencies above 8 kHz (which is where the painfully shrill sounds live). You may need to boost or cut at 1 kHz and 3 kHz depending on what your amp does at those frequencies in order to reduce feedback or help the harp cut through the rest of the band.

Anyway, you should be able to find a device that works very well for stage performance for well under $100.

Regards, Richard Hunter

author, "Jazz Harp"
latest mp3s and harmonica blog at http://myspace.com/richardhunterharp
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