[Harp-L] Bending explained - but now correctly

[icemanle@xxxxxxx]

What Winslow is describing is exactly the same conclusion I've made the last 10 years through extensive examination of the process and through successfully teaching bending to pitch to total beginners with great success. 


The problem, as I saw it, was that there was no reference points given to awareness of mouth, tongue position, throat, etc. Instead, it was described in nebulous terms of feel.


Here is my conclusion in a nutshell.


Throat is independent of tongue. Keep throat in a "pre yawn attitude". As you begin to yawn, the throat does it's thing by opening and relaxing, with very gentle muscle flex. When you recognize it for what it is, you can voluntarily keep your throat in this "attitude" the whole time you play the harmonica. (I've trained myself to automatically do this even as the harmonica approaches my mouth).


Changes in pitch can be totally controlled by the tongue, with minimal amount of musculature. In fact, I've discovered that most will use the tongue almost correctly, but bundle it together with a lot of unnecessary musculature tension. The trick is to eliminate everything that does not contribute to the desired effect. 


To this end, I began teaching tongue position awareness 10 years ago at Augusta Heritage Center Blues Week and to my private students, once again with astonishing results.


When you say the consonants (or nonsense words) "T", "D", "Rrrrr", "K", "Guh" and "Cha" (The Jewish "Cha" - not the dance "Cha Cha) and turn your full attention to what the tongue does to create these sounds, you will find TARGET SPOTS along the roof of your mouth (moving from just behind your upper front teeth to down the back of the throat) that you can "aim" your curving tongue towards. The airflow that enters your mouth is diverted up and over the curve created in the tongue when aimed at these target points. This airflow diversion instigates the bending effect. On the inhale, you will find it easy to create all the inhale bends in, say hole 3, by coupling the aural feedback of correct pitch with a definite spot to which you aim for in curving the tongue. For instance, 3 hole inhale 1st bend may be a target point around the "T" with subsequent lower bends having target points that move back towards the throat ("Rrrr", "K", "Guh", etc).


Try this slowly a few times right now. You will develop a sense of solid and specific target points that can be recreated exactly time and time again. You can aim your tongue at these points. Remember, the tongue is a miracle muscle that can be quite acrobatic and you CAN learn to control it. It was just taught in quite this fashion to anyone outside of those that specialize in linguistic differences and/or language accents.


If you combine this new knowledge with the BREATHE YOUR HARMONICA - not suck, blow or draw it - and keep your throat at the pre-yawn attitude, you will discover the doorway to complete control of all the bends with MINIMAL amount of musculature movement and effort. 


This is actually much easier to teach to someone that has never played the harmonica, as they are not full of bad habits that need undoing. I've taught rank beginners to do this in one lesson and see amazing results within one to two weeks. I've had these students totally out control notes created through bending technique when compared to players with years of experience and bad habits.


The exhale notes created through bending technique uses the exact same concept. The difference is that the air direction is out, so the tongue has to curve at the very front of the mouth, creating that up and over air deflection effect at the front of the mouth. It is a bit more "compressed", so the target points need to be created in a much tighter area, but once you "get it" through inhale bending, it is not much of a stretch to apply this new knowledge to the exhale.


Once again, you will have to rethink and undo bundled bad habits and rebuild your technique. However, I promise you that the results are worth it. You will begin to approach effortless mastery of bends.


The Iceman


When bending very low notes, some players describe this as bending 
'with the throat" but I'm fairly sure that it's really just the tongue 
constricting in concert with the very back tip of the soft palate, which feels 
as if it's in the throat.







-----Original Message-----
From: Winslow Yerxa <winslowyerxa@xxxxxxxxx>