[Harp-L] Star/Kruezwender/Sextet/Carambola

[Niall Tracey <internationiall@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi all,

I was a regular here about the turn of the century and have been away a while (the guitar stole me away).

I was a ten-holer man for a long time, but I've now switched to tremolo in order to play folk and traditional dance music.

I've built a bit of a scatty set of harmonicas -- an ultracheap C (Big Valley), a vintage G (Echo 48), a Hohner Highlander (D + mixolydian A) and a Hohner Sextet spare in A -- and was hoping to neaten up, and I figured a star/sextet/kreuzwender would be the best way to go.

However...
I've noticed that the Big Valley and the D side of the Highlander (which is a modified Echo A/D) both miss out the bottom notes from the bottom hole -- starting at the equivalent of hole 2 on a 10-holer.

This doesn't work right for the sort of tunes I play, as I'm doing split blocking and rythmic chordal work, so I'm loathe to spend hundreds of pounds on a kreuzwender set without knowing that it's got the notes I need.

The 3 types of kreuz I'm aware of are the Hohner Sextet/Kreuzwender, the Hering Carambola and the Seydel Concerto.

According to the Seydel website, the Concerto has the right tuning... although they only show it in C.  But I have one octave harmonica in my collection at the moment and it doesn't really sound right for some of the self-accompanied stuff (I find the high octave of the accompaniment hides the low octave of the lead and muddies the sound a bit).

Neither the Hohner or the Hering websites give note layouts for their instruments (that I can find) and I'm concerned about the possibility that some of the lower keys might be missing the bottom notes.  Can anyone confirm one way or the other?

Also, has anyone tried the Carambola?  It's a lot cheaper than the Hohner Sextet, and I'm wondering whether that's down to a week Real and a strong Euro, or if there's a real difference in quality.


Is there any other star-types out there that I'm not aware of?  I'm half tempted to buy a set of Thomann tremolos and make my own brackets for them....

 

Thanks,

Níall.

 		 	   		  
_________________________________________________________________
http://clk.atdmt.com/UKM/go/197222280/direct/01/
Do you have a story that started on Hotmail? Tell us now