Re: [Harp-L] "Oh Girl" position

[joe leone <3n037@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Sep 20, 2010, at 10:35 AM, Winslow Yerxa wrote:

> Sound like a chromatic to me, too, though it could be a diatonic.  
> Either way it sounds like first position.
>
> I caught the lip-sychned video by chance last night on some oldies  
> program hosted by Aretha Franklin. The guy hold a harmonica kept  
> making these illogical wide moves or a large harmonica.

Yeah Wizard. That was the first thing I noticed. Elizabeth mentioned  
it could have been a 'Goliath' model, AND from the thinness and  
length, that is a perfectly good assumption. 'I', myself was thinking  
Polyphonia. On a subsequent look see, I seem to feel that the width  
(front to back) is slightly thin for a Poly....But possible. However,  
even in a big town a Goliath would have been easier to find than a  
Poly. So Elizabeth, ever the vigilant, has a point.

> When I first saw it I thought "Oh, a CBH 2016," which would have  
> been right for the period. But further viewing revealed this not to  
> be the case, and as I noticed the "player" going from one end of  
> the harmonica to the other to play notes that were in the same  
> hole, I realized that, once again, the largest harmonica available  
> for display purposes had been pressed into service as a prop.

That's exactly what I concluded and I wrote Johnnyharp off list  
because I was afraid that my continued input was belaboring everyone  
on what may have been perceived as a 'deminimus subject matter'. The  
player holds the harp in his left but DOESN't cup it. He cradles it  
and lets his other hand 'push' the harp back and forth. So much so to  
the extent that the intervals are ridiculous. If I had to give him at  
least one saving grace, at least he went right for low notes and left  
for high notes  lol.

Here's the deal, as I see it. There is an old axiom in the  
entertainment world that: 'Everything is fair in show business'. To  
that end, I firmly believe that since the harmonica figures SO  
heavily in this tune, the producers made a concerted effort for it to  
be seen. Now we (as people having what I like to call 'Harmonica  
Torettes') all know that seeing someone holding AND cupping a  
chromatic, which is almost mandatory for these sounds, leaves one  
with a picture of a person with their hands over their face, and not  
much more. Only players like Stevie Wonder and a few others who hold  
the harmonica by the very ends as if it's a hot waffle iron, allow  
one the opportunity to even see it.

As for diatonic, Pshaaaa, a cupped diatonic would have been virtually  
invisible. Anyone who ever watched my friend Charley McCoy play would  
have a hard time seeing it and he even SWITCHES harps and hardly  
anyone notices. So, you and Gary Lehman are right. This long thin  
silvery covered harp was definitely a prop.

Sorry I bent everyone's ear.   smokey-joe

> Winslow Yerxa
> Author, Harmonica For Dummies ISBN 978-0-470-33729-5
> Harmonica instructor, The Jazzschool for Music Study and Performance
> Resident expert, bluesharmonica.com
> Columnist, harmonicasessions.com
>
> --- On Sun, 9/19/10, Gary Lehmann <gnarlyheman@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> From: Gary Lehmann <gnarlyheman@xxxxxxxxx>
> Subject: Re: [Harp-L] "Oh Girl" position
> To: "harp-l" <Harp-L@xxxxxxxxxx>
> Date: Sunday, September 19, 2010, 9:01 PM
>
> This clip is lip synched to the original recording.
> So it's not much help to our quest to determine the instrument in  
> question.
> Does sound like a chrom to me!