[Harp-L] Re: XB-40

[David Fairweather <dmf273@xxxxxxxxx>]

Very sorry to hear that the XB-40 is discontinued.   But I'm not surprised.
 The decision to make each note (except the 3 draw) bend one whole step,
may have been logical and easy to understand, but musically  was not
optimal.   Despite all those available enharmonics, it was still necessary
to hit precisely controlled "in-between" bends if you wanted to play it
with full chromaticity.     Just before it was released by Hohner, Rick
Epping allowed me an hour alone with a pre-release model and I immediately
knew those in-between bends were its Achilles heel.  Hence my decision to
have Pat Missin retune my XB-40's to XB-Melody tuning which  I designed to
give every note in the chromatic scale its own stable home, either unbent
or fully bent.   In order to achieve that goal,  the bending range of some
reeds were reduced to 1/2 step,  some were unchanged and some were
increased to 1-1/2 steps.

The end result can be viewed here:

http://youtu.be/Hbvh8-coLqw ("Moody's Mood for Love")

 and here:

http://youtu.be/H6ksUBFk9So (Medley "Grazin in the Grass, Do You Know the
Way to San Jose, I Say a Little Prayer".)

I regret that despite my best efforts,  no one else seemed interested in
exploring my concept.   Perhaps it was the Melody Maker tuning which put
people off, but the same concept of modifying the tuning on the responder
reeds to reduce the "wobbliness" of all those in-between bends could have
been applied to Richter tuning.

There were other less bothersome problems with the XB-40 including its fat
mouth profile, and its neither fish nor fowl valved diatonic sound.  But
those I could and did get used to.

So goodbye XB-40.  Although in recent years I have switched to Fourkey
tuning,  I still look back fondly on those heady days when the XB was new
and I still keep in the back of my mind an intent to someday return to the
XB-Melody for more exploration.