[Harp-L] tongue blocking vs corner playing

[philharpn@xxxxxxx]

I've always thought that  tongue blocking was a misnomer because it only partially describes what is happening.


What is really happening is corner playing. The player most likely is playing out the right corner of his mouth.


Calling it tongue blocking obfuscates the process. If you think of it as corner playing, it's easier to understand and easier to execute.


But the real key is corner playing. That's because you can play out of the corner of your mouth without using your tongue. Once you get on to it it's about as difficult as lip-pursing, lip blocking, whistle shape, straw sucking or whatever the center mouth shape wants to be called.


>From the first time I picked up a harmonica with that little wrapper describing tongue blocking and through several books that insisted that tongue blocking was the ONLY way to play until several years later, I could never GET tongue blocking. I could never figure out where the tongue was supposed to go.


That's why playing octaves is actually easier than playing single holes/notes : all you have to do it put the tip of your tongue on the partition between holes 2 and 3 and make sure your mouth is wide enough to cover four holes. It is almost as imprecise as playing a chord. 




Then one day I started playing out of the corner of my mouth and playing stuff I could already play lip pursing. Within a few minutes I had a start and a few hours later I had the technique under control. I had no idea where my tongue was. All I did was concentrate on getting a good seal in the corner of my mouth. Later on I got involved in vamping and slaps. Slaps and vamps can be executed by moving the tongue off to the left on the harp while leaving that right corner open. The most important thing to remember is just to get the tongue out of the way. 


I once saw a guy demonstrate corner playing and its more advanced component vamping by putting his mouth on his glasses so it was plainly visible where the corner of his mouth was.




Hope this helps,
Phil