[Harp-L] Laurent Maur tries MIDI Harmonica for the First Time

[Richard Hunter]

That's some pretty impressive stuff.  This may have been mentioned in
another post, but what is the synthesizer on the back end of this
controller?  And did you (Brendan) pre-select the sounds for him to use
based on your knowledge of the synth involved, or did he just start
scrolling through synth presets?  The arpeggiator on that synth is pretty
wicked.

This video makes it pretty clear that this thing 1) works, 2) is capable of
transforming the palette of sounds that a skilled player can bring to a
performance, 3) isn't a harmonica per se.  It's a device that a harmonica
player can use to enter a new universe.

Blues players might say that it's not much use for blues, and I tend to
agree that it's not tops for playing roots-based music.  But if you want to
explore music from a 21st century point of view, it's da bomb.

In this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwgIAFOnJVs
We see one of the differences between a harmonica and a synth.  When Brenda
talks about "swelling" the note with volume, what's really happening is
that the increasing (MIDI) volume is triggering a filter in whatever synth
patch is active. Very cool, but fundamentally different from the tone
changes you achieve when you increase volume on a reed instrument.

Regards, RIchard Hunter
-- 
"The Lucky One" 21st century rock harmonica project at
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/richard-hunter-s-the-lucky-one/x/5259889#/
Author, "Jazz Harp" (Oak Publications, NYC)
Latest mp3s and harmonica blog at http://hunterharp.com
Vids at http://www.youtube.com/user/lightninrick
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