[Harp-L] Chromatic KEY choices

[Ron Burton]

Having been a personal observer of Smo-Jo's playing since the last century, I can attest to his somewhat confusing, initially, and always mind blowing method of "which key do I use now" chromatic?  There is a method to his madness...just ask to see his "circle of keys" chart which to this day I am still trying to reconcile.  He turned a "what harp to use" question into an astro-physical equation that, as you can see below, I am still trying to wrap my harp around.  Consequently, since I read, I have unfortunately, as some may lament, been forced to stay with my "C" and know that when I have a  Bb...it's a draw with the stem in..   as long as my mouth is in the right place.  Bottom line is...Smokey KNOWS his instrument...back and forward.  Proof of which comes from the first time I heard him play.  A local band was doing a light jazz jam.  Long story short...band leader asked what do you want to do?  His answer was how about "Song For My Father"?..Somewhat taken aback, the bandleader asked with some degree of disbelief  "what key"?  Smokey's answer still amazes me....."Any key you want."  I rest my case.

I'm not here to pump his rep...not needed.  Just saying, practice what comes best and easiest to each.  KNOW and own each tune or scale.  I still can't overblow but that doesn't mean I still don't try.  See you in Carnegie Hall.

Ron of the 'Glades


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From: Harp-L <harp-l-bounces at xxxxx> on behalf of Joseph Leone <3n037 at xxxxx>
Sent: Tuesday, March 14, 2017 10:50 AM
To: fmajor7


Everything you said was correct fmajor7. And I wasn’t contradicting a thing. Agree totally. I was just saying that some (shall we say advanced) players ‘mess’ with tunes. Here’s an example:

Richard Hayman gave a concert at the Jackie Gleason theater in Miami. He said “I have a request for Ruby” (from the movie Ruby Gentry). He said “I haven’t done it in years (yeah…right),
but I’ll give it a try. I don’t even think that we have the music for it here”.

Sooo, Hayman starts to play the tune and guess what? The camera zooms in on the piano player and right there on the music stand is a chart for Ruby..clear as day, and ‘I’ was able to make
out ONE flat on the sheet. Which IS key of F.

Here’s what happened. Hayman, who is known to play an A tuned chromatic, played the tune in F (one flat) ON an A chromatic (3 sharps). The sound came out as bup-a da-ba….  TWO sharps
( D major ) Ok, the original movie theme was done by George Fielding IN D but George used a C chromatic. The deal IS..The ONE flat of the music cancelled out ONE sharp of the harmonica,
and the result was TWO sharps. Which is the original key.

The cool thing is that BOTH F and D are draw keys and the critical notes that set the mood are both draw notes. So the tune still sounds good. Because everyone knows that you can milk draw
notes better than blow notes.

Ok, so..it doesn’t take a nuclear archeologist to see that this can get quite involved. A person would either need the transposed charts OR have spent a lot of time on this. And for this reason I
totally agree with what you said. Best to use a C. And maybe some oither key now and then on certain tunes for effect. But a C usually suffices. The only reason why I ever experimented was
because unlike other instruments, which are ‘all blow’ (so to speak), the harmonica is a wonderful instrument that swings both ways. When I first picked one up, instead of blowing like most folks
I sucked. (still do. lolol).

25 years ago I was going to do a group presentation at SPAH but was shot down. The leaders felt that it was not the direction to send newer players on. Too involved, too confusing. But I cross
key all the time.

smokey joe

> On Mar 14, 2017, at 9:48 AM, fmajor7 <fmajor7 at xxxxx> wrote:
>
> Sounds quite interesting but complicated. You can use the 4-Octave Chromatic to get the low octave sound or the Tenor C (I use it also) which has wonderful sound. Ron Kalina, the famous jazz chromatic player used the Tenor just for the tone.
> Toots Thielemans and all other jazz players use only the C-Chromatic.
>
> On 14 March 2017 at 14:35, Joseph Leone <3n037 at xxxxx <mailto:3n037 at xxxxx>> wrote:
> Some people (that’s ‘some’) use different keyed chromatics in order to get a different sound. Iow they want to get into a draw key instead of a blow key. Then ‘lean’ on the draw notes.
> Example: A tune is in Cm and the ends of the phrases are on blow notes on a C chromatic. So they use a Bb play it in Dm and the ends of the phrases land on draw notes.