[Harp-L] [Harp-l] Harmonica conventions in Europe - Some reflexion

[Sébastien Frémal]

Hi !!

I was thinking yesterday evening about harmonica conventions in Europe and
I thought maybe it's worth a message, a conversation. I don't know if it's
recent, but I see many nice harmonica projects in Europe. Cain's UK
harps, Brodur's french harps, french dom'y'seal... And behind these
projects, there are interesting people with who we could
have interesting chats. There are a lot of known or unknown harmonica
players it would be great to hear and meet... I checked for harmonica
conventions to see if it was possible to meet these people, to discover
these projects, learn some harmonica technics... I'm in Belgium, I'm
half-time artist (I need a half-time conventional job to pay the roof and
the food), I don't have a lot of money. I checked the internet for nearby
and affordable conventions. I found this page :
http://harmonica.co.uk/diary.htm

I won't go into details, but most conventions are far and expensive and
strongly blues-oriented (I'm more interested in the chromatic
Massolo/Charlier/Peyrelevade style). If I could reach the convention
location, workshops are pretty all focused around blues and most are really
really expensive (often half the money I have to hold the month, and
sometimes they even ask all I have). And I found no conventions about just
gathering, meeting and sharing innovations or thought on the instrument.
There are no "harmonica markets" where you could meet people like Cain or
Messier to discover and try their work. Or just meet people who are not
necessarily blues players and who could share their knowledge with the new
generation.

And I'm from the country which gave birth to one of the most known
harmonica player. But there is only one convention once every two years.
And as their budget is pretty limited, they offer interesting but limited
"content".

There it is, some thought about the lack of opportunity to meet new people
and to share about innovations and technics in the harp world. Maybe some
things could be done, I don't know. I hope so :)

Sebastien Fremal