[Harp-L] John Potts' Harmonicas on eBay

[Tom Halchak]

John Potts’ Harmonicas on eBay



Some of you may know, we recently lost a good man, a fellow harmonica
enthusiast back on February 26th.   John Potts, (aka hvyj) from Toledo,
Ohio.  I never met John in person, but we exchanged voluminous emails and
spoke on the phone many times.  He was a very strong supporter of Blue Moon
Harmonicas, and we did business for many years.  At first, he just
purchased aluminum combs from me.  He loved my anodized aluminum combs and
installed them on many of his sets of harmonicas.  As my reed-smithing
skills increased, John commissioned me to build several sets of harps for
him – some of which had non-standard tunings.  For example, he had me tune
a set of Suzuki Olives to A=432 Hz.  He had me tune a couple sets of harps
to what he referred to as “Mad Cat Tuning” a recipe apparently created by
Peter “Mad Cat” Ruth. He had me build two sets of hybrid harmonicas using
Golden Melody covers.  One was a combination of Suzuki Manji Reed Plates
and Golden Melody Covers.  My machinist was able to create a custom comb
for this project which married the Golden Melody comb with the reed plate
holes for the Manji.  This was fairly easy as the spacing on the Suzuki
reed plates and Hohner reed plates is identical.  The other set of hybrid
harps was a combination of the Golden Melody and Seydel 1847 reed plates.
Again, my machinist was able to accommodate us but the spacing on the
Seydels is different than on Hohners, so it was a bit more involved.



Upon learning of John’s passing, I expressed my condolences on John’s
Facebook page and elaborated a bit about our relationship.  Shortly
thereafter, his brother reached out to me asking for some help figuring out
what to do with all John’s harmonicas.  He sent me some photos, but I
really could not tell much via the photos, and I told John’s brother that
the only way I could assess the harps was to inspect them in person.   He
sent two big boxes that contained more than 250 harmonicas, most of them
organized into nice sets with nice carrying cases.  I looked through them
all and created a report that provided basic information and my estimate of
what they might be worth on the open market.    Upon receiving my report,
John’s brother asked me if I would be willing to help sell them.  Even
though I am super busy, I agreed to help.  I am presenting all of John’s
harmonicas AS-IS.  I have an assistant who is disassembling and cleaning
each set of harmonicas as we go.  So far so good.  All the harps have good
solid reed plates.  They may be in need of some tuning and adjustment, but
none of them so far are in need of repair.  A lot of the guys who hang out
here on Facebook are skilled in working on harps so it would seem that some
of you would be ideal customers for some of these sets.  I have priced them
to sell.  In the event that someone has an interest in one or more of the
sets but would also like to have them customized to one degree or another,
I would be happy to have that conversation.  But for now, just assume that
the harps listed are in good working order but probably could stand some
TLC.  I have listed three of the sets on eBay and there are more to
follow.  In one of my last conversations with John, he mentioned that some
of his harmonicas had been stolen and we talked about making some
replacements for what he lost.   We never go that far.  But this would
explain why I did not find some of the sets of harps I was expecting to
find in the boxes that his brother sent me.  Here are links to the three
eBay listings I created today.



Suzuki ProMasters – Set of 10 – Blue Moon Anodized Aluminum Combs

https://www.ebay.com/itm/195139752239



Suzuki Olives – Set of 10 – Blue Moon Anodized Aluminum Combs – Tuned to
A=432 Hz

https://www.ebay.com/itm/195139738539



Hohner Meisterklasse – Set of 10 – Blue Moon Anodized Aluminum Combs

https://www.ebay.com/itm/195139772959



Please let me know if you have any interest or questions.

-- 
*Tom Halchak*
*Blue Moon Harmonicas LLC*
*P.O. Box 14401 Clearwater, FL 33766*
*www.BlueMoonHarmonicas.com <http://www.BlueMoonHarmonicas.com>*
*(727) 366-2608*