Brendan Power & Alternative Harmonicas Forum

After playing around with it more, the problem with the dual reed bends was my embouchure. My bottom lip blocks the draw reed opening with my normal embouchure. When I tilt the harp down and play, I get all the bends, and overbends. Its actually pretty cool to be able to quickly switch between dual ...

I really wish I could read German now! Tonight I made the first iteration of my version of the "Winslow" Comb. 20240404_214820.jpg 20240404_224243.jpg 20240404_224219.jpg First impressions of the first iteration: The "valved" blow and draw bends, by using my mouth to isolate one reed, are very stron...

This conversation really went places when I was on vacation! We were in Amish country, so in the vein of the vacation I was away from technology most of the time. I also learned that the Amish do not even allow themselves musical instruments! That fact surprised me. They only sing, and all their son...

So far the most workable idea seems to be to fit 2 reeds in one hole somehow (maybe with some extension of the reed plate under the coverplates) and then block one of two reeds with some switch. If you could get two draw reeds per hole in the size of a 10 hole diatonic (ala Sub30 or something like ...

If you want a way to instantly swap the reeds of a single hole in a diatonic, would it be an option to simply include an extra hole and use some mechanism to block the hole you don't want? This would make the harp longer, but maybe if it's just one or two holes you want to change it's acceptable. M...

And one more thing about the comb design of Seydel's 1847 low harmonicas: The comb is about 1 mm thicker than it is on the standard 1847. And on their highest soprano tunings the comb is about 20% thinner than on the standard ones. I did not know this. This is great to know! It also means that over...

My twin diatonic Switch-Harp is currently the only option that would give you alternate tunings in a relatively small size harmonica: https://www.brendan-power.com/harmonicas-twin-diatonic.php#twin-harps-diatonic-switchharp However it's still bulkier than a standard diatonic. I have something in th...

I've often wanted to be able to change maybe just a couple notes on a diatonic on the fly, in order to change between similar tunings. I actually achieved this using the Turboslide to be able to switch on the fly from normal Richter to Paddy Richter. I raised 3 Blow up a tone so the harp's default i...

I printed a few more of these "Noble" sized combs with the "Lightning" chamber shapes. Here are a couple I still need to finish the 400 grit sanding on, and one I've installed in my Low D. inprogcombs.jpg On my Low D and Low E they definitely improved the responsiveness of the reeds in holes 1 2 and...

What type of valving did you have in mind? Conventional reedplate valves wouldn't be enough, I think. Even if you give the x-reeds zero offset, over-valves would probably be required to stop interference between x-reeds and active reeds. I would probably need your advice for this. The only valve ex...