Brendan Power & Alternative Harmonicas Forum

Jim Antaki's excellent but under-appreciated TurboSlide Harmonica has so much to offer harp players! In this video, I show how it can transform the sound of your licks if you swap stiff, unresponsive blow notes for sexy draw bends instead.

https://youtu.be/g00MPhfP4r0

Good to see a few other like this pitch-based graphical interface for the harmonica. However, it could go further, to be more widely applicable to all keys. Personally, I don't think about the names of notes at all - I think numbers of the scale. Thus on a C harp, instead of CD - EG - GB - CD for th...

I was chatting with IaNerd on another thread about how to depict tuning diagrams, and it got me thinking... I mentioned my preference for having the notes laid out according to their pitch, rather than how they are fixed to the reedplates inside the harp: Low notes on the bottom row, High notes on t...

Fair enough - the standard tuning diagram based on harp construction is definitely the one used by most. And by me too, most of the time! It's the correct one for showing exactly where each note is being sounded inside the harmonica, for sure. It's only as a memory aid on appropriate regular-breath ...

I admire your steadfast dedication to mapping tunings, Patrick! They are useful ways to visualise scale layouts. Personally, if I'm wanting to show in graphic form the shape of a phrase or scale, and the harp tuning has a regular pattern of blow notes being always lower than draws in each hole, I pr...

Ah... Good analysis. Similar to what I showed here a long time ago (from 4:50): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPcxPZGBwQg&t=6s So are you saying he's basically dropped the blow even further, and is simply doing the in-between bends with embouchure control? If that's so, as you say, it's not really...

Good questions... There are some visual differences. The Antaki Tuboslide passes a small magnet above the middle of the blow reed to get a specific blow bend (one semitone normally). The lowered blow allows an extra semitone of draw bend as well. Osumi's magnet is larger, static, and attached to the...

Good questions... There are some visual differences. The Antaki Tuboslide passes a small magnet above the middle of the blow reed to get a specific blow bend (one semitone normally). The lowered blow allows an extra semitone of draw bend as well. Osumi's magnet is larger, static, and attached to the...

Kan Osumi is a young Japanese harp customiser who recently came up with an interesting new way to get a much wider range of notes from a single hole in a diatonic harmonica. He demonstrates it here: https://www.facebook.com/705774160/videos/pcb.10158830992609161/10158830991804161 Pretty impressive, ...

For harmonica players wanting to explore MIDI sounds, there are two ways to do it. Probably you will know of the excellent DM48 MIDI harmonica, but did you know that you can also get MIDI sounds from your standard harmonicas (chromatic or diatonic)? Each approach has some good points, and I'm enjoyi...