Brendan Power & Alternative Harmonicas Forum

Lately I have been considering the possibilities of circular/spiral/helical tuning with respect to bluegrass and American folk music. I am not the first to do so; this pairing has been explored extensively by others.

Since I was recently invited to sit in on a monthly circle, I started planning a Seydel Configurator order of various keys of Big Sixes, with this general tuning pattern:
The tuning above can be played very easily with full octaves of: G mixolydian; A aeolian; C ionian, and D dorian. It also contains all seven chords of the parent scale of C major. (This pattern was Seydel's Harmonica of the Month for April of 2015.)

Then I a had a couple of thoughts related to this pattern. First, I have noticed that when I play in aeolian mode, I often want/need the three notes just below the tonic. The pattern above has only one of these notes. Second, I thought about the utility of double-stops. A regular spiral tuning does not allow for these.

So I started thinking in terms of 10-hole harps. I shifted the pattern above to the right by two holes, and I added two holes to the right of all of those. I came up with this:

download/file.php?mode=view&id=883 The tuning above can be played very easily with full octaves of: G mixolydian; A aeolian; C ionian, and D dorian. It also contains all seven chords of the parent scale of C major. And as a new feature, it has five notes below the aeolian tonic of A and four notes below the mixolydian tonic of G. And it has every double-stop (except for B), starting with the draw notes of C. Note that in the upper half of the harp, B notes are attainable with partial draw-bends of the C notes.

One way of considering this tuning is that it is entirely spiral, but transitioning from major diatonic into major hexatonic.

At the moment my intention is to order these in the parent scales of G major, A major, C major , D major and F major . Before I commit to an order of harps like this, I invite your thoughts.

This would be the group of harps and how they can be played:

As I continue to consider the tuning two posts above, the possibilities of minor blues scales (with b3, b5 and b7) is an afterthought, but an interesting and important one. Here is the rundown:

1st position: yes with three draw-bends, the third being a whole tone
2nd position: no
3rd position: yes in the low octave, with one draw-bend
4th position: yes, for two octaves and one draw-bend in each
5th position: yes in the upper octave, but with two tricky partial draw-bends
6th position: yes, for two octaves; first octave with two draw-bends and the second with three draw-bends
12th position: no

5ᵗʰ postition does look a bit tricky, but what do you think about 6ᵗʰ position? In the top octave the B would be a half-step bend, but in its first octave, from the first B I think it looks better.

Good eye, Edvin! I will add 6th position to the list above. Cheers!

Four posts above this one, I considered the possibilities of minor blues scales (with b3, b5 and b7).

Here is the rundown for major blues scales (with b3 only).

1st position: yes, starting at 1 blow
2nd position: yes, starting at 4 draw, but with two tricky draw-bends
3rd position: yes, starting at 3 blow
4th position: no
5th position: no
6th position: no
12th position: yes, starting at 2 draw

I want to point out that all of the above discussions omit the possibilities of overblows. I invite your thoughts on that but I am not an overblower and never will be. To each his own.