Brendan Power & Alternative Harmonicas Forum

Hi arsen, nice to read your very interesting look at alt tunings. I, too, have taught myself how to overbend, beginning just shy of two years ago. It is the best thing I have learned about the harmonica since I started playing in, yes, 1973. Having overbends on top of all the alt tunings is a huge p...

I noted that the All Minor allows one to adjust for quarter steps. It would be great if all reeds could be adjustable. I play piano, too, and in my town we have three public pianos available 24/7. Two are okay to play harps against, the third is tuned to "A 430", or so says the tuner's not...

Very interesting topic here. I have a Suzuki Airwave in C major and have worked on it to access obs. In so doing, I was surprised to note the draw one, D, is a reversed-direction reed. It is still on the underside of the reedplate, though is riveted way up close to the mouth, the reedpad is flush wi...

Try it in a pool or your bathtub, might be easier to access the experiment. I would think that the resistance of the water would be too much for the reed to vibrate. It's hard to throw things under water, so...that comes to mind right away. It would be interesting to know how a reed behaves in zero ...

I would think that the sliders would get accidentally moved out of the desired tuning, as noted above, due to one's hold on the harp. Having to worry about that seems like a problem. One should be able to play with abandon, not with kid gloves on. I may be wrong here, though, and I look forward to a...

I am in my early 60s, have played mostly diatonic harps since 1973 or so, 99.99% of the time as a mere hobbyist. Butterfield was/is my main influence, I really love jazz/blues, jazz standards like Misty, Bluesette, Autumn Leaves, etc., bossa, jazz/samba, swing, funk and some reggae. I am a self-defi...

Thank you, IaNerd. Do you have any experience playing any of the "Magic" harps' tunings? I saw Winslow's rambling descriptions of the ones he auctioned off. I had a real hard time following him and could only get one of the tunings written down. It would be nice to have the layouts of each...

I am trying to find the specific layouts and resulting chords within the various known "Magic" harps. I believe I have found one of maybe five known layouts for said harps, it being BLOW = EADGCEADGC ... DRAW = GCEADGCEAD. I found Winslow's beautiful "Soulagement" using said tuni...

Ohhh, thanks again, Edvin. I'm getting at least one of each !

Thank you, Triona, for your thoughtful reply. Yes, I do understand it could be in any key. I am still not quite certain what the Lucky 13 layout would be; just the same layout continuing up to hole 13 from hole 10 ? Or, is it extended on the bottom and if so, what would be the notes as per the above...