A friend of mine asked me if I'd put some harmonica down on a a track for his band. It's got a kind of middle eastern feel to it so I said I'd give it a look and see what I could do. I don't/can't over blow (not through lack of trying), or play chromatic – and wanting to add some more of that flavour I googled Arabic scale and found this on wikipedia:
So the top octave isn't that useful for me as the two flat notes are what gives it it's character and require over draws, but there are two full octaves available with just beds, I'm sure over benders could get those missing notes form the top octave.
Anyway it was a bit of a revelation how much easier I thought this was going to be so thought I'd share.
Not sure what I'm going to do with it yet but it's been fun noodling around with.
Hope some of you enjoy it!
EDIT: Corrected information
Last Edited by Baker on Mar 21, 2013 5:51 AM
Similar to Harmonic Minor I believe. Try using a minor tuned harp from Lee Oskar if you don't OB - OD. I'd be curious to hear the file they want harp on.
J-sin is your pro in this dept. ----------
Last Edited by bonedog569 on Mar 12, 2013 10:00 PM
I haven't worked out exactly what the scale is, but if you play a chromatic with only the blow notes, but still using the slide, you get a very Middle Eastern sounding scale.
If you're a fan of the surf guitar sound, most especially Dick Dale, this is a scale you may hear more often than you think. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
J-sin beautiful work on this stuff as ususal. Are you playing an A in 1st? The vocal and lyrics remind me of Tom Jones - only the music is hipper.
Interesting that the song lays out as a 1 4 5 blues and you can play over it wtih a D harp in 2nd. The Arabic lines are layered on top of that simple base. ----------
Last Edited by bonedog569 on Mar 13, 2013 10:41 PM
@RyanMortos: A good deal of traditional Middle Eastern music is actually homophonic, meaning the harmony can be just one chord or drone note, and the nuances of melody and parallel single notes give the song a harmonic quality. That's why their scales (called maqamat) are so colorful! They kind of "compensate" the lack of proper harmony, along with the interesting rhythmic patterns of course.
Take a listen to this, one of my all time favorite songs ever:
The melody is pretty much everything here, right? They play beautifully in unison, and the saz and the kanun just take turns in droning the tonic note.
That said, there is also polyphonic Middle Eastern music of course. I guess you can make pretty much any progression sound like Middle Eastern, like Mr. Roots did on that blues track. I'd still say the "Middle Eastern feel" has usually more to do with the melody line over it...
I have actually thought of making a YouTube video about playing Middle Eastern music on the harmonica. Would anyone be interested in something like that?
Also: I'm glad you like the track! It just came to my attention that the whole album is in Spotify. I play harp on 4 tracks and also beatbox on "Lemon Days". Give it a listen if interested, Mr. Andres Roots is one of the most innovative blues songwriters in Europe.
I would love to see / hear some instruction / demonstration videos on Middle Eastern music with harmonica! I fell in love with the sound during the couple of years I spent working and traveling in that part of the world.
good idea lor, I've got a bunch of the theory down and can play some stuff on the "oud" (wish I could do this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2cmg8qzQs2I ), which also has that single drone low string going on, so maybe I'll try a rough attempt at transposing some maqamat (scales) to harp. Gotta dig those books out. Should work well since bending will give us plenty of the microtonal elements... I think oh yea, that taksim trio (taksim = improv) vid is nice too!
Am I wrong and maybe some one already addressed the first post from Baker. the 10 blow whole step bend would be a Bb ????? ---------- And I Thank You !! KCz Backwoodz Bluz
