I read a thread awhile ago that talked about Norton Buffalo using cheap huangs because of the cost of burning through harps quickly. Well, I have worked a lot on my technique and am pretty sure that the planned obsolescence of harps is the mitigating factor when it comes to my marine bands and special 20's going out in 2-3 months. My seydel 1847 has outlasted them all, but I can't afford to drop $90 on harps, even if they last longer. So, I was wondering if anybody could offer suggestions about harps that are cheap and functional. Or, if it is a bad idea to buy more cheaper harps to save money, what is the solution? I've never played an instrument where u have to replace it monthly...
Yeah, I guess I kinda did answer my own question. Is that really the best answer though? Replacement reedplates I've seen are around the 20$ range for special 20's. That's outrageous if you ask me. Thanks for the tip about the huang star performer, where do you buy those from?
i was getting them off ebay,but found out that coast to coast music has them in 14 keys at about the same as i been getting off ebay,and the ones off ebay only offered around 7 keys so im going to try out the coast to coast.I gapped and embossed and open up the back of a c harp and i play it more than i do my lee oskars and hohners it hits all those notes well and bends good im hard on harps but the huangs hold up well for the money there hard to beat.if you dont mind setting them up a little
Bushman Delta Frost, long lasting, cheap at 25.00 a piece. They are easy to play, good response and bend easily. Great harp for blues and excellent for fast bluegrass.
Two things cheap harps have in common are: a. harder brass and b. wider reed slot tolerances, and better, more expensive harps have the exact opposite. Why? Every harp manufacturer knows for a proven fact that 98% of all newbies and 50-75% of intermediate players are BRUTALLY HARD on harps and it`s usually because of flat out bad playing technique and the number one bad bad playing technique is playing with an excessively hard breath force, and it becomes MUCH worse when bending notes because these players, from their initial difficulty getting them, they resort to forcing it to happen and they`ve allowed this bad habit to be heavily ingrained and as long as it stays that way, every harp they will blow them out fast no matter who makes them and these very same players will always blame the harmonica and will NEVER consider their playing technique as the REAL problem, which 80% of time is the real culprit. If they used tighter tolerances and softer brass, those harps would be blown out FAR quicker than they do now. I know that there are manufacturing defects, but truth be told, bad playing technique ruins harps 80% more often than manufacturing defects will, real or percieved. Saying this won`t put me on some people`s popularity list, but it is the truth and I do NOT work for any harp maker, customizer, or retailer, nor do I have endorsement deals with them. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
you get what you pay for. i tried the cheap route some years ago and while it was kind of reassuring that i wasn't going to waste $25- the price of a sp20 then- there is still a part of me that just despises bad manufacturing. i would blow out a $7 huang sometimes in a single night, or worse i'd get one that was unplayable out of the box. to me that is just pathetic.
these days money is about as tight as ever, but instead of buying a lemon, i will save and get something at least mid range in quality like a delta frost or a comparable suzuki. and when i can control myself well enough i will go for something really nice like a suzuki pure harp or a manji, and take pains to treat them right!
my bench is littered with harps that have a blown reed. many have the same blown reed and are a few years old. since i have begun working on controlling my breath and air column, i blow far fewer harps out. i used to blame the makers for lesser quality. these days i buy more carefully, play more responsibly, and blame myself more than anything else for blown reeds.
the better harp you buy, and learn to use right, the more your chops will improve. unless you aren't interested in improving, in which case there are plenty of cheap harps out there looking for a home and a decent burial not long after you get them.
i read awhile back about a big time pro player dont quote me but im thinking it was Tom Ball and he said he used hohner special 20 and would go though 1 a week,I was wondering why he went through one so quick,It seems to me he would have good breath control.
Funny, just like Barbeque Bob said, as I progressed, the number of harps I blew out fell. I agree with him.. I do use Johnson Blues and Haungs to noodle on, but use the Suzukis and Delta Frosts to play with bands..
dont get me wrong i believe that breath control is the key,but was curious as to why this pro blew a harp a week,Thats way to exspensive you would think,Im a Lee Oskar fan myself as to what i would spend if i was looking to get a middle harp,but i do like huangs for the durabilty and exspence,I had a Seydel solist pro loved it but it lasted 2 weeks got new reed plates 2 weeks later another busted reed,but huangs and lee oskars last me 6 months or longer go firgure
Last Edited by on Nov 28, 2009 9:51 AM
No matter what, it all comes down to playing technique. It's why I would never r3commend a newbie get a better harp because they will lack control and this becomes even more important when it comes to custom harps, which have the tightest reed slot tolerances by a country mile and need VERY LITTLE breath force to play them because of that. The Manji has the tightest of the stock harps, and I would NEVER recommend a newbie get one of these because they'd blow them out in as little as 72 hours, and they're still nowhere nesr as tight as a custom harp is.
Too many players are totally unwilling to face the truth, much like a heavily addicted alcoholic, drug addict, or smoker. Now that may be tough love that may not be a popular way of putting it, but unfortunately, it is far too often the truth.
Another thing the average player fails to realize is that with every different brand/model/manufacturer, you DO need to take a bit of time to woodshed with them to get used to the quirks and adapt to them to get the most out of them, but too many players think in the "one size fits all mode," and so consequently, they set themselves up for failure doing that.
If Tom Ball blew his Sp20 out in a week, I wonder what time period it was, and if it was from stock made from 1981-1995, it would make sense because Hohner was using a thinner, harder brass, and when they changed the way they paid their factory workers from hourly to piece work, plus many of the old families of perfect pitch hearing tuners retired and the members refused to work for that pay, plus being allowed to spend exactly 5 minutes PER harmonica to tune them, they were often filed diagnolly across the reed with very haeavy gouges, which tune them faster, but seriously weakens the reed structure, and if this was the case, I'm not surprised, as that time period was Hohner's worst. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
Barbequebob could you please cite those statistics? You do know 65.2% of statistics are made up on the spot. In all honesty, I am sure playing hard could be a factor, but my experiences have showed me it is the harmonica. For instance, I play on holes 1-4 draw the most practicing bends etc. and the holes that have gone out on my D harmonica were the 5 draw and 6 blow, and with my A harmonica it was the 5 draw and 7 draw. They quickly went out of tune then just stopped. The Bb marine band, the 2nd harmonica I got, has not had any problems and has been the harmonica I play the most. Of course, as a learning player it is always best to look at myself before solving the problem, but I practice playing soft as much as I play loud, the bends come out, but then a hole not often used goes out? It's the same with clarinet reeds, you gotta toss 7 before you get one good one, and it WASN'T because the player was bad that the reed is bad.
When you bend, do you go all the way to the floor of the bend?? Am am I saying there are no defects in harmonicas? No way, but too often from what I've seen, even from teaching, it's far more often playing technique that ruins harps first and most people have no idea just how hard they really do play. My experience is over 30 years. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
Yes barbequebob, I would say that I do go all the way to the floor of the bend. Mostly on the 2 and 4, lots of bending on the 3 draw. I never really bend on the 5 draw or 6 blow. Ironically, it's never been the 2 or 3 draw that goes, the 4 draw has once. That's a good point though about hitting the floor of the bend. So with your 30 years experience, tell me how long a harmonica SHOULD last before going out with good technique. I assume eventually all harmonicas will because they are simply not made to last so long.
Michael, Aren't you the guy trying to practice 5000 hours? How much playing do you put in a day? Maybe you shouldn't be asking how many months or weeks a harp should last but how many hours of playing. I get about a year out of my harps but I probably don't practice nearly as much as you.
Yes scstrickland that is me at www.youtube.com/the5kproject and currently I have been putting in lots of hours to catch up, sometimes 8 hours a day. Since august 27th I have put in roughly 400 hours. Trying to average 4-5 hours per day. This winter I will be on break so it will go up to 10-12 hours per day. I just hope I have some harps to practice with at the end! How many hours is a "years worth" for you then?
The easiest way to blow out a harp is to jam with other people. I have never blown out a harp playing alone. I have never blown out a harp playing with others as long as I was properly mic'd and had a good monitor.
5000 hours in a week? That`s big time overkill and the way you go to the floor of the bend constantly, you will have poor articulation and intonation on the bends, plus you`ll be making things needlessly more DIFFICULT for yourself when you try to get a good vibrato on all the bends you hit, And in addition. you will also cause micro cracks AKA stress fractures on the reeds, and once that happens, the reed cannot be retuned, and then the reed gets blown out and in a worst case scenerio, the reed breaks apart. Remember, what might be proper breath force for a horn or a clarinet is often gonna be far too hard for harp, and horn players often have problems transitioning to the fact that harps need 1/2 or less breath force than what they`re used to using. A harp reed will bend down to within 1/2 step of the lowest note in the hole in 1/2 step increments. Bending 5 draw, you can only go 1/4 step at best and trying to bend this note to the floor is VERY foolish and the huge amount of stress you`re putting on the reed is the cause of the blowout. In hole 7 draw, bending it is FOOLISH because that IS the lowest note in the hole so there`s no place to go (for example, on a key of C diatonic, hole 7 draw is B, and the blow note is C), and trying to bend 7 draw makes no sense at all. Why does 4 blow go flat as well as 6 blow even tho you`re bending the other reed in the hole? It`s because the two reeds in each hole work together as a pair and in holes 1-6, the blow reed is what actually is doing the bending and in holes 7-10, it`s the draw reed doing the bending. If you don`t believe this, remove BOTH coverplates and then play 4 draw. As soon as you start to bend the note, place a finger on 4 blow and the bend will not play. Now do the same thing with 9 blow and then place a finger on 9 draw and the same thing will happen. I can assure you with 100% certainty this happens with ALL diatonics REGARDLESS of the manufacturer and all metals are going to succumb to metal fatigue and every metalurgist is gonna tell you the same thing. With better playing technique, on a cheapie harp, you should be able to get 6 months to a year out of them, with better quality stuff, a minimum of 1 year to as much as 5+. So, it`s clearly time to stop taking the easy way out and blame the instrument (which FAR too many players tend to do) and take much more time to honestly reassess your playing technique and study a chart that has a note layout of both the unbent notes and where all of the available bends are, which many players often don`t bother doing. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
Last Edited by on Nov 28, 2009 6:54 PM
You've made me re-think my technique. I think I'm an OK player - not amazing, but not crappy either.
The thing is, I've had a couple of Seydel Soloists - not Pros - in A, which I really like a lot; I prefer their tone to the Pro model, it's not quite so muted to my ears. I don't blow that hard on my harps. In fact, I've never blown any reed on any harp in the last year or so since I took up harp again.
Anyway, both those harps flatted out on the 4 blow within a few weeks. I was really cheesed off. The other day I tried phoning Rupert Oysler for some kind of reassurance that it was not ussually the case that that happens with that model - I was going to buy a whole set - but I couldn't get through.
If I understood you, that harp is no more likely to blow out than any other harp of a similar price, and I had a bit of bad luck. Is that accurate?
Thanks. And, by the way, I love reading your posts. We're extremely lucky to have that kind of knowledge on here. ---------- YouTube SlimHarpMick
That`s closer to the truth. On the other hand, the reed slot tolerances (the distance between the edge of the reed and the wall of the slot the reed vibrates in) on Seydels and Herings tend to be tighter than most Hohners and because of that, Seydel has a lower gap setting because the tighter the tolerance, the less the breath force needed to do anything, but the lower gap setting also makes the harp much more sensitive to amount of breath force it`s being subjected to. The differances in tightness can be measured in increments of roughly 1/10,000th of an inch, and each increment can and does make a BIG differance in how a harp plays and that also how easily it bends as well as overblows and it`s in the slot tolerance is where the vast majority of air leaks are really coming from. The tighter the slot tolerance, the louder AND brighter the harp plays and the two tighest of any stock harp presently in production are, in this order are the Suzuki Manji and the Seydel 1847, tho they`re nowhere near as tight as a custom harp is by a good sized margin. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
Last Edited by on Nov 28, 2009 9:05 PM
haha, no barbequebob or narcoran, nowhere was it written 5000 hours in week. 5000 hours is the goal of my project. It's usually 25-35 hours a week. Your post was very helpful BBQBOB but much of that information was not what I said I do. Yes, I hit the floor of the bent note, but usually only when I am "crunching" it (if that makes sense). Explaining this won't really do much good without examples else the debate is rather pointless. I play the 5 draw very little but that is the note failing you can hear it, a note that I don't bend or play as often. All the others are fine. Here's two recent video hopefully demonstrating:
If your critique still stands BBQBOB then so be it and back to the drawing board. But certainly not before you've even heard me play!
Two things: 1. I don't think that worse harps blow out quicker (in all cases). In the contrary. The wider the tolerances the less force is given on to the reed, less stress, less failure. 2. The standard harp should be playable a liftime without going awry... I had two harps go bad in the first year. But since then,... nope. No problem at all. It's the properties of metals. If they're not strained too hard they don't fail - as simple as that.
I've had a couple of Huang Silvertone Deluxe harps. They are OK-better than most harmonicas made in China-but I don't like the cheap cover plates. The best inexpensive ( under $20 ) harps that I have played are the Suzuki Folkmasters. They're very well-made and dependable. They are also compfortable to play. You can buy a box set of all 12 keys for $132 at coast2coastmusic.com or maybe even less if you search the internet.
Don't wanna knock your FolkMasters, but why not save a couple more bucks up and get a real nice harp like the Suzuki HarpMaster $25 or BluesMaster? I prefer the HarpMaster. I have one FolkMaster and i just found it kind of uncomfortable but that's just my preference i recon. Good Luck yall. ---------- $Daddy Rich$ "The Blues is Ok!"
Yes, clarksdale. I agree. I love both the Bluesmaster and the Harpmaster. In fact, my 3 favorite mid-priced harps are the Suzuki Bluesmaster, the Suzuki Harpmaster, and the Bushman Delta Frost ( which I think is made by Suzuki ) in that order. But the original poster wanted to know which cheap harps are worth having. While I don't like the Folkmaster as well as the 3 I just mentioned, in my opinion, the Suzuki Folkmaster is a good harp and a good value for the money.
MichealAndrewLo- I know, someone was busting on BBQ for his math earlier in the thread and I thought I'd jump in since I don't have the chops to bust his chops on his playing!
Nacoran only has one R, people keep putting an extra R in it. You are throwing my off my Control+F powers! (I was going to call them my Control+F Fu, but I realized that could be pronounced two ways.) You do seem to be hitting some of those chugs hard, but that could just be how you're recording.
From giving a careful listening, the first thing I heard immediately were thast the octaves were being played really hard, and the overall playing is largely on the hard side with a few exceptions. I didn't hear you get any of the 3 bends svailable in 3draw orboth bends available in hole 2, and some of the bends were a tad out.
For someone relatively new to the harp, it's a good start but you need to try to use less overall breath force. With less force, the use of the hands to help shape the sounds of the instrument will work more easily.
What I often tell players for advice is think of it this way: play just loud enough that you don't wake up a baby sleeping in the next room.
Don't give up, but at the same time, over practicing can work against you as well as not doing so. Try maybe 1-2 hours a day, but more focused, and take a day or two off during the week to give yourselfd a break and a chance to come in with a clear head so frustration levels don't go thru the roofand that can happpen.
If you find yourself hitting a plateau, don't freak out about it, because it's part of the learning process.
Many of those things I did when I started out teaching myself how to play. IT's too bad that many players aren't in enough contact with really good, experienced players and teachers they can get together with and get a really honest critique and get some much needed pointers. On the other hand, I wish there were 1/1000th of the stuff available today that's in print and on the internet when I started in the 70's. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
Yes nacoran, weird how the mind automatically adds that R! Thanks for the critique BBQBOB, I appreciate it and it's very helpful. Coming from a classical training on clarinet, I simply cannot just practice 1 to 2 hours. Maybe if I wanted to be stuck playing in a community orchestra :p 4-5 hours of concentrated practice is certainly more effective if done correctly. No virtuoso got that way by 1-2 hours a day. By and large, I have done this correctly as I know how practice, just some bad habits creep in as you have pointed out. Another good point is to not always apply everything to from old instrument (clarinet) as not everything (most) isn't applicable to harp. Now does my newfound knowledge of what to work on solve the fact that I need some new harps to practice and have no money? If you have an answer, it is needed STAT.
As an extra note BBQBOB, with youtube and all this new technology, it HAS allowed many more players interested in improving to get feedback and honest critique so it's actually to good, not to bad! you are a part of that I guess.
I kinda thought you came from a classical background when you mentioned the number of hours of practice you`re putting in and that is typical of musicians from that genre, and that includes great classical chromatic harmonica players like Robert Bonfiglio, Cham-Ber Huang, Stan Harper. and John Sebastian Sr. and I have recordings of some of those players work that I enjoy very much. Practice can also be useful for experimenting and see what you can adapt from other instruments. LW, arguably the greatest blues harpman, borrowed very heavily from Jump blues and Big Band Jazz sax players. A few months before he passed away, William Clarke and I had a discussion about things and he and I both listened and borrowed a lot from sax as well. With your classical background, you have a huge leg up on the average player because of your knowledge of music theory, which is a necessity in that genre and it`s something half the players on the planet never bother to learn and really need to ASAP. BTW, your tone is actually deeper than most beginning players and that takes away the usual excuse of some players needing the most expensive anything to sound good. Learning any instrument is a life long process and that I know for a fact as I`m always trying to learn something new and that helps keep the mind young even when the body can`t keep young. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
Just thought I would give a shout out to the classical training mentality, learning music theory, etc...
The only problem I see with clasical training is it focuses too intently on playing pre-written music, and not enough on creating music. Aside from that, its a great way to learn.
It depends on who was the teacher, and some are really rigid and dismiss the idea of improvising and some don't. Some people would think of classical training as almost OCD, but I can understand both sides of the argument completely. One thing,tho, classical musicians are among the most highly disciplined musicians on the planet, which is often the exact opposite of what the majority of harp players tend to be. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
When I was younger, I learnt how to play classical piano. I'm way far short of being a virtuoso, but got good enought to get onto a music undergraduate course with it.
In my experience back then, improvisation was sorely neglected. When I first heard Memphis Slim, and tried to learn how to do that stuff, I couldn't; I had most of the technique, but not the mindset.
With harp, I've never even tried to memorise which holes play which notes. Of course, I can work it out in my head, but it's not necessary in order to 'play'. I don't really think about it. Instead, I try to embed patterns; that's what music is: sonic patterns.
A lot of the time on here I read discussions about theory, and sometimes get the impression that people think it will make them play better. I don't think that's true.
I think that the way we use language provides a good analogy: you learn to speak first; you learn to write the words, and maybe some rules of grammar, after that. You speak - well, most of the time - without really thinking too much about it. If you tried to think about every word or clause, you'd probably be extremely inarticulate.
Having tried both approaches on different instruments, I strongly believe that the classical tradition stifles improvisation: the printed notes are the end in themselves; you slavishly follow the score and its editors' notes.
Of course, there are exceptions, but classical musicians are quite well known for being pants at improvising. ---------- YouTube SlimHarpMick
I do agree with you that theory is a language but at the same time, it helps a harp player understand basic things like progressions and chord structure, and if, for example, a player tells a guitarist something like "I`m starting from 4 draw," if the guitarist has never played harp, he`s gonna look at a harp player like he`s an idiot. In the last 3 centuries, many classical teachers frowned on improvising, but Mozart often improvised fugues on piano. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
It is ironic that classical music has become so stale given that it's main composers were some of the most creative and best improvisers ever. I have always had a secret life with blues and jazz while playing in high school. I used to play 2nd clarinet for the Oregon pro arte and knew that I simply could not devote any more time to the soulless act of getting note for note without expressing myself. The conductor was pissed at our last concert when I improvised my own solo during beethovens 7th and mendhelssons 4th :) I decided not to go to music school because the "establishment" is just to dogmatic for me. If rhapsody in blue is considered outrageous for classical, shoot me! I found the same thing Mickil with the sheet music, you become tied to it. I think the best balance is to learn theory, internalize it, throw in some disciplined learning/rote learning, forget out it and play what you feel. Many in the classical world simply have nothing to say in music and "speaking" through 200-300 year old men seems rather irrelevant to me. Here's a video I did recently on clarinet/harp:
On an unrelated note, BBQBOB, do you tongue block?
I use a TB as well as puckering, often switching in mid phrase. I started out TB and then switched to pucker mainly to get the blow note bends but in the last 20 years, I use both. One player I know personally that does the alternating method in mid phrase is Kim Wilson. The classical method of playing is with a TB, and move the harp in a small arc rather than moving your head, which if you need speed, it can be very advantagous. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
I found the same thing, that I wanted to create my own music rather than devote years of my life to the music of others. BUT, because of the training, I have a full time, stable (stable as is possible these days) gig where I teach kids to play music all day. Without the training, even trying to do so would be a joke, at best.
Sometimes people tell me 'man, you should do __________, you could be a famous piano player!' I say 'I've already got my full time music gig, and I don't have to live in a hotel to do it.'
Absolutely. It just seems better if people are taught to internalise the music - it's progressions and the physical act of playing it - then they learn the theory, which, compared to the other stuff, is a walk in the park.
I think that the theory, for example: perfect and plagal cadences; how diminished chords resolve, etc, makes much more sense when you already know how it sounds. I've often seen Buddha write on hear that music is taught the wrong way round. I'd hazard a guess that that's what he means.
MichaelAndrewLo,
That's funny about the Beethoven 7th. Herbert Von Karajan would have had you hunted down and killed for that. Still, B's 7th is mind-boglingly bloody amazing just as it's written. I can't listen to the finale without pogo-ing all over the room - with the volume set to 11! ---------- YouTube SlimHarpMick
Last Edited by on Dec 01, 2009 4:35 AM
Another thing about learning discipline and music theory is that if you make a mistake, rather than looking like a deer in the headlights, totally mortified and clueless, you can more easily work your way out of the mess and turn that into a passing tone and only a musician with well trained ears would know, especially if you don't panic and make a dumb face, which 75% of harp players tend to do too often.
Learning scales is essentially learning note patterns more than anything else and that's at its simplest. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
BBQ- That's a good point about the deer in the headlights moment. Someone early in my music training taught me that if you screw up you just try to keep going. You can pause for a second to figure out what to do, but plow through it and learn how to fix your mistakes on the fly. It's worth doing even in practice. (That doesn't mean you can't go back and work on trouble spots, but stopping is an easy habit to get into.) It got drilled into me and I've tried to share that little bit of wisdom with every would be musician I've ever met.
That is very sound advice and I was given that very same advice in my early years as a pro and the pro that gave me that told me that anytime you made a dumb face, not only do you make yourself look bad, you also make everyone else around you look a million times worse. Man, I found out in a hurry that he sure wasn`t lying about that one bit! ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
