a quick-start guide (with a FREE LESSON just below)
If you're a complete novice and you've ended up on this page, welcome!
(And if you're NOT a beginner, or if you'd simply like to begin your encounter with Modern Blues Harmonica on the homepage rather than this dedicated beginner's page, please hit THIS LINK and you'll be taken to the homepage.)
Nobody is ever too young, or too old, to pick up a harmonica and learn to play a little blues. ALL of us, whoever we are, fell at one point into the "raw beginner" category, as Jon Gindick calls it. We had absolutely no idea what we were doing. We just KNEW that we were called to cup a harmonica to our face and express ourselves. We had that sad, crazy, wild, playful, hopeless, euphoric.....THING inside us. That blues feeling.
If you are that slightly crazed seeker, or merely a curious bystander who loves the sound of a harmonica and has always wanted to do this: welcome! We're happy to have you aboard.
This website, despite all its riches, can't substitute for a flesh-and-blood teacher--somebody who listens to you play and offers feedback, guides your development in a hands-on way, etc. But my videos, tabs, jam tracks, and music can take you surprisingly far, if you're willing to put in the work. And the priorities I set--including the techniques and idiomatic styles I introduce through my lessons and the list of Top-20 players I point you towards--can save you valuable time. (I'm an internationally-known blues performer and a widely-respected teacher with more than 20 years of experience ministering to players of all levels, including hundreds of beginners just like you. Not many blues harp instructors can make both claims.)
LEARN HARMONICA HERE? YES YOU CAN!
Just below, you'll find a number of useful resources that can quickly send you on your way.
FIRST, if you need a harmonica, please visit my "HARMONICAS for sale" page. The reference standard for beginning players is a 10-hole diatonic instrument in the key of C:
If you want the exact make and model of harmonica that I play--the Hohner Marine Band harp--hit this icon and you'll be taken to a page at Musician's Friend where you can buy it at a solid discount:
SECOND, if you aren't already familiar with my playing and teaching style, please take ten minutes and watch my "North Mississippi Blues Harp Lesson" just below. Over the past five years it has proven to be one of the most popular videos I've uploaded to YouTube. Many intermediate players have viewed the several harmonica solos I improvise here as a kind of graduation exercise and have uploaded videos in which they perform them. I keep things simple and clear, and I take you deeply into the music:
THIRD, think about purchasing my BEGINNERS SPECIAL, a collection of four key videos for beginners, with tabs thrown in for free. They're all available in the form of one easy-to-download zip file, just by clicking the link below. (And while you're at it, scroll to the bottom of the page that the link takes you to and look at the five-star raves from other beginners who have purchased the package and delighted in their own progress):
FOURTH, if you'd like to start a little more modestly by purchasing a single lesson, you might want to pick up one of the following videos and/or tabs for raw beginners. EVERY VIDEO requires no more than one harmonica in the key of C:
"Raw Beginners Start Here": For absolute novices. If you were my private student and you showed up for your first lesson with a harmonica that you'd just purchased (or that somebody had just given you), I'd spend most of our first hour together showing you the basics: How the harmonica is put together; how to hold the harp; how to play single notes; how to play your first scale; and how to troubleshoot several basic problems that raw beginners always confront.
"Bending the 4 Draw": For most beginners, the 4 draw bend is easiest--and therefore the first that I've always introduced to my students. This video offers a wealth of tips, metaphors, and suggestions to get you bending and bending well.
"Counting and Playing Your Way Through a 12-Bar Blues": an extra-long (45+ minutes) and extra-important lesson for beginning players. In response to popular demand, I've done my best to demystify the 12-bar blues format and help you navigate your way through a foundational experience. This lesson contains one video and two FREE tab sheets!
FIFTH, you'll need some jam tracks so you can take the licks and grooves I teach you and begin to put them into action. I offer two sets of jam tracks, one featuring a solo guitarist and one featuring a whole band in a music-minus-one format. You can find them HERE:
SIXTH, if there's one book I'd recommend to beginners, it's Harmonica for Dummies by my longtime friend, Winslow Yerxa. Winslow isn't just a great player, but he's been teaching the harmonica at a very high level for a long time. Back in the early 1990s, as the publisher of a newsletter issued by his Harmonica Information Press, he was tabbing out Jon Popper's ridiculously fast solos--one of the many ways in which he served the harmonica community. BUY THIS BOOK!
SEVENTH and lastly, you may well have some additional questions. Please check out my Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) page:
OH, AND ONE MORE THING: Here's a video uploaded by one of the thousands of students who have used my instructional videos and tabs. He's playing "Floyd's Hotel," one of the four lessons contained in the "Beginner's Special" above--and he's doing a damned good job. Have you always dreamed of playing blues harmonica? This can be you:
ADAM GUSSOW is an official endorser for HOHNER HARMONICAS
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