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beginner forum: for novice and developing blues harp players > Tone
Tone
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NJenkins83
6 posts
Mar 04, 2017
11:25 AM
So I've noticed tone factors right near the top with the majority of harp players. What are good exercises and practices beginners can do to work on their tone?
bublnsqueak
81 posts
Mar 04, 2017
11:59 PM
Went to a workshop with Lee Sankey recently. He is very concerned with tone.
Lots of him on YouTube. Good place to start.
Killa_Hertz
2254 posts
Mar 05, 2017
12:40 AM
Tone is absolutely key. Without good tone, no matter what you play .. how fast you play ,, how much "feeling" you put into your playing ... you simply sound like an amateur. To put it bluntly.

Your final Sound comes from many things. Your vibrato, your intonation, all the subtleties and things you do "in between the lines", so to speak. However your Core Tone comes from using your entire body as an extention of the harp. To take those sounds coming from the reeds and let them resonate deep down into your body by opening everything up and tuning your body so that everything is assisting in the shaping of the sound. Nothing is restricting the sound from being full.

It's just like learning anything else, it takes practice, but I assure you, once you get a taste of it .... it's pretty amazing. My Tone was very weak and nasally at first and I really hated it. The more I recorded myself, the more I realised just how Unlike all the records, I sounded. "How the heck do they get the harp to sound like that?" I wondered. But after chasing "How to get good Tone" and going down that rabbit hole, I'm finally starting to get something resembling a good Tone, but even what I have now is just so satisfying.

Its almost like signing the note. If you can imagine a singer just belting out a note from deep down. That's kindof what it feels like. Except with the harp you don't need much breath. In fact breath control is a HUGE factor aswell. You Do Not have to play hard or with alot of air to have good tone. In fact quite the opposite. Breath control is all apart of it. You can actually play louder and sound better by keeping your throat opened and relaxed and by drawing from your diaphragm. Because when a person normally tries to draw hard .. what happens? .. you tense up your throat muscles, right? Well that completely goes against what your trying to accomplish. But I'm going to stop blabbing now and give you something you can actually work with. I could talk about this for days. Lol.

Last Edited by Killa_Hertz on Mar 05, 2017 12:49 AM
Killa_Hertz
2255 posts
Mar 05, 2017
12:52 AM
This article was what started everything clicking for me and really got me understanding what it was I needed to do.

Harp Gear Tone Page


Your embochure is VERY important when it comes to Tone. But until you get that dialed in .. Another way to really help tune the rest of your body to get good Tone is this exercise.

It was a video by Jon gindick which I can't seem to find, but the exercise is this.... take your harmonica, open your mouth and put the left side of your harp in your left cheek. So now you have the 123 chord Inside your mouth. This takes the embochure out of the equation. Now breathe out with a deep slow breath, but HOT breath .. like your fogging up a window. Notice how your throat is open wide and your mouth cavity is open wide? Now keep that and breath in. Repeat this a few times and really listen to how rich the cord is. Now when you pull the harp out of your mouth and go back to your normal embochure, does it still sound that rich? Well if you have a proper embochure it should. If you work in getting a good relaxed embochure you can play with that very rich tone, all the time. Believe me when I first tried this .. the difference between the tone of the harp in my mouth vs in my embochure was night and day. Yours likely is too. But if you work at it, it won't be.

Last Edited by Killa_Hertz on Mar 05, 2017 1:17 AM
dchurch
112 posts
Mar 08, 2017
8:36 AM
Hey Nick,
Here are some more thoughts:

Good tone is sound that is fitting to the music. It varies using terms like: full and round, airy, bright, piercing, harsh, gravelly… Creating a fitting tone is all about listening, technique and control. You have to hear it in your head and with your ears to play it.

The first place to focus on is creating a clear, full and round tone. Isolate a single hole and play it long, pure and clear (no wavering, or vibrato…). A popular tip is to “drop your jaw” (I’ll say enlarge your airway/cavity; think yawning with your mouth closed). Apply this in various degrees and avoid a pinched air flow. Work on different reeds and harps because an F harp will challenge you differently than a G harp…

Practice slowly fading in and out of the sustained note, again no wavering… The point here is control and listening for that great clear tone. This also applies to cords and octaves.

Long sustained blows and draws (breathing) give you a chance to really focus on the subtleties that affect tone. Manipulate your air flow and cavity to create changes in the tone. For example, play while pronouncing, “a, e, i, o, u…”. Try regulating air flow through your nose and mouth seal… Practice sustaining different tones and moving from one tone to the next.

Vibrato and tremolo rely on a foundation (similar to your trombone experience) but the harmonica is pretty unique in that the hands form part of the instrument (the bell) and greatly affect tone.

Another practice I like is trying to impersonate other players, instruments and sounds.

The acoustics of your practice space is a major factor for creating/hearing tone so experiment with that too.

Tone is unique to each person and specific harps. To complicate matters, tone is affected by how the harp is setup, especially for bent notes. I personally like playing different harmonicas but that’s not necessarily a good idea.

I also agree with idea of recording. It’s a great way to check your tone... It doesn’t have to be complex music. Just sound good and be expressive.


----------
It's about time I got around to this.

Last Edited by dchurch on Mar 08, 2017 8:39 AM
Killa_Hertz
2256 posts
Mar 08, 2017
9:58 AM
Good advice Dchurch. All of the info about dropping the jaw, yawn technique, embochure, etc. Is all in that link above. I read many things when trying to improve my tone, but only a few really helped. I think that harp gear page was one of the major things that helped me.

Also Winslow Yerxa gave me a bit of advice when I was first attempting to improve my tone.. I told him I could get a good Tone sometimes, but I was often losing it. He said (paraphrasing) each time you practice, take a few minutes before hand and really focus on tone. Don't play anything fancy, just hold a note and focus on really getting that good deep full tone. Then when you continue with your practice try to keep that same tone. Over time your ear will be trained for what good tone sounds like and it will become easier to retain.
D church says basically this same thing above. It really helped me alot.


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