|
beginner forum: for novice and developing blues harp players >
Overblow practice comparison
Overblow practice comparison
Page:
1
Gerry
74 posts
Mar 23, 2017
12:52 PM
|
I’m not a blues guy, more rock if anything. I’ve played harp very sporadically over 30 years but thought I’d learn a few correct techniques. I decided on overblows to get extra melody notes,so hard gapped a bunch of different harps/keys. (Session Steel C +A, MS Proharp A+D, MS Special 20 C, Lee Oskar G, MB 1896 D and a Golden Melody in C.) Some needed heavy embossing , some light, some just gapped.
Over a few weeks of 15 mins a day, I can hit the OBs on 4, 5 and 6 on every harp. There not in tune but they are reasonably clear.
I was going to get you to guess which harp is the best to play them on, but here are my findings.
The best tone are the Session Steels. The GM the loudest. But the easiest to hit, and play with consistency and even volume is the Lee Oskar. It was also the hardest to set up as the smallest adjustment made wild differences.
I don’t know what this proves. The LO is the lowest key and my technique, such as it is, varies a lot.
Any thoughts? I know Lee Oskars often get criticized but I am really surprised.
|
indigo
338 posts
Mar 23, 2017
3:04 PM
|
Imo L/os are a very good harp.They were a big step up from Hohners when i started playing during Hohners bad era.
But like most oob harps they can be improved by some simple tweaking.
But the best improvement was when i fitted a few with aftermarket wooden combs.Like night and day.
The reed plates are cheap to buy so even with a new comb they are still very good value.
|
SuperBee
4591 posts
Mar 24, 2017
1:03 AM
|
It's kinda interesting. I'm sure I've seen it stated they're the most difficult to overblows, ootb at least.
Of course, with sufficient work anything will overblow.
I don't use them in my playing, maybe the 6 but not really. I did learn to produce 456 overblows though and can do on most harps.
Generally seems higher keys a bit easier, but only key I can get overdraws on is a G, and only the 7, and only tongue blocked, so basically I don't really know how to do it I just got lucky with a couple harps (marine band types). I certainly wasn't trying to set up forvthe 7 od.
I can usually get a 6 overblow on any decently set up harp but sometimes I deliberately set up to have an airy 6 blow because I often slap it with a lot of air and I use the 3/6 split quite a lot. It's not that I blow hard, just I hit it with a big puff of percussiveness and an overblow harp will sometimes choke which kind of spoils the effect.
I don't usually find it necessary to emboss for overblows but no doubt it helps. I have an E GM here which was set up by someone to overblow, and it was very easy to get them on, but I found it very difficult to play generally because it just couldn't handle any air. I'd never use it the wY it was so I opened it up. It's much better for me now.
|
Gerry
75 posts
Mar 24, 2017
11:59 AM
|
It's difficult to know if it's the set up that I've just managed to nail or there's something about LO that works with my technique.
I'm still going with Session Steels as my main harps but I thought it might help other overblow beginners that you can do them on LO.
|
Post a Message
|
