One of the best memories from my recent tour of Asia was performing the famous Chinese tune Mo Li Hua (Jasmine Flower) with three elegant and very talented young women from the Shanghai Conservatory of Music. The instruments they play are (L-R) the Erhu, Pipa and Guzheng. We only had a brief run through before the gig but it sounded sweet:
I love the exquisite use of note bending in Chinese traditional folk music, and have created some special harmonicas to obtain it. The one used here is a custom Slide Diatonic in a pentatonic scale, radically retuned from a Suzuki SCX-48 chromatic.
Last Edited by on Feb 01, 2012 8:33 AM
Remarkable. We had an exchange student daughter from China with us earlier this year. She plays the Erhu, and I've passed this video along to her. What a treat.
Brendan, that is truly extraordinary stuff. If you're not already a superstar in China, I have to think that this sort of playing will do that. I wouldn't have believed one could make music like that on the harmonica. We're living in a great moment for this particular instrument, and you're one of the people who is leading the way.
Last Edited by on Feb 01, 2012 8:32 PM
The Erhu is such an expressive instrument! I've been inspired by an erhu legend, the great Min Huifen:
She has such moving, intense soul and feeling! Min Huifen was an erhu star from her younger days in the Communist era (you can find early clips of her on YouTube) and her playing has simply matured with age.
I've been testing various strange harp tunings and configurations to try and emulate the expressiveness of the erhu. Here's an MP3 clip of me playing along with Min Huifen (same tune as above), this time on a custom diatonic, trying to capture those amazing bends:
Very impressive, Brendan! Very interesting. I always talk to my student about how different music can be. And I always talk to them "You may like rock or blues or jazz, but don't forget, there's whole worlds of another kinds of music like Chinese trad music, Thai trad music, Indian music, Klezmer music, modern electronic music, heavy metall, etc. you don't have to limit yourself, just listen to your heart and decide what do you like and what you don't like yet (!)."
I'm glad to have samples of harmonica playing in any traditional context other than european/african-american. ---------- Excuse my bad English. Click on my photo or my username for my music.
Last Edited by on Feb 01, 2012 10:25 PM
incredibly inventive and masterfully played. brendan is too clever! what a fantastic stretch of ones imagination! i'm completely floored. brendan is brilliant! ----------
MP doctor of semiotics and reed replacement.
"making the world a better place, one harmonica at a time"
There is a reason why, if you go to the one-and-only Musical Instrument Museum here in Phoenix, and you go to the free-reed instrument section, you will see, as one of only five examples chosen from around the world, a clip of Brendan Power playing harp.
Glad you peeps like this stuff :-) In a way, aside from the fact I simply love the sound of Chinese folk music, I'm on a bit of a mission to complete a historic circle in trying to play it with authentic bending expression on the harmonica.
The free reed is a Chinese invention dating back several thousand years. It is used in traditional Chinese instruments like the Sheng (multiple reeds in tuned pipes) and (as a single reed) in the Bawu and Hulusi.
Supposedly Marco Polo brought some examples to Europe and eventually in the 19th century the modern harmonica was born (along with a slew of other free reed instruments like the concertina, bandoneon, accordion etc).
The free reed returned to China in these new forms, and the harmonica became hugely popular there - but mostly the tremolo model, which can't bend notes.
What I'm trying to do is create new harmonicas that incorporate the interactive reed bending style pioneered in Blues music, but designed to play Chinese music in a truly authentic way, with the beautiful pitch bending you hear on traditional instruments like the Erhu.
I see that as completing a circle, where China gave the free reed to the West, and the West developed it (with the bending style on the harmonica) to the point where it can now be used to play Chinese music better than ever before! It would create a beautiful symmetry and show the harmonious effect of cultural transfer.
I'm only at the early stages of making these experimental harps, and have a limited knowledge of Chinese music. But I can imagine that native Chinese harmonica players equipped with harps that really allow them to play their own music properly would come out with some incredible and beautiful new sounds :-)
Last Edited by on Feb 02, 2012 11:47 PM
