I found this JJ Milteau video and was trying to work on it. It seems 3 harp keys fit very well and I am wondering which key it is he is actually using in his first solo.
I could play it on an E (2st pos?), A (3rd pos?) and a B (1st pos?) I would think he is playing either in 3rd or first pos due to some of the bends I can hear, but I am not sure. We also see him changing harps at some point.
Also, would you call this a blues ? It's got the spirit, but technically it isn't a twelve bar - has only 2 chords as far as tabs on the net seem to say.
This is sort of a folk/country/blues style, not straight blues. I messed around with it a little in 2nd, 1st, 3rd, and 12th position. My initial opinion is that all but 3rd could be used effectively without overblows, but none seemed to fit what he was doing exactly as regards bent notes.
Possibly some alternate tuning like circular tuning?
@harpwrench You might be correct. The range of the pitches in his solo certainly fits with B harp in 12th, and at first I thought it was B in 12th (A in second would be an octave lower for what he was doing, and the pattern did not seem like 1st on E to me). But I thought I heard a bend that was inconsistent with B in 12th. I will have to listen again and work on it some more later to see if I was right about the bent note.
Thanks, Winslow. A high A harp had passed though my mind as a possibility due to how it sounded on the regular A, but I wanted to rule out B in 12th. I guess I did hear an inconsistent bend, as I thought. ----------
