Today for 15.95. It was in f#...weird key in a little music store. When i got home, I took the comb and installed my formerly leaky blues harp reed plates from my spare D harp. Then i took the blues harp cover and put it all back together. I took the covers from my blues harp in c and swapped with the big river covers. While i had it apart, i fixed the horrendously wide gaps on the f# plates so they are playable. All the draw reeds were nearly unplayable and definitely super hard to bend from all the extra air. Now my old leaky d harp is fixed, my new f# harp is playable and dirt cheap..maybe I'll practice harp mods on it (I can overblow hole 4 on it already). And my c blues harp sounds very marine band-like now! I think I got a lot of bang for the 15 bucks.
I bought a Big River a few days ago in the key of F.
I was pleasantly surprised at how good it is. It sounds great and plays really well. It's a little heavier than a Marine Band but I that doesn't really matter.
I can't say it very leaky. It's certainly not a toy.
I probably will buy another some time.
Last Edited by on Sep 02, 2009 10:22 AM
I really expected it to play well from what I've read. This one was nearly unplayable in the 1-4 draw reeds. those same blow reeds were wide gapped too. It was pretty leaky sounding when i opened it to play it in the store after I bought it. I did my best to hide my "disappointment" and went home to do the stuff I bought it for in the first place...lol. This one may have been in that store since the early 90's for all I know. I heard there were some quality issues then especially with MS harps. It's al good now. My C frankenbluesharp sounds like a marine band and my worthless D blues harp even overblows now. The f# plates seem to seal better on the old d comb, but it may just be the lighter reeds...either way, it plays okay too! Happy camper. I am glad yours was good out of the box. I may get another one if I can find one around here.
