I try to use both lip pursing and tongue blocking as I think both have their merits and uses and because I feel having both options is a good thing.
My inclination at present is to generally lip purse holes 1-4 and tongue block 5-10. (The exception to this is when playing chords and octaves lower down the harp and then switching to a single note, so I might play the 1+4 octave then block the 1 to get the single note on 4 if you see what I mean?)
Ultimately I try to practice so that one day (a long way from here) I will be comfortable with both lip pursing and tongue blocking anywhere along the harp.
I'm interested to know, of the players who both lip purse and tongue block do you also split the harp like this? I think I've heard a few people say they tend to LP the first few notes and then TB the rest but I'd like to see if there is a general trend / consensus or if everyone is different.
Any tips or comments on the merits of a combined method and reasons why you might choose to LP this or TB that are most welcome!
Thanks!
Last Edited by Estragon on Nov 22, 2016 7:01 AM
You'll get many varying answers on this and it all boils down to what works best for you. I play all single notes, double stops, and chords lip blocking, but I do flutters and splits tongue blocking. I think many players have no problem switching while others prefer all or none. Practice EVERYTHING and find the combinations that work best for you. ---------- www.facebook.com/catfishfryeband
I think your exactly right. I do both aswell. I LP or TB every hole accept the 1 & 2. I always LP the 1 & 2 hole because tongue switching just feels wrong ( and I just can't do it .. yet). Also I use the 123 area alot for rhythm and it just seems better LP. I feel that there is a certain rhythm and sound you can get LP on the 1,2 holes that I just cant get TB. Particularly the 123 draw cord and narrowing to the 2. I use this alot. (But there is also the Walter Horton TB 2 hole sound that you just can't fully replicate LP ...so ... )
Ronnie Shellist and Jerry Portnoy are two pro players that play like this. I'm sure there are many more. Bob Maglinte told me he plays this way also. And like me, he tends to switch between the styles multiple times in a run.
Like you, I aspire to be able to do every technique LP and TB with equal skill. I have been learning to bend TB and its going ok. I'm hit or miss with them right now. The 3' and 3" I can hit all the time, but the others not so much for some reason.
I feel there are definite advantages to doing both. For instance, when I started using both, big jumps became SO much easier. I can jump from 2 draw to 6 blow without barely moving my mouth. Just LP the 2 stamp your tongue down and a slight shift. Easy as that. Movement just becomes so much easier when you learn to seamlessly change between the embouchures.
Plus I think using both just makes your playing so much more dynamic. There are obvious strengths of both techniques and I really don't know why anyone would only use just one. Atleast for blues.
Lip pursing is great for the single note fast runs. And I still use LP for most of my bends. Unless they are just passing notes that are easier to hit TB during the lick. Or the 3 bends during a heavy chord rhythm.
TB just really fattens everything up. With the slaps, octaves, etc.
Anyhow, this has all been said before, so I'll stop rambling now .... lol.
Edit: Well said harpdude.
Last Edited by Killa_Hertz on Nov 22, 2016 7:28 AM
I think tongue blocking and lip pursing are like a hammer and a screwdriver. Which one you should use depends on the task at hand. If you don't have both in your toolbox your tool set is incomplete. You can still get things done, you can drive a screw with a hammer and a nail with a screwdriver, but it would be easier with the right tools.
Last Edited by STME58 on Nov 22, 2016 7:50 AM
I have been playing the harp since 1972. Up until about 18 months ago, I was strictly a Lip Purser. Sure, I played some split octaves and maybe a flutter here or there but I could not tongue block at all. I tried to learn how to tongue block a couple of times and couldn’t get it. I found it easier to makes excuses and just settle for what I was comfortable with. “I’ve always been a lip purser. I play good enough. I don’t need it.” Then came a turning point. I attended Jason and Winslow’s Harmonica Collective in 2015. Something clicked and I came away from that weekend absolutely determined to learn how to tongue block. It was like going back to Kindergarten. I was a total klutz with my tongue. I could not get it to do what I thought it was supposed to do. It was very frustrating. But I kept at it. Everyday. Soon I could get clean single notes with good tone. But when I tried to draw bend while tongue blocking I would instinctively employ the pucker style embouchure and it was a total mess. I had to learn how to bend using my throat. I had been reading about it for years but never really understood it. Eventually, with persistence, I started to get it and I finally got what people were talking about when they said “Phat Tone” from tongue blocking. I don’t think my tone is bad while lip pursing or that it is any better while tongue blocking but it has a different feel to it for sure. One stepping stone in my learning curve was Ronnie Shellist’s video in which he says he plays all his bends lip pursing but plays most of the non-bent notes tongue blocking. I thought, “Wow, that is a lot of switching back and forth.” Another stepping stone for me was when I bought Steve Cohen’s book, 100 Authentic Blues Harmonica Licks. Many of the licks he teaches in his book involve switching from single notes to double stops to octaves and back again. It’s all over the place. And so, I have arrived at a place where I think that lip pursing (or pucker playing) is a little like the kiss on the cheek you would give your mother or your sister. Not very intimate. The combination of lip pursing and tongue blocking is like the wet sloppy kissing you do with your lover – aka Sucking Face. That’s where I am right now and it has opened a lot of new doors for me. After all these years. ---------- Tom Halchak www.BlueMoonHarmonicas.com
You know Ronnie Shellist was a Huge inspiration for me wanting to learn to play both ways. Before I heard him mention that he played that way, it seemed everyone else was either Black or White.
Anyhow I just wanted to add something here. You brought up that once you started tongue blocking you realized what people meant by phat tone. And that struck a chord with my own learning.
I found that after learning to TB my tone got much better. But not only my tone when Tongue Blocking, my Lip Pursing tone got better aswell. Because I got used to playing with the harp deeper in my mouth.
When I first started learning TB, and would switch from one embouchure to the other, there was quite a bit of movement forward and back. Meaning that my TB embouchure was much farther back in the mouth that my LP embouchure. Now as I have gotten much better at it, there is very little movement at all. My LP embouchure is MUCH deeper than it was. This has had an enormous improvement on my tone.
Anyhow ... for what it's worth.
Last Edited by Killa_Hertz on Nov 22, 2016 10:48 AM
I lip purse single notes most of the time. I can bend a little tongue blocked, but not really well. I do do a lot of tongue blocking octaves and flutter. I also do a fair amount of melody on the right, with a low note on the left to fill out the sound. I know I've said this before a long time ago, but I'm still trying to play rounds with myself tongue blocked.
I can play both and am certainly an advocate for learning both. I teach both techniques. I constantly switch between them when playing. I'll strategize and experiment with both when learning a new song to see what works best for me. I usually LP the 1 and 2. The 3, 4, 5, and 6 are a mix; but more towards TB. The 7 and above I usually TB. My bends (both blow and draw) are mostly LP, but I can TB bend to some extent and will sometimes do it on the 3 half step. I can perform almost all the TB techniques that I'm aware of. Knowing both makes you more versatile and gives you more options and greater range of textures to use in your playing.
BC http://www.bluesharmonica.com/teacher-accreditation?page=1
I learned to play 100% tounge blocked as a kid and when I picked the harp seriously I only knew that technique. And I only played holes 1-7 for years and never ever did any blow bends or overblows. I was good at splits and octaves and was always complimented on my "tone" from others. And I would have a hell of time trying to play Red River Valley lip pursed.
About 3-4 years ago I decided I needed to learn how to lip purse and have made a concerted effort to do so. I now use the upper end of the harp a little bit (still out of my comfort zone) and I 100% lip purse holes 8-10. I also lip purse the 6 OB because I can hit it on demand that way - I can do it TB but its about 8 out of 10. The 6 OB is the only OB I use and only in go-to pat licks, never when improvising during a 4 or 5 chorus solo when I'm wailing. But I am floating up to 8-10 these days and it's like stepping out on a wire.
Killa_Hertz - Ditto your comments. Learning to TB has helped my tone LP and given me another way to bend LP. I was surprised to find that vibrato is way easier TP and that also has bled over into LP. Warbles are also much easier for me TB. ---------- Tom Halchak www.BlueMoonHarmonicas.com
I first started out totally TB'ing everything and then after awhile, I learned to LP, mainly for the top register blow bends but ave since used both menthods up and down the instrument and often change mid phrase. Developing muscle memory becomes really important so that you can do this without even thinking about it one bit.
I know for a fact Jerry Portnoy as well as Kim Wilson does the very same thing as I do.
Most techniques can be done, with some good amount of woodshedding involved, either way, but each one has some advantages over the year that are unique to itself.
For example, something you hear a Sonny Terry or Junior Wells play, using the tongue to beat off the pallet of the mouth, like with Junior Wells' solo on Messin' With The Kid, that is, the version he cut on the 3 LP set, Chicago/The Blues/Today, can only be done LP and below is that tune:
I know for a fact that the opening 4 bars of Big Walter Horton's solo on the Jimmy Rogers classic, Walking By Myself, the only way to get the accenting right is with a TB and below is that tune:
The thing with both embouchures that needs to be learned is how to manipulate the inside shape of your mouth and be 100% fully relaxed and many people new to the TB far too often tend to press the tongue down really hard on the instrument plus play very uptight and the minute you do that, you will automatically shoot yourself in the foot and make it needlessly more difficult for yourself.
The vast majority of classical chromatic harp teachers all teach TB'ing and in an LP/instruction book/harmonica teaching set that I bought many years ago that was done by the late, great classical chromatic virtuoso Cham-Ber Huang, taught this method and he mentions, just like all the classical teachers, that to move around much faster with the TB, he teaches moving your harmonica in a very slight arc rather than moving your head which, when I tested this out myself, actually allows you to play even faster than you would using the LP method because tons of head movement gets eliminated completely.
With enough woodshedding, you can learn to fool just about anybody about which method you're using for a single note and still get a really deep tone, and with such woodshedding, I've often fooled quite a few players into thinking when I use the LP, they thought I was actually TB'ing, and vice versa.
Bottom line, learn both because they eachcome in handy, especially if your embouchure gets tired feeling, you have another weapon in your arsenal. ---------- Sincerely, Barbeque Bob Maglinte Boston, MA http://www.barbequebob.com CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
Perhaps the labeling and the way these two techniques are discussed could be different.
For instance, in my teaching protocol, I consider both approaches to be part of one big harmonica technique to learn instead of two smaller ones to be learned as stand alone entities.
I begin with single note to get the student to master single note, awareness of the notes on the harmonica and where they live as well as introducing all bending techniques.
Then, I'll broach the subject of TB, in many cases going back over exercises mastered with single note approached for a redo w/tongue on harmonica.
Finally, I'll introduce tongue on and off the harmonica to bring the chordal sound, or chunkiness to the front end as well as the "cha" at the end of the note. Once that is understood, we revisit bending techniques w/tongue on the harmonica.
Student eventually pops out the other end with full understanding of just about all the options available to play the harmonica in all situations. ---------- The Iceman
