Well, this one was a real project. I'm a big fan of transcribing tunes. When I stumbled upon this video of Sonny Boy playing Bye Bye Bird, I thought about how cool it would be to see every little nuance of the piece. So, I took it upon myself to do exactly that. Some notes about this 'transcription' below..
1) Yes, Sonny Boy is doing a lot more tongue-blocking then what is shown in the visual tab. I realized early on that it would be nearly impossible to tell exactly when he is using the tongue-blocking technique and when he is not. So, I decided I would highlight the tongue-blocked parts that are very obvious and tab the rest as if it were lip-pursed. Part of me thinks it is likely that the entire tune is tongue-blocked.
2) Yes, the harmonica shown on screen is not accurate to the one Sonny Boy is using (which had 12 holes). I did this because Sonny doesn't play any of the holes above hole 6. Instead of taking up more screen space by using a picture of a 12 hole harp, I decided to just use a 10 hole harp and save more screen-space for Sonny.
3) I'm not entirely convined that I have the main riff correct. Everyone has their own way of playing this tune and this is just another stab at trying to replicate what Sonny Boy was doing. After slowing the tune down to 25% and listening super closely, this is what I came up with.
4) Can you use this video to learn the tune? Well.. kinda. The purpose of making this video wasn't so much to teach the tune, it was more about showing folks just how much is going on 'behind-the-scenes' when an experience player picks up a harmonica and starts to play. If you did want to try learning the tune using this vid, you could use youtube's 'slow down' feature to bring the speed down to 50%. The visual tab goes by pretty quickly at full speed. Why didn't I include a text tab? Well, this level of detail is impossible to show in a text tab. Once again, this isn't supposed to be a 'tutorial' video.
I actually really enjoy the process of making these vids. Sure, there were a few small episodes of frustration with the video editing software but that's about it. Thanks for you comment
That's pretty cool! I also find it somehow satisfying to tab out songs. Only problem is once they're tabbed it becomes obvious how hard they are to play!
I would trust that part of you that is thinking he is TB'ing. I believe he is all TB'ing, or at least most of it is TB'ed. I play TB exclusively now (not as well as him), and it can sound and look like I'm lip pursing, but I'm not. Maybe this will spark a heated debate and get you more views on the video.
#TBornotTB?
Last Edited by Chris Sachitano on May 13, 2020 9:30 AM
Very impressed, thanks for sharing it Woodnacho. I just wish the technology we've got these days had been around when I started my journey some 45 plus years ago. I threw out the paper sheets that came with the Hohner harps back then. I could never figure out why you'd want to make playing so awkward by playing out the side of your mouth when puckering was so easy! I'm only just over a month into putting in some hard work trying to get my TB'ing to a more advanced stage. I've got the bottom end 1-6 draw bends happening now but nowhere near as solid as I'd like. Blow bends, no idea!
