Since I have gotten on the internet I have read a lot about this. The consensus is basically never blow your harp too loud. I am going to offer an different approach with the theory being based on my learning (in isolation from other harp players), blowing "too hard" with the greats, and some questions I would like to raise on the greats begining days of harp blowing. I will try to keep this real simple.
I began blowing the harp like a madman. I was way too hard. I was needing to do this because of all the stuff inside me found a way out. I was young, full of testostone, and troubled. To try and control it was not even in the thoughts. It felt good, so I did it.
Then I got to be around sonny terry. He made some huge sounds at low volumes. I was so confused by this. I would sit next to him while he played and physically felt this (no pa, amplification). When I would ask how to get there, he took my arm and said keep doing what I do and I will be there in about 35 years. I was blowing real hard trying to get the greats sounds. He never critized that. In fact one night, while my eyes were closed, he danced next to me while I wailed it to death (a friend told me he what he was doing). Well now I am getting to the point he told me about so it is time to share it.
As the years went on I began amplifying via amps and PA systems. I was still needing to blow hard to feel good and again, blowing soft never entered my mind. It came at times naturally and I loved it as much as blowing hard. Soon I was involved with the NYC and then the SF Bay area blues scenes. The harp players were almost always amped and played so controlled I was again confused. I would get up there and knock them out with sheer energy. Several asked me how I got certain sounds. I tried to explain them, but I never heard them play them back the same because they were so controlled. When I played with guys like Champion Jack Dupree, Louisiana Red, Lightning Hopkins, none said play easier.
Now I blow softly, in a different way, but will never put a limit on what I do to a harp. That kills the art of it. My harps last over a year and I play at least 30 hours a week and mainly in the key of A. People often comment that I really hit the reeds hard. I do, but have learned via not even knowing I was learning it, from blowing hard on the harp. It is about having a ton of air in the tank and funneling it out through the lips/shape of the mouth. Junior Wells did this wonderfully.
Todays beginning players in large are so controlled that I find no umph in most of their sounds. They are missing that because they never have messed with just letting the untamed youthful juice come out. I can hear this in their playing quite clearly. They tend to be paint by the numbers players.
Now, to the greats. We all have only listened to them in their zenith. They weren't recorded when they were kids starting out. Did they blow real hard to get this sonny terry thing I am referring to? We will never know because they are dead. So my theory is contradicting most everyone elses. It is based on starting out as being a child, not a full grown adult. Play without fear. Jump high, fall, and scream. Laugh and cry. Forgive, forget, trust, try new things, have hope. It is all part of growing up and if we are living right, will stay with us through life. I see the learning of music and art the same way.
Walter
---------- walter tore's spontobeat - a real one man band and over 1 million spontaneously created songs and growing. I record about 300 full length cds a year. " No one can control anyone, but anyone can let someone control them"
Interesting read Walter. I agree that sometimes in our search for controlled, precise and clear playing that we forget that we're supposed to be having fun.
absorb the energy, let it out in your playing and enjoy the journey.
Great Post. ---------- "Keep it in your mouth" - XHarp
Walter: As expressed elsewhere this is a rich post imo. I play too hard: It is very primal- I like to really draw out notes into long vibratos. And then there is the volume thing: No matter how idiotic this seems I play very loud (even though I'm amplified) when playing with loud band members. So -other than longevity- what's the problem? Why am I seeing it as a problem that needs to be "fixed". The problem is reed paralysis during solos from pressure and probably hyper-salivation from the passion too. Reed settings (something I've always been too detail-impaired to achieve myself) is important in that some harps just play well with less paralysis potential. Some of the pro-customized set ups have not worked for me because of their hyper-responsiveness and consequent easy paralysis with inspiration-experation pressure. One guy that has been very very deferential to my "hard attack" playing in creating a harp for me that responds to Dennis's organic pressure style has been Brad Harrison. Occasionally we communicate via email and phone and Anytime he discerned that my set up harp was too responsive and needed a little more "resistance" he insisted on rectifying it over and over if necessary. He did not even hint that I might have been the problem. I know this might just sound like "good business" but it actually helped untwist a knot inside of me between "knowing" I should not play so "hard" when playing "hard" is my organic voice during solos much of the time. Finally- one thing I really get: We are all different neurologically regarding behavior, anxieties, abilities to change, override the organic creative voice in deference to "doing it right" academically. I acknowledge I play "too hard" much of the time during improvisational solos but at this point in my life put more energy into acceptance of this expression rather than looking at myself as "a problem that needs to be fixed". My best. d ---------- Myspace: dennis moriarty
As usual, another tremendous post. You are truly a cat who thinks outside the box (sorry about the cliche). Thanks to you, Adam and big d, I feel a lot less bad about my hard attack. Still got to deal with a blown reed every now and then as well as occasional "reed paralysis" (thanks to big d, good to find out "rp" also happens to accomplished players as well, and not just the technique-ly challenged like me).
Walter, your voice continues to be a breath of fresh air on this board.
Last Edited by on Apr 09, 2010 8:36 AM
thanks for responding everyone! Dennis, Adam, and I, ran in the sort of same time space of the NYC scene. I never broke into it really. Bill Dicey took me under his wing for a bit. He said he never saw anyone use a diaphram like I did. Lousiana Red turned me on to him. But sadly his alcohol addiction soured things pretty quick and I soured on the whole NYC scene. I was making 5x's the money and playing to packed houses that responded heavy, to my heavy blowin across the river in NJ.
I am plesantly suprised and excited to hear I am not alone with coming up a heavy blower. Dennis shared he still is. I have lightnened up a lot, but it is that big tank, going to a small nozzle effect that I use.
I would love to bring back SBW1& 2 and ask them if they started out blowing hard. Walter ---------- walter tore's spontobeat - a real one man band and over 1 million spontaneously created songs and growing. I record about 300 full length cds a year. " No one can control anyone, but anyone can let someone control them"
I think volume is many times translated into playing hard. To me the instrument should go from ppp to fff. Robert Bonfiglio used the term opening up your sound. Sometimes I think of this as being able to focus your energy like a Marshal artist.
When you consider statements made repeatedly about SBWII playing acoustically like this,
"He had a largely acoustic sound, playing to a mike on a stand and using his hands extensively for tremolo and wah-wah effects. However, he sometimes opted for an amplified sound, using a mike cupped in his hands"
It makes me agree with you more Walter. To play acoustically over amplified instruments you would have to have some serious volume. In that case blowing hard would have been the result.
If you watch any of the vids of him playing he is indeed playing acoustically and backed by an amplified band.
I agree on the vocabulary Diggs. But when I was starting out, for at least 4-5 years I blew out harps like crazy. I had to steal to come up with the $4-5 they were going for back then.
XHarp: I played for 20 years as a real trio (bass and drums backing me) and with a real bass, guitar, drums, keys, occasional horns, very often. Even in Austin, where I lived 11 years, and most blasted their sounds, I played acoustically off the mic. the band either played quiet enough or we didn't play. Luckily I had great musicians wanting to do spontobeat. guys like charlie sexton, jimmy carl black, dave sanger, bobby keys, uncle john turner, speedy sparks, keith ferguson, and guys like that knew how to sound big and play quiet. those videos of SBWII with a band behind him played very quiet. I have turned into a recording fanatic (with the same full speed ahead method I did with the harp) and can tell by the mics used that they played quiet when backing him. Also their body language oozes laid back quiet intensity. I bet it wasn't much above acoustic volume. My playing during recordings are no louder than a speaking voice. Lots of instruments in close proximety of each other means you have to play quiet or it all turns into a mic bleeding mush.
Here is a couple posts from the bushman forum where I also posted this. I have learned that we all learn differently and to put a must not start out blowing hard on everyone is not gospel.
this is from a meeting after my performance at the bean blossom blues festival last year:
Walter, I do not think that you play "too hard" as the relative term implies in my connotations. Unrestrained, yes, but not destructively so. When you let me sit in your van and listen to you play privately, all I could feel was a sense of energy. There wasn't any forceful emphasis on effort. Does that make sense? Any loudness or hard blowing through your harp was more of an afterthought, and had nothing to do with poor technique, in my opinion.
Maybe the real problem with "blowing too hard" is that the term is far too relative. Similarly to Not2Sharp, I have been playing for 3.5 years and I still have the very first Big Rivers I ever bent a note on, and they are still alive, every reed 100%. And I know I played too hard at first. For me, "too hard" did not mean that I was forcing too much air into the harp, although I likely was, just not enough to do damage. For me, "too hard" meant that I was focusing too much on playing the emotion on the harp, and not letting the emotion play the harp through me. In English, that translates to "I was trying waay to hard".
My response:
Mike: Thanks! You heard me 34 years later. I blew real hard early on. I could easily go through a few harps a night back then. My biggest problem was coming up with the $4-5 to buy new marine bands. I stole to buy harps. I am sorry I did that, but I needed to play. I would soak them in water alot when they went bad and also play them with stuck reeds, and way flat. Somehow I was able to make them sound good enough to sit in with some of the old time greats.
I use to by my harps in Ca from Sid, a retired pawnbroker from Chicago. He said junior wells would always be coming in to pawn his harps when he was a kid. Sid gave him a few bucks so he could eat. He said juniors harps were always in terrible shape.
I wish I could bring SBW 1&2 back and ask them if they started out hard. It seems to me, that if you start out controlled, from what I hear of examples on the net, then you never really put off that kind of energy that comes from honning down over the years. Like I said, this is just my theory, and like most theories, will be proven wrong with just one player that started out light and can put out that vibe. I also think trying too hard is a intrical part of the learning process. It causes tension, like the moving plates of the earth, and when they release , an earthquake takes place. Walter
---------- walter tore's spontobeat - a real one man band and over 1 million spontaneously created songs and growing. I record about 300 full length cds a year. " No one can control anyone, but anyone can let someone control them"
Ah, I can agree if the recording is in a controlled environment or people in the venue were reasonably calm but often they were playing live bar/juke venues and the noise level in a live venue like that meant the band was turned up. He'd have had to step it up.
As I'm sure you would have had to also if you stop and think about. Been in live venues too and you can't play soft if you need to be heard over a crowd of drinkers and often them yelling " turn it up !!" Also, I wonder if that wasn't the reason that Snooky started the amp thing on Maxwell street? He would have wanted to be heard over the noise of the street and other musicians.
---------- "Keep it in your mouth" - XHarp
Last Edited by on Apr 09, 2010 1:08 PM
XHarp: The first and biggest mistake I have seen with even the best players when in a club of noisy drinkers is to to get louder than them. That is a fatal error in endless turning up till amps are maxed out. I learned from guys like Lightinng and Lousisana Red to come out quiet in all venues. Then the audience usually quiets to listening level. From there you can tear it up quietly. Remember also those guys played street corners, unamplified gigs full of people, and when with amps, usually ones of low wattage. It wasn't until the late 50's on, that fender started making powerful amps. That was also the begining of the end. Now we have technology that can put hundreds of watts out of tiny little set ups.
I played the streets all my life and still do, and can tell you most won't because they will say they can't hear themselves with all the traffic and city noises. Again, this brings up the playing big, but being quiet. The streets will teach you how to draw the world to your sound instead of it being drowned out by it. It is a spiritual/meditave thing. When I am on the street I feel like I am on a big stage with great monitors. the city sounds become an intrical part of my backup band. I work off them and they are my friend.
You have to do the same thing in clubs with loud partrons that are use to super loud. I watched a few minutes of Mark Hummels show last night and I can guarantee you they were loud. It was also very boring to me. Turning up amps is the easiest thing to do to avoid drawing the crowd to you with your magic.
I would bet my salary to a penny the old guys played more gigs having to draw the crowd to them as they played quietly (because they had no amps or real little ones) than they did blasting them out by turning th volume up. To me, this is the magic of those european videos. They got to show off all the magic they developed over their careers at those venues because people listened quietly and were with them from jump. A huge change from the drunk lace joints they did most of their lives.
I will never buy the "everyone plays loud so I have to too" response that you hear so often. If the musicians can't grab an audience playing quietly they just aren't very good. Blasting is a natural comfort zone that most drunk audiences have been raise on for the past 40 years. So when you blast, you make them feel comfortable right off. I saw that with the mark hummel show. I knew mark way back in the late 70's when he was backing guys like mississipi johnny waters. He played loud then too. His playing hasn't changed much and he still blasts the same way. No disrespect on him. Playing everynight and traveling in funky ways leads to bad habbits and blasting to get through as easy as possible. It also makes you deaf and you have to keep playing louder and louder just to hear yourself. Walter ---------- walter tore's spontobeat - a real one man band and over 1 million spontaneously created songs and growing. I record about 300 full length cds a year. " No one can control anyone, but anyone can let someone control them"
I watched a few minutes of Mark Hummel's show last night, too, and I was struck by how restrained he and the band were--at least on the songs I saw. I haven't especially loved what he does in the past, but I thought the song I saw was exemplary: exactly the right volume for the circumstances.
I think dynamics are important, but after I'm dead and gone, I hope to be judged by a handful of recordings (including "I Want You" off HARLEM BLUES), and they're pretty much all characterized by the fact that I was playing very hard and very loud, which is to say, I was pouring my whole soul into the music.
I've watched the videos put out by many beginners and others on YouTube and if I have one criticism, its that 98% of the players aren't really playing from their souls. It's possible that the camera is inhibiting them. The wildness and anarchic spirit aren't there. The intensity isn't there. Intensity and volume aren't the same thing, but they overlap.
This is not to say that wildness and anarchic spirit and volume alone are enough. It takes a hell of a lot of practice, a hell of a lot of living, and a heck of a lot of stage time to develop one's music to the point where one can cut loose without becoming sloppy. It's certainly not hard to find good, competent playing on YouTube, and in your local blues club, by players who are relentlessly patterned. Just knowing how to "go through the moves" ain't enough. (To that extent, I'm a big fan of the SpontoBeat philosophy.)
Walter, you've paid your dues twice over, and you've got a harp tone that shows it. By the same token, I don't always feel that intensity in your guitar playing and percussioning. I feel that you're carrying the groove in a relaxed way that lets you focus your attention and creativity on the vocals. Your aesthetic, as a one-man band, is in that respect very different from the aesthetic of the guy who mentored me, Sterling "Mr. Satan" Magee. He played very hard most of the time, and ridiculously hard some of the time. Then, as a break, he played relaxed--on a song like "Ain't Nobody Better Than Nobody," for example. It's not surprising that I would tend towards his full-throttle approach. It's a street-musician's approach: stop 'em dead in their tracks.
(If I'm wrong about your guitar playing and rhythming, please post a video or two below that show you completely cutting loose on guitar and percussion; I'll be the first to say that I misjudged you. You've got an awful lot of videos out there; I can only speak about the handful that I've watched.)
It's important for a harp player to know how to play relaxed, but it's also important for a harp player to know the other extreme. The kind of player who excites ME is the player who seems almost dangerous. Jason has that, which is why I like what he does. The most dangerous harp player I've ever shared the stage with was Watermelon Slim in his 1989 incarnation in Cambridge, Mass. He was terrifingly intense. He was more intense than Sugar Blue. He's not like that now. I don't know where it went.
There are different sorts of blues aesthetics, and my own tastes range widely. I love Charles Brown, Keb Mo, and Albert Collins. Collins CAN play relaxed, but basically he prefers to toss off lightning bolts. He's a master of dynamics, in other words, but he DOES know how to crank it all the way up. Charles Brown, on the other hand, swings like hell and prefers to play it very sweet and pretty. Different aesthetics. A harp player can learn from both. I know how to play sweet harp--you spend a lot of time on the 6th, among other things--and Jason does, too, although he plays that style in 12th position. More blues players should cultivate this mode.
Last Edited by on Apr 09, 2010 2:24 PM
I agree with you Adam. I also love the hard driving stuff like you guys did to the super laid back jimmy reed. You guys attracted each other. The universe is great that way. I was in turn guided to guys like Louisiana Red, lightning, and the less heavy players. I did get to be good friends with albert collins and I would blow harp with him. I never felt like I fit but it sure was great being onstage with him.
I am turning out all these recordings in a studio setting. Live I tend to be more jumping, but still am no where near your style or Jasons. Also at this point of my life I am finally finding peace. Most of my early on crazy playing was a means of releasing those demons and getting a small break of calm in my soul. Now my soul is more peaceful than tormented. I am not infering yours or Jasons is, it is just the way I was able to ease my troubles. Now the calm stuff feels so good I can't let it go.
Thanks for your post. It shows you are a writer!
In response to your asking if I had any driving songs out there here goes. Totally cutting lose is a subjective term, but here are some. I have some old video from about 1979 with my band. I am trying to get it from tape to dvd so I can post some of it. I have over 2,000 songs and about 70 videos up, and to expect any one to check them all out would be insane.
Just for kicks here is a typical live gig vibe. there was no vocal amplification. I was trying to do a live recording but it got all messed up. Trying to play and record at the same time is not a good idea. the quality is bad, just a hand held camera mic:
something I beleive I invented lead guitar and lead harp at the same time. It gets going some towards the end
Walter ---------- walter tore's spontobeat - a real one man band and over 1 million spontaneously created songs and growing. I record about 300 full length cds a year. " No one can control anyone, but anyone can let someone control them"
Walter, your post, and this thread, is one of the most important ones I've seen made on this forum in a long while. It resonates with me a great deal, and agrees with stuff that I've been thinking when reading other posts on here, but felt like I couldn't type because the idea is an unpopular one. I'm very glad dudes like you are on this forum posting so that young guys like me can gain from the benefit of your experience.
isaacullah: you are welcome and I am just as touched that some people have felt like I have something to offer. Walter ---------- walter tore's spontobeat - a real one man band and over 1 million spontaneously created songs and growing. I record about 300 full length cds a year. " No one can control anyone, but anyone can let someone control them"
phogi: Stop thinking about it and let it do its own thing. there is no right or wrong with music. Walter ---------- walter tore's spontobeat - a real one man band and over 1 million spontaneously created songs and growing. I record about 300 full length cds a year. " No one can control anyone, but anyone can let someone control them"
Im an artist. pencil and paper comes very easy to me. its something that ive always had a knack for, as far back as i can remember. my family has nurtured it, facilitated it's progression as a child, and i have honed it to a point, as an adult, where im very happy with the quality of work im able to put out. anymore, i dont see me getting better as i do more of it, i just simply make "new" art. barring a subject ive not touched on, it all has become automatic...
to get to my point:
Ive never been the kind to worry much at all about the innards of any situation, i always look at the end result, imagining what it will be and not giving much attention at all to how i get there. i make moves to make that end result happen. sometimes it is VERY much paint by numbers, as there is no other way. other times it HAS to be a generic approach, chiseling away as i go along.
Creativity, in any art form, is subjective, and unique to everyone. Especially in the processes we take to achieve it.
I would imagine that anyone who ever does anything great, has had to have done so via cookie cutting, cloning, exploring, failing... you know...trial and error mixed with whatever God given talent. I could have never become so proficient in art had i never imitated those i hold in high regard. For me, and how I learn things, imitating the best and making it my own is the best way i learn. soft or loud, amped or acoustic, michelangelo or dali.
As it relates to the harp, and the masses of beginners who never make it to intermediate. They probably do so because it doesnt take much for any one person to get down at least one simple ditty on a harmonica. But the reality of it is, that, in my guess, much as in art school, only a few in the crowd are really cut out for it.
What i LOVE about this place, is that, with a few exceptions, everyone here is part of the few in the crowd that ARE cut out for it. and for once, i am not the dude who's the best there is. Im low on the ladder, a foot deep in the soil, growing my roots, in admiration of those around me who do it better. I thrive here. Because the end result, as i see it, is that i will be as good a harp blower as i want to be.
I play loud as hell when I jam with the boys. it probably isnt always the best for my instrument, but hey, its 30 bucks, and it feels good as hell to let loose when it calls for it. ---------- Kyzer's Travels
Last Edited by on Apr 09, 2010 10:03 PM
Walter, This is becoming a fantastic post. Excellent call.
I will revert back to the title of the post. In it you were questioning whether or not the greats started out blowing hard. As I've read through the posts, made observations and seen replies. I've made my conclusions that they likely weren't. How about you? Still think they started out really blowing too hard?
I would think that to be as great as they were and to draw audiences as they did, with low powered equipment as you said and following the basis of playing low to draw the crowd in I would think that they had this down pat from an early age. May have started that way but I think they would have been cut down on that very quickly.
If you watch Hammonds vid on Searching for Robert Johnson he shows how the originals used to play opposite street corners and basically cutheads to get the crowd over to their corner. It would fit that smooth playing, tasty licks and fluidity would do that far better, as opposed to simply a lot of volume or blowing too hard.
I think they, like those of us now listening to you, and the other pros here, had this drilled into them from their peers.
There is a difference between energy and blowing too hard. For me, it took a long time to understand those differences, likely due to the fact that I had influences of great players but no direct mentor.
Great post, good discussion. ---------- "Keep it in your mouth" - XHarp
Last Edited by on Apr 10, 2010 6:27 AM
XHarp: I too am enjoying this topic! When I am talking about starting out, I am meaning like the first 5 years or more. My gut tells me they did. They would not have been able to make the intense sounds they later mastered any other way. I go back to how a child learns. take a sport. No great athlete started out controlled and reserved. they blast through the learning curve and it honed their fluidness.
To make big accents on your playing you have to have spent time playing hard, with no holds bar, pushing the limits to no end. Starting out playing the harp and putting a rule down - you can't blow too hard, ruins this. This may work for players that have little talent, but it won't work for one with natural talent.
Plus part of the youthful learning process is adrenilin taking over. Musically, it can be seen at any jam. Most start out quiet, and get louder and louder via turning up volumes. To master the adrenilin, it has to be let to run free. Again, i am talking from an athletic point of view with one with real talent. A great player needs to run free at whatever they do. Then over time, it gets boiled down to the stuff we call classic/great/one of a kind. This is what it takes to have your own sound. If you just want to be a player that paints by the numbers, then putting rules on things out of the gate is fine. I don't belittle that in anyway. It just isn't the way I am called to. Walter ---------- walter tore's spontobeat - a real one man band and over 1 million spontaneously created songs and growing. I record about 300 full length cds a year. " No one can control anyone, but anyone can let someone control them"
I think we're on the same page with that. They probably started as we all did. Then grew into it. I believe that they had to get it right far sooner. I don't think they would have built the classic tone, or loyal following, without having their playing well refined at an early stage.
---------- "Keep it in your mouth" - XHarp
Last Edited by on Apr 10, 2010 6:50 AM
XHarp: Agreed. Also remember that most people on this forum do other things most of the day. The greats blew harp alot more hours per day. there was not net, tv, distractions that we have. Plus they needed to project their energy without amplification to draw people. It is kind of like the old silent film/vaudville performers. I find them much more interesting than the ones of the past 50 years. Guys like chaplin, gleason, etc, are what I watch. they convey that in spades to me. ---------- walter tore's spontobeat - a real one man band and over 1 million spontaneously created songs and growing. I record about 300 full length cds a year. " No one can control anyone, but anyone can let someone control them"
I'm reminded of when I was first learning the harp. I was playing in a local blues rock band, just a kid and like waltertore says "full of testosterone". I went to a music store with a couple of my bandmates to replace a harp one day. Out in the parking lot on the way back to the car they were begging me to "wail on that thing". Of course I blew out a reed before we even reached the car... ---------- http://www.myspace.com/jeffscranton
Perhaps, this can be a completely different forum...have a listen... I tend to blow hard. It's like the original post, my youthful expression has finally found a healthy channel. It's been over 10 yrs, and I have learned alot of standards. Some are hard blowers, and some not so hard. What I have learned recently, is the art of blowing hard..softly. No laugh. If I listen intensely to the greats, like we all do over and over again. They all have a certain dynamic going on with their breath. Sometimes it hard, and sometimes NOT so hard. Yet they maintain the dynamic attack just as though they were blowin hard. Keepin the youthful soulful ATTACK alive and well. This is even more apparent now that I have a friend who tunes my harps. His sage advice has saved me both money and embarrassment. Nothing like a tuned harp, too...btw. Harmonicas are not made to blow hard...all the time, they simply can't take it, for long. If you are racing through too many harps, then you need to tone down your enthusiasm just a little...there is no harp tough enough for you.
oh..I forgot to add... we all achieve a certain amount of DEAFNESS, after years of rock n roll, etc.....so, if you are blowin too hard, maybe you can't hear yourself. This is my problem, too. Have your ears checked, maybe there are issues with your hearing, too. check out Born In Chicago/Hot City...that's my sis shakin it. She sings, too. This was one she decided to not sing. And it sorta looks funny. She rocks, when she does sing. I'm a big Paul Butterfield fan... He's a hard blower, if there ever was one. He mellowed his attack "big time" later in life. but he was among the greatest, RIP.
