I recently bought a hohner harp rack in order to play rythm guitar and harp simultaneously. What a disappointment! The harp is so low that I have to basically play with my face looking down at my feet. And as a consequence, I have this terrible leaky weak tone (and I'm used to producing a pretty powerful one). If I pick up the rack in my hands and bring it closer to my mouth I can play musch better and get my strong tone back. So what sould I do? Should I have bought a longer rack? Should I tweak and make it longer? OR should I throw it in the trash?
I actually bough a pretty nice rack from Rockin' Ron's after going through a hohner rack fiasco.
I found that even a better rack did not have any angle I liked. I need at least straight on attack, and since all the racks i was trying seemed to point up at me, I tried bending the rack.
It came closer, but it wasn't what I wanted either. I was going to throw it away when I decided to try one last thing. I have 2 young girls and an abundant supply of small elastic hair bands.
I pinched the hair bands in the rack and basically laid the harp with the holes facing down against the rack and placed the loops over the ends of the harp.
Now, when I put my rack back on, the harp is dead even or even lower - which is what I prefer. You have to be careful not to knock a loop off sliding around too much, but I can still play the 1 and 10 holes effectively. (this probably wont work with something other than a boxcar type harp)
The bands might cost you 2 bucks at the local drugstore. A little better than the $200 bucks for a fully adjustable rack.
Last Edited by on Aug 02, 2010 1:45 PM
No matter what rack you buy, it is going to take a good amount of time to get comfortable with it. I have tried most out there except the multi hundred dollar ones, and stick with the basic bob dylan, jimmy reed, slim harpo, rack. It only costs about 8 bucks. I have seen tons of people spend tons of time and money trying to make it a right off the bat fit. I don't think this will ever happen. You have to look at it like another instrument and a new learning curve. It is meant to move around and you have to learn to work with that. Also most people don't realize how scrambled your brain can get when you try to play your harp riffs and guitar at the same time. Getting good tone without your hands is another challenge. That is where the moving around of the rack is an assest. You can work that to your advantage by changing the position of the harp in relation to your mouth. I have been playing harp on the rack for about 35 years and it finally feels comfortable :-). Walter
here is a video where you can see me moving the rack around to get different tones on the mic.
---------- walter tore's spontobeat - a real one man band and over 1 million spontaneously created songs and growing. I record about 300 full length cds a year. " life is a daring adventure or nothing at all" - helen keller
I bought the 8$ rack from Rockin rons and love it,He called and said he saw i was a M.B.H forum reader and said he would take it back no qestions asked if i wasnt happy because it was a bottom line rack.But i thought it works great, of course i had previosly read Walter advise on cheaper harp racks and the learning curve needed for one,So i had a good outlet to see one from,Walter is the man on rack playing advise,I really dig using both, but it takes a while i cant do half my normal licks but that could be a good thing;-) I do like the acoustic tone the a uncupped harp in a rack has,Exspecially Walters,I dont like it better than a cupped harp,but i do like it just about the same.It adds not only a new dimesion to a guitar but also a new dimension just playing a harp.
Last Edited by on Aug 04, 2010 8:20 AM
I am glad you are digging the rack Hobostubs and thanks for the compliment! 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. " life is a daring adventure or nothing at all" - helen keller
