this is still today one of my favorite shows,Not bad Playing,(you big Dummy;-)thanks for the lesson, Adam ---------- Hobostubs
Last Edited by on Feb 23, 2011 12:39 AM
Great lesson from the garage! You've got me thinking about other TV themes that might translate to the harp - probably a good way of learning bending control too. Did you get a chromatic, by the way? How's that going?
"You've got me thinking about other TV themes that might translate to the harp"
I've been guilty of inserting quotes from the Dick Van Dyke Show, I love Lucy, The Flintstones, Bonanza and the Quincy Jones TV catalog for years. Guilty pleasure from learning everything I heard when I was young. It is always a crowd pleaser when folks recognize them as they unfold.
Not to be a total nerd, Kudzu, but you definitely mention Sanford and Son when you did your series on Thunky Fing and how the main riff of the song is a permutation of the Sanford and Son riff... only I believe you were playing in 3rd... now you're doing it in 2nd.
I'm sorry but that song just ain't that song without the bass harp intro. It's what makes the song for me, being an old Sanford & Son fan from way back. It's why I bought a bass harp (really). You oughta get one! Have you seen Paul Oscher's racked Bass harp?
Great song. If you're a real overachiever, I'd love to see somebody play it with 3 harmonicas. A bass harmonica do the intro part, and the the two you've already heard.
Over here in the Uk we had a show that started back in the 60's called Steptoe and Son about a father and son who owned a junk yard, or "scrap yard" as we call it this side of the ocean. The theme tune though doesn't quite translate to harmonica as well the Sandford and Son theme though
---------- For sure, an old dog can learn new tricks
Adam I absolutely am floored by this lesson.Thank you. Please make a part 2 or make an MBH lesson for purchase. I'm getting better, but I can't sound out the rest of the song.
I think I've got the rest the C harp tabbed out through the 1st verse, but in case I'm right, I won't post it. I doubt he'd want anybody to give it away until Part 2. (He did say he's giving it ALL away.)
I have a guess what key the other harp is, too. Hint: The letter does not appear in my typed text in this post. ;)
Don't look!!
Last Edited by on Feb 23, 2011 11:33 PM
The funky harp phrasing / staccato attack on this reminds me of Lee Oskar/WAR.
There is a fantastic version of this tune on Quincy Jones's 1973 album 'You've got it bad girl' . Has Stevie. W. and Tommy Morgan on several funky tracks.---------- KiwiRick
@ groyster1 - I actually play a suzuki bass harmonica. I wont tell you how much i paid for it though. the last time that was discussed was at my marriage counseling!
Thanks, everybody. To answer various points in no order and with no attribution:
1) I'm not an overachiever. I think of myself as a restless, endlessly curious, populist inspirer. I'm an adventurer, not a classicizer. (I'm not the kind of guy, for example, who cares whether Little Walter begins "Juke" on a 2 draw or 3 blow.) I'd rather try something that hasn't been done, fanning the spark of something new.
2) The bass harp part is great. As some of you noticed, I wasn't trying to replicate the various harp parts on the original recording verbatim. They consist mostly of a little bass harp at the beginning, some warbles on a C and then an F harp, and later some warbles on a Bb harp. I'm both more ambitious than that--I wanted to play the whole melody on harp--and more modest. I was offering students of the harmonica a quick-and-dirty, reasonably playable adaptation of the song, using two easily-available harmonicas. A bass harp costs several hundred dollars. Most players can't afford to blow that kind of money just to play this song. I'm a populist, not an elitist. I wanted to scoop out the meat of the song and hand a sopping handful of it to curious beginners and intermediates who might actually then walk around tooting some of the melody and having fun doing so.
3) Yes, the Rockford Files song is terrific. Thanks for reminding me!
4) When I perform this song, I open with a chugging rhythm on the C harp that approximates the clavichord intro. I personally think the clavichord is more important than the bass harp.
5) The "giving it all away" thing is sort of a schtick at this point. I used the phrase for old time's sake. I meant by the phrase, basically, "I'm going to use my professional chops to crack a bit of the code for you here at no charge. Have fun with it!"
Last Edited by on Feb 24, 2011 8:27 AM
The song is a fascinating construction. What's not obvious--or at least wasn't obvious to me until I actually sat down to woodshed it--was that the song modulates to the subdominant. It doesn't just cycle through the IV chord, the way blues songs do. It actually modulates from the key of G to the key of C, and then, while staying in C, cycles between the I and IV chord IN THE KEY OF C, which is to say between the C and F chord. That F chord has a pure IV-chord function in the song; it's not the b7th of the G on which the song began.
And once the song modulates from G to C, it then resolves on C with that riff at the end. So the melody begins in G but modulates to C--and the F harp--and resolves there. Later it goes back to G.
At least that's how I hear it. I hear the opening riff of the song as a I-chord riff, followed by a V-chord riff.
Last Edited by on Feb 24, 2011 10:42 AM
Adam, is that a 1972 Honda 350 scrambler? I didnt know you were a biker, and, dont feel bad about the trashy garage, I have a 24 X 32 garage and a 32 X 64 Pole barn that beats your trash hands down! I've got to learn this for my father in law, he watches Sanford and Son every day.
@RT123 I am glad that I was made aware of a bass harp-for so long have only been aware of the 12 keys then found out about low f and high G but it only gets deeper and deeper
Last Edited by on Feb 26, 2011 5:27 PM
