Post by jbone on Mar 22, 2021 8:48:28 GMT -5
I put some miles on both my regular and back up D harps this weekend. Both began showing some reed fatigue on the same reed- either 4 or 5 draw. We played our butts off Friday, Especially Saturday, and Sunday. So last evening I looked around and luckily I had new reed plates or both harps. It was a matter of taking the harps apart, cleaning the comb and covers, and putting the new reed plates in.
When a reed goes flat, it's because I have sucked the heck out of it to get more volume. Not a good habit, but at the point before that much stress there is a great sound you get on that bend. A real blue note. Still, both harps have lasted at least 2 years with no tweaking except some gap adjustment. That's good value.
We play a lot of stuff in E and A and D, so between the 3 positions I play in the D harps do see a lot of use. Playing acoustic on the street you are contending with chattering civilians, big and lesser diesel trucks, hot rods, sirens, barking dogs etc., all of which tend to make you try for that little bit more volume.
Over all I'm pretty happy with my harp set. I have tried a lot of different brands and models and have several varieties in my case, a lot due to a friend who has sent me a lot of harps he's tried and not liked for his purposes. But at the end of the day any harps I buy new will be 2 different models of the Hohner Marine Band, the Deluxe and the Crossover. Both have distinct features I like and both have the signature feel and sound, very much classic. Both are the sort of evolved models with better tuned reed plates and screw construction although they do still make the classic nailed together version of the Marine band.
A harp player named Joe Filisko, out of Chicago I think, many years ago went to Hohner and convinced them to up their game and start making better quality Marine Band harps. The quality on Hohner's most popular model and slipped because they had increasing demand for the harp and had let their tooling and their standards slip. To their credit they upped their game and we have a couple of really good models these days, and I think they revamped their quality assurance on a lot of other models as well.
That's probably more than you ever wanted to know about harmonicas!
When a reed goes flat, it's because I have sucked the heck out of it to get more volume. Not a good habit, but at the point before that much stress there is a great sound you get on that bend. A real blue note. Still, both harps have lasted at least 2 years with no tweaking except some gap adjustment. That's good value.
We play a lot of stuff in E and A and D, so between the 3 positions I play in the D harps do see a lot of use. Playing acoustic on the street you are contending with chattering civilians, big and lesser diesel trucks, hot rods, sirens, barking dogs etc., all of which tend to make you try for that little bit more volume.
Over all I'm pretty happy with my harp set. I have tried a lot of different brands and models and have several varieties in my case, a lot due to a friend who has sent me a lot of harps he's tried and not liked for his purposes. But at the end of the day any harps I buy new will be 2 different models of the Hohner Marine Band, the Deluxe and the Crossover. Both have distinct features I like and both have the signature feel and sound, very much classic. Both are the sort of evolved models with better tuned reed plates and screw construction although they do still make the classic nailed together version of the Marine band.
A harp player named Joe Filisko, out of Chicago I think, many years ago went to Hohner and convinced them to up their game and start making better quality Marine Band harps. The quality on Hohner's most popular model and slipped because they had increasing demand for the harp and had let their tooling and their standards slip. To their credit they upped their game and we have a couple of really good models these days, and I think they revamped their quality assurance on a lot of other models as well.
That's probably more than you ever wanted to know about harmonicas!
