I knew people were right or left handed and we have one eye that is dominant. But I didn't realize this condition also extends to our tongue.
When I tongue block I use the right side of my tongue. If I play the song and try to use the left side it feels and sounds wrong. Like I got drunk on the way back from the dentist. I have been working on the left side, mostly when I need a good laugh!
I have been told that Little Walter could use right or left equally.
At some point I bought a special 20 and kind of quit looking after that. I know there better harps out there but for the price, I am pleased. There are a bunch that are not nearly as good too. I have a few. Funny what you get used to. I have a wood comb marine band, I blow the dust out of now and then. But after getting used to the SP 20s, it feels like I have a brick in my mouth. It doesn't look that much thicker but it sure feels fat Michael
As far as repsonsiveness, loud fat tone and volume, the Delta Frost blows away every other stock harp I've played. But I understand your problem- the Delta Frost has a high learning curve (for myself atleast). A Delta Frost is almost like a custom harp; it's so responsive that you must be super accurate with your breath control. You can overbend and choke the notes so easy with those harps because they're so air-tight. It's like giving a Ferrari to a beginning driver. He doesn't have the skill to utilize the precise power of the machine if he can even get it to function at all.
It was a huge jump for me moving from Lee Oskar's and MB's to the DF because I realized how sloppy some of my bends were. The DF forced me to become much more accurate and play using very little air.
My only criticism of the Delta Frost is that its tone is a bit on the bright side, the notes are so damn loud (even with hardly any air) and cut through a mix so well that big chords can almost sound grating and abrasive at times. That is why I often play a custom Marine Band when I'm playing a Chicago style tune with a lot of chords and split-octaves.
But for the price, nothing can hold a match to the DF. And that's why you sometimes have to wait months and months to even get one from Bushman. There is no other stock harp so in demand that the factory can't keep up, that's for sure.
Thanks for the continued input. I have found recently that I can get better, cleaner tone from a Special 20 than a Delta Frost, when puckering. I kinda favor the Delta Frost for tounge-blocking, just like the way they sound and seem easier to play right out of the box. Anybody else have a preference? Thanks again for the support.
Don't buy the myth that all of the harmonica greats are tongue-blockers and you can not get good tone with a pucker. Many of the greatest harp players ever that had awesome tone were puckerers; off the top of my head, Paul Butterfield, Magic Dick, Charles Musselwhite, Lee Oskar, Jason Ricci, Charlie McCoy, Howard Levy, Mark Ford, Tom Ball.
Even the most famous tongue-blocker of our day Dennis Gruenling puckers from the 2 hole down. Most of the greats switched back and forth with different embouchers to suit what they were playing. According to Little Walter biography 'Blues With a Feeling', he U-blocked for single notes and tongue blocked for split chords and octaves.
onenote, You were talking about learning from each other. Sometimes I think about the old blues masters from the 1920s and 1930s. Figuering this stuff out as they went along. Im sure they had interaction with other musicians, to some extent. But nothing like it is today. With the video lessons, internet access and all the instruction at our disposal, I'm going to give myself two more weeks.
When you get a chance check this out on wikipedia about Tommy James and the Shondells song "Crimson and Clover" which they said used "tremolo" on the vocals, because of a vocal mic through patched through a guitar amp - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crimson_and_Clover. (It's kind of cool to read this trivia and how they got this effect.)
I heard a guy a few years back who played this same trembling, warbling type effect - only on harmonica! This guy had been using a vocal mic into his small amp with no effects! I laughed out loud because I thought seeing and hearing this (effect) on harmonica up close and personal at a distance of 10 feet away - was so cool!
After he finished playing I told him I was a harmonica player too and he asked me to play a few riffs for him. After I finished playing, he noticed I was using "puckering" which he said was fine, but he was using "tongue blocking" to get those cool sounds he was getting, which was the same technique all the great Chicago blue harp players used. He told me this helped him get more air into his lungs on the draw for the tremolo/vibrato effect!
This guy told me he got this effect on his draw notes by saying, "uh uh uh..."
Days, weeks and months later when I sat down by myself, I noticed how much more natural it was to use tongue blocking, than puckering was to chug and do vibrato/tremolo. You guys might differ in your opinions on this.
I thought tongue blocking to play octaves gave my harmonica playing an almost Cajun/Zydecko sound.
Next time when you're climbing up a flight of stairs and if you're getting winded, notice what shape your mouth naturally makes when you're running out of air. (I noticed my mouth relaxes and my jaw drops a bit.) I noticed this a few years ago, when the elevator at work wasn't working and I had to take the stairs and also discovered how "out of shape" I was too! LoL!
I wasn't puckering when I was climbing stairs either! LoL! I remember when I used to run long distance in Junior high, if I puckered, my side would hurt/cramp and then I'd hyperventilate!
When I first started playing harmonica, I tried using the guide that came with my Marine Band which showed how to play using the tongue blocking and gave up completely. (It was my fault and not Herr Hohner or the Hohner Harmonica Company by the way.)
Since I had no one to ask at the time, I had no idea what this should sound like. Which is a nice way of saying, I had no idea what I was doing! LoL! Thank God for Jon Gindick and his early books with cassette tapes! Without them, I would not have learned how to bend notes on my own! Puckering helped!
What I thought was interesting was reading what you and Michael wrote about playing "sloppy".
A few years back, I played onstage as a guest with a band another harmonica player who told me he had only been playing for a year and a half. He asked how long I had been playing and I told him, "almost 10 years".
Since I was nearly 10 years older than this "kid", I told him not to get nervous or intimidated because I had been playing 8 years longer than he had.
I nearly made him laugh when I said my playing was "5 years forever" which meant I grew as a harmonica player for the first 5 years and I was (stuck in a playing rut) repeating what I learned now, in those first 5 years."
After I heard him play, I was amazed at hearing his bright sounding, staccato tone! Wow! That was real inspiring for me to hear!
When he finished playing I walked up to him, shook his hand and congratulated him and asked him how he got that tone! He laughed out loud saying he wanted to ask me the same thing!
He wanted to know how I got that "warm" sound. I told him, "It's because I play sloppy. I don't use my tongue when I play. You use your tongue, I don't. This is called 'slurring'."
I did this by blowing and drawing the notes on my riffs without using my tongue. His playing was the total opposite. When he played a riff - he was using his tongue whereas I didn't.
To this day, many years later, I think about this incident and laugh because we both learned from each other how to make these sounds, or how to get these tones. I think if I ever saw this guy again, I would still be in awe at his bright, articulate, fast/staccato notes which he played like greased lightning (which I couldn't do myself)!
All that to say, it's nice to appreciate what others can do, that you can't do yourself. Practice and fellowship with other harp players is what brings your own playing up a notch.
One guy told me this years ago in a jam circle (which I wrote down) which was this:
*If you hang around someone who knows less than you do, you're a teacher to them. *If you hang around someone who is on the same level as you are, this is a peer and you probably won't learn much by hanging around them all the time. *If you hang around someone who is more advanced than you, this person can be a teacher to you.
I can't say every advanced player or musician, has been a teacher to me, but when it's happened it was way cool! By the way, I think that's makes this format great, you can learn from other people.
Bottom line: Don't underestimate "sloppy" playing. You might be making some cool warm tones (aka "slurring") without your tongue and some cool bright, articulate tones with your tongue.
I think you should try both and for those who are physically able, try the "U" shape too!
Anyway, that's my thoughts. Happy New Year everyone!
Thanks for the input guys, keep it coming. Michael, you hit the nail on the head. In the first few instruction books I used, there were diagrams of tounge-blocking and puckering. I could finally get that clear, single note after practicing tounge-blocking for a few weeks. So I stuck with it exclusively. Much later, after trying some bends, it seemed to me that puckering might be better. I am in that transitional stage you mentioned where it sometimes gets sloppy, but am getting better each day. ( I still give equal time to tounge-blocking) Thanks again for taking the time to respond guys, great information!
When starting to play harmonicas in 1970, I didn't know that there were harmonica instructors in the Milwaukee area, so I went to a music instrument retail store and bought a few harmonica books.
The pucker and tongue block methods were listed and illustrated in beginners' books, but they were difficult for me when trying to produce single notes.
I discovered the "U-block," a system of tongue blocking in which the tongue forms a "U" shape, and rests on the harmonica mouthpiece, blocking the holes to the left and right of whatever hole you wish to play.
The U-block method was never mentioned in any harmonica method book that I've seen, but many professionals use it, mainly in the performance of classical music.
It seems that the ability to form a U-shape with the tongue is a genetic trait not available to everyone. But it works fine for me, with some exceptions.
In my experience, when using the U-block, bending notes are difficult and not always precise.
Tongue switching (blowing or drawing from one corner of the mouth, then quickly switching to the other corner of the mouth, moving the tongue only) is not as easy with the U-block as with tongue blocking.
In tongue blocking, the tongue rests on the mouthpiece and blocks holes to the left or right of the desired note.
A few years ago, I re-tried the pucker. The bend notes are much easier, deeper, and more precise with the pucker than with the U-block.
I have begun using the tongue block system recently, but it's a slow learning process.
If you want to expand your musical flexibility on the harmonica, try to develop all 3 systems. Each has its advantages.
It could be that it has to do with the way you learn first. When I first started, the challange was to get a clear single note. Tounge blocking allowed me to do this in what seemed to be a natural way. I didn't even know about lifting my tounge to play chords yet or slapping. As I got more into bending the blocking wasn't working so good. I wanted to bend, so I forced myself to do the pucker. Now that I think about it, I played kind if sloppy durring the transition. I just chalked it up to learning process. Now I use them both. Sometimes both in the same song and dont think about it much. And by the way, I still sound sloppy sometimes.
Most pro's utilize both techniques or are tongue-blockers. Even Jason Ricci admits that really the only advantage of puckering is that you can play faster (which is a large plus if that's your style). Jason forced himself to learn tongue-blocking in the last couple years because even he could see that tongue-blocking can provide awesome rhythm accents (which both Walters heavily employed) and makes it easier and more natural to get a loud deep tone.
That being said, I'm a puckerer who has come to the realization that I *have* to learn tongue-blocking if I'm going to ever get that massive rhythmic Chicago sound I want. You can fake some of the effects you achieve with tongue-blocking; but there are many you just can't get with puckering.
It appears to me that the more advanced harpists use the pucker rather than the tounge-blocking method. (especially for more advanced effects) I am much better at tounge-blocking, should I work more on puckering, especially for bends?
