Blues Harp - Harmonica

Learning to play the blues harp which is also called blues harmonica won't take a long time to get started. It has been suggested that the only difference between a blues harp player who has been playing for 10 hours and one who has been playing for 10 years is the amount of songs they know!

Of course this is an unfair statement as, like most instruments, it takes a long time to become an expert and play an instrument to its full potential.

However, once you get over the initial challenge of learning where the notes are and whether you should suck or blow, you've made a great step forward.

Single Notes
Perhaps the most difficult part to master when you first start, is to be able to play one note at a time. This is more difficult than is often thought when you discover that the holes are small and mouths are a bit too big!

You can learn to blow notes separately by blocking unwanted holes with your tongue or puckering-up to make a small hole and then blow into the harmonica.

Here is an example of notes made when the corresponding holes are blown into a harp in C.

note: C     D      E      F      G      A      B     C
--------------------------------------------------
hole: 4     4      5      5      6      6      7     7
     B     D      B      D      B      D      D     B

B=blow D=draw

When you have mastered the scale and the ability to blow one note at a time, you are well on the way to becoming proficient on the blues harp.

Bending Notes
One technique which is an essential part of blues harp playing is the ability to bend notes.
This is achieved by drawing or sucking the notes flat to get that blues sound that is so distinctive of the blues harp style. Bending notes by drawing holes 4 and 5 is a good place to start.

Other techniques include trills learning riffs and chords, and improvising on the blues scale.

Crossharp or Second Position Playing
It should be mentioned that a C blues harp is usually played in the key of G. This is because the C harmonica has F in its scale (rather than the F# in the key of G) and therefore gives a blues sound. When the B natural note is drawn down to a Bb, you get all the notes you need for the blues scale in G.

The blues harp can also be used to play other styles of music by using both the major and pentatonic scales.

Gospel Organ

Gospel organ playing can be as simple or as complicated as the player wants it to be.

Most songs or hymns can be played just using a few chords but those few chords can be transformed into a variety of chord substitutions that would please even the most discerning jazz player's ear!

Unlike traditional church organ playing, gospel organ allows the opportunity for improvisation, giving the player freedom to express his or herself while at the same time, leading a congregation in worship through singing hymns.





The traditional sound of the gospel organ, as opposed to the church organ, is jazz based. Often the percussion tabs of 2nd and 3rd are added to create that funky expressive sound to the beginning of notes and chords. Registrations also have their distinctive sounds and the Hammond B3 and C3 tone-wheel organs have always been the bench-mark by which other gospel organ sounds are judged.

A virtue of learning the gospel organ is that you only need a few chords to get started. You can then develop skills to any level you wish and at the same time be a highly valued church musician.

Introduction - Changes

This blog is about anything to do with making music. Including the learning of a musical instrument to the performing side of playing, and of course singing.

Over the past 30 years or so, music and musical styles have become so diverse that one person's meat is another person's poison - to avoid using the word "man" - another sign of the way things have changed.

Furthermore, technology has enabled a professional standard of recording music with a home computer. Just 30 years ago anyone who wanted to make a serious recording had to go to a studio full of very expensive equipment.

Live performance has also changed with the use of backing tracks and of course Karaoke, enabling any singer to have the best sounding backing available.

We could also compare things today to the dance band days when if you wanted to hear live music and dance to it, you would have to book a band of musicians who would be able to play a wide variety of musical styles in order to satisfy the wide range of dances around 20 years ago. Sadly both the dance bands and the quick steps valitas St. Bernard's waltzes etc. are also in sharp decline.

So is music today better or worse because of the changes that have occurred over the past 30 years?