Hi, my name is Pascal, I´m 40 years old, from Vienna Austria and I´ve started 8 days ago with the Beginner to Boss course.
A special thanks to Luke for creating such an educational course, that is so much fun to experience.
My musical background is piano as a child (4 years practicing but unfortunately stopped), turntablism/djaying and sampling/beatmaking.
A week ago I´ve stumbled upon Harmonica com´s videos on youtube and thought to give it a try, as the instrument is inexpensive and it looked like fun to start Luke´s course.
Little did I know that I would be literally blown away.
The first couple of days were really exhausting because my body was tense (even when I tried to relax), breath control seemed impossible (especially accentuations like Ta-Ka-Ta inhale).
After a few days of just riding along with the course and not getting discouraged, I could feel and hear the differences in my breathing and hitting the right tabs.
Yesterday evening I´ve started with the single notes module and fortunately something clicked.
Reflecting after the first week of studying, my major practice for this week (besides the single note module) will be inhale accentuation practice and syncopation.
I can hit often the syncopations in; as example; “Heart of Gold” but the moment I´ll try to think about the rhythm (trying to count it while playing) Ill mess up.
The syncopations feeling I´ve used in turntablism come pretty handy but counting and playing at the same time is a challenge at the moment (especially in a 16th rhythm).
Anybody got some tips (I´m counting the rhythm out loud as advised from Luke)?
I´m sorry for the long post, the blues harp fever caught me and I´m just very happy to found a new instrument to learn, with a great community of like minded people
You write:
"I can hit often the syncopations in; as example; “Heart of Gold” but the moment I´ll try to think about the rhythm (trying to count it while playing) Ill mess up.
The syncopations feeling I´ve used in turntablism come pretty handy but counting and playing at the same time is a challenge at the moment (especially in a 16th rhythm)."
Since you already have at least a feel for syncopation – something not all beginners have – it might be better for you to try to rely on and use this skill more. Save the counting for truly difficult passages. Your “inner rhythm feeling” is probably much better than you think, and all of the counting is perhaps getting in its way.
Thank you for the great advise, it makes me much more confident in what I´m doing.
I´ll definitely try to focus on my weak spots (like the mentioned 16th rhythm) but from now on without a guilty conscience
@derekm1973 welcome to the forum bro. FOR SURE! You got this!
@colinmort - wow Colin you sound quite experienced. GREAT to have you here. Looking forward to hearing more from you in the future.
@Hassan - welcome to the community here my friend. Great to have you join. Of course Stevie mostly plays chromatic, tho he does play diatonic on Boogie on Reggae Woman. (But you’ll need to wait until you get blow bends down before talking that.)
Isn’t she lovely works pretty well on the diatonic harp key of A, or even easier on an E Melody Maker Lee Oskar harmonica. Rock on!
@joserichart1 remember this is “learning by immersion” so it’s natural to feel overwhelmed at times! Just keep trucking.
@djpas - Hey Pas - so happy you’ve joined Beginner to Boss. Yeah, so all that turntabling experience is really going to be helpful for the way you play harmonica. Now the end result is always to be able TO FEEL IT. BUT lots of people THINK they are feeling it (but are actually FAKING it. ) So the trick is: 1.) SLOW IT WAY down and clap while counting.
2.) Speed it up.
3.) Dispense with the counting and just feel it.
4.) Play it.
To be clear - I’m never counting in my head when I’m performing. Hope that helps! Rock on! @Slim even though Neil Young isn’t super technical, there is one passage on his Heart of Gold solo that DOES warrant this type of approach for sure.
@hooligan Great to have you hear Ed. I hope you’re staying cool.
@Streets365 welcome to the forum George! So glad you’ve taken up the harmonica. I hope you never quit! Keep us posted how it goes…
Hi @Luke , thank you for the kind words and again, your course is so much fun and in depth.
Yeah I can relate what you wrote in terms of feeling and faking it
The more difficult or less known songs to me (just a few) are tricky and are getting slowed down, clapped and later on repeated.
I´m still moving along with the course, even if there´s a couple of songs where I´ll play them 70% correct in the fast workout (*moving along/keep on trucking, like you´ve said in the course)
Recently I had some unexpected revelations
I practice everyday between 1-2,5 hours (since 2 weeks) and made good progress with the singles notes but suddenly felt stuck.
One day to the next I couldn’t hit them clean, forgot the feeling of moving between hole and in general felt like I did 3 steps in the wrong direction.
Because of my office job I couldn’t practice last Thursday and had my first harp practice day off…
Lo and behold, when I started to practice the day after it was a huge jump in handling/single notes/moving between notes.
It went more fluently, more relaxed and less thinking of all the factors that made my single notes sounds bad (lips, tongue, pucker, blowing/drawing too hard)
Sorry for my long reply, I just thought that it may encourage other students to take a day off, when they feel that they are not progressing.
I have a set of john popper signature’s he did with seydel and fender years ago. Their discontinued and I replace their guts with session steel parts from seydel. I dont like the sessions as much as poppers but I got a set of ez 3 tunins with them and their the next best thing to poppers. I reached out to Popper after years of looking for more of his signatures and asked him where i could get some. He got back to me with a very generous text and agreed that they were,In is own words, “a honey harp” but no way to grab some. He said he has a set hidden in his piano in case he, in his own words, “gets called to saint peter” so obviously he thinks their pretty special.
I play harp with The Brooklyners in Nyc once a month. I have a set of ez3s that i use for 1st ,3rd and 4th position and diatonics for 2nd position. They play reggae. I get called up throughout the show and am told the key when I jump in. If it’s a major key I start with an ez3 in first position. I put a diatonic in my pocket to jump to 2nd position if it suits me and ill do that sometimes. When transitioned well, it can be a real welcomed bluesy feel to the lead. Alot of the reggae tunes are in minor keys ,so Ill choose between 3rd and 4th position and sometimes switch mid lead from low to high…same thing on the major key…go from the low in 1st position to a higher register on the diatonic in 2nd. Id been a fan for many years of the band and never considered playing with them until I got the ez3 tunings. That changed the game and now I look forward to being a featured performer with them each month. After playing 2nd position in blues venues for the previous couple of years, to have 1 through 4 to choose from has been a welcomed brave new world. My facebook page is peppered with videos of our performances at AOC bistro in NYC. I add clips from each show. I use John Poppers signature seydels and blues session steels for the ez3s. I like the low f’s and low e’s and they resonate nicely in a club atmosphere without getting all shrilly. Nice to be onboard!
Hey there fellow music lovers. My name is Luke Miskol. Been playing harmonicas since I was a kid. 54 now still playing. Look forward to being on this forum.
Hello Luke
Finally managed to get on the forum
Not quite sure how I did it but…
I’m 83 and always looking for new activities to keep my brain working and love the idea of playing this amazing wee instrument
I live in Scotland and at odd times in my life I have played some fiddle, double bass and had a go at guitar
Have started the B to B course and having a great time so far
Very nice and easy pace to move with
Got me breathing properly too
Great stuff
Chris
I´m not sure if its the right spot but I finally did it
My first 1-6 bends happened yesterday
I´m currently in my 4th week (finished Single Notes module and I´m repeating parts of every Module daily…
Since Saturday I´m working on the bending module that (no surprise) was a struggle…
I did try to not tense up but its a very subconscious thing, so I had to take many breaks in between and went to research every video/post about bending.
Long story short, the tips, exercises and ideas of Luke in the bending module are top notch. Thank you so sooo much @Luke
Yesterday it finally clicked for me (I saw the video of JP where he mentioned a “JETSTREAM” and pressurizing inside the mouth) and my tongue, mouth and inhale played along and I started to bend
In my beginner experience the most difficult thing with bending may be the tensing up of the body and the thought process to get a bend going.
Of course the bends are nowhere near of sounding rich and full but they are recognized from the benditbetter tool and I´m stoked/proud…
I really hope that my comments could help somebody with bending and I just wanted to share my happiness that the “jetstream” trick not just helped me but skyrocketed me to the 1-6 bends (6 has to be way more precise with tongue mouth position but
I´m working on it)
Next I will work on my 2 Draw tone (sounds weak) by adjusting the harp angle outside/inside the mouth (slant) combined (the tongues position makes a huge difference as well)
Single note module songs are part of my everyday exercise as well and warm up always starts with some breathing lessons out of the Levy Breathing book.
Hopefully my long post does´nt sound bad intended, I´m just very very happy and I had to share my thoughts with likeminded people
-To the admin- If the post is in the wrong spot please move it
Congratulations, Pascal @djpas !!
I’m sure your bending progress will now speed up and become more accurate and natural for you. The first major hurdle is always getting that first bend !
Thank you for the warm welcome and the uplifting words.
It means very much to me to hear that I´m on the right path.
Do you got any recommendations besides tilting and slanting the harp to get a fuller Draw 2 note?
I’ve only been learning and playing for a relatively short time. There are numerous tips, helpful or not. But if you keep going like this, I think you’re on the right track.
Don’t let yourself go crazy, that means don’t get lost through too much YouTube and the like.
When you’re learning, just always add a pinch of relaxation (salt) and a pinch of patience (pepper) and you’ll get a perfect “dish”.
The rest will come by itself if you stick with it. Give yourself breaks, your brain will continue to work during this time.
Great to hear that you think I´m on the right track, I agree youtube was a bit much because of the bending issue
Now I can relax much easier and just enjoy certain channels (like Jason Ricci) besides the course.
Coincidentally I have to do a forced break because a cold hit me and I´m not able to practice
The itch to play is almost unbearable but Ill try and study more music theory in these times
is probably much better than you think, and all of the counting is perhaps getting in its way. 
) So the trick is: 1.) SLOW IT WAY down and clap while counting.
