There’s no upside to the sharp edged plates on old-school harp designs. Most modern makers have addressed that. I’m a fan of the Kongsheng Mars design. Very mouth-friendly, with a rounded comb & large round holes, and a great player (the gold one in the photo). I went with an aluminum comb, but comes standard with the same design in an abs comb). Well made, well set-up out of the box, and very good pricing.
I like the Seydel Session Steel as well. The one shown has orange abs comb (W.Wilde tuning), I think their standard tuned version has the same comb in blue.
Both are GREAT harps, ergonomically comfortable for mouth and hands. No sharp edges. How all harps should be made.
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I also love ergonomic harps with no sharp edges.
Had a gold aluminum mars, even got extra cover plates so I could have a bottom plate on both sides of the harp. No stamping that way!
I thought the harp was decent, but alas, I lost it!
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Hogie,
I think there are a couple of contradictory issues involved.
Firstly
The tuning matter is rather intellectual/theoretical while blues basically is a folky highly emotional engagement. Sad, suffering, depressed. even, Per definition NOT harmonious. How come there is this thrive for harmonious chords while the idiom itself is much based on the “blues scale” blue notes which are NOT harmonious ? And playing style naturally often rough…NOT harmonious?
Secondly…pianos and guitars…other basic instruments in the genre ARE always in ET. IF harmonious musical cooperation is important WHY isnt it regarded as harmonious or even selfevident having harmonicas in ET also ?
Jefgat7
Rather funny…my first order some month ago was Session Steel and my second a week ago a Mars ! Both simply like you say for ergonomic reasons. Very curious hoping to share your praise after receiving it !
Just intonation chords sounds great because they vibrate more overtones and have fewer audible beats. They literally sing more.
ET chords don’t have that same quality.
If you listen to a just tuned harp over ET chords, the ear goes to the harp and it’s richness.
The justification for playing ET harps isn’t in playing rich-sounding chords, it is in playing melody. That’s actually the reason for the Hohner harp being called Golden Melody. If they named it after it’s chords the name would have to be “beating chord” or something.
You certainly don’t have to play Just tuned harps. I rarely do. For a lot of chordal playing, it is intensely rhythmic and with choppy articulations, in which case the rich chords are not absolutely needed.
But if you want to play a simple long draw or blow chord, or do a three hole split for some absolutely gorgeous 6ths, Just tuned harps give you that!
Nice thing about harps is you can carry a some of each to suit what you want to do for a particular song.
Or, just play ET. No one has ever complained about it to me anyway 
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Hogie,
I agree with most of it. The last line is significant I think…listeners dont care about all this and I believe most of them wouldnt notice the difference even when told. Ironically I believe many players are unaware of it also if a blind test would be carried out. Personally I dont care at all being habituated to ET for 60+ years. Im afraid I dont see the argument for JustT when playing melodies with the GM for example. It IS when sounding sour intervals simultaneously ,(not melody) you notice the poor harmony most …right? So…and ET harp is not better for single note playing unless you jump between keys or modulate BUT it IS less good for chords! Still I “love” my GM…! and I just ordered two other ET harps !: Simply due to old habits I guess
This is simply wrong. As Pete Hogie (@Hogie.Harmonica) already has noted, playing a melody in 5th position on a harp with just tuning gives you a flat root note. Similar “out of tune” notes occur in other positions.
I personally am not one who has a very sensitive ear for identifying pitches, but even I notice this problem with just tuning. I have purchased harps in the past (not knowing ahead of time that these particular harps did not have ET tuning) and was so disturbed by this that I had to manually retune them myself in order to play melodies (which is primarily what I do) without wincing at the “sour” notes that would occassionally be produced. If I were a chordal player then I would not have had the need to do this.
I agree with you that most probably the majority of listeners would not notice the differences between ET and just tuning (even when told). But that does not negate the fact that there are listeners and players who can hear the differences, ET tuned harps are better for playing melodies and just tuned harps produce better, richer chords.
Carlos, I didnt express myself so well Im afraid so you maybe misunderstood my intentions.
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JustT… (not the numerous “compromise tunings” which make up much confusion when trying to analyse pros and cons ! )
Works well in only one key and when playing scale notes it is fine in that key. No others. It is fine with pure intervals (of course) and simple triads. But complex chords/harmonies may still be a real nuisance. -
ET…the primary historic intention and present benefit is a compromise option to use all keys and to modulate between them. Harmony effects will be the same for all keys .This is a pro in complex chordal (!) music !
For " melody playing" ET is actually dubious IF you are sensitive regarding clean intervals. A con in “melody playing” you need to keep in mind. The benefit with ET in single note playing thus is most evident precisely ( as “intended” ) when changing keys, modulating, or using so complex chords that the the otherwise pros with JustT are lost when its pure arithmetic, “nice” intervals, not are often practiced.
SO…I mean it is not that simple as you expressed it in the end. For specific purposes we can fairly easily specify which alternative is preferable. Fine…we “need” not more than two types of harps …!
Pure JustT and ET.
Others, if having individual or very particular expectations can have reasons for various “compromise” tunings and find certain pros with these but that may be exclusive/unique. NOT in the interest of the majority, not in the interest of producers and thus reasonably not in the interest of the “market”. Hence (along with some more reasons) my advocating for a more general establishment of ET as the “primary standard” and other tuning systems at wish secondary may be offered as alternative options and at individual order.
Honestly …when observing the present market trends I think such a development has been going on already for a while…
and likely it will continue…
Objections ?
I think Temperament is a much deeper topic than what we are covering here…but for selecting harps all options on the market are good for slightly different purposes. It is an over simplification, but generally:
Playing in a bunch of positions? ET is pretty good. You will need to intonate frequently.
Play mostly in 2nd position but with some melody? Modern Compromise temperament is better. Your 6 And 7 scale degrees won’t sound so flat. Chords smoother than ET, not as smooth as Just.
Want historically accurate pre-war blues and for (some) postwar blues? Get a just tuned harp and/or a historically accurate temperament harp. Believe best info on this is on Pat Missin’s site.
I would be interested in a well-tempered harp, or mean tone. Particularly for classical music. Have not thought it through and honestly don’t remember the deviations from ET. i vaguely remember mean and just are similar.
If we are talking blues, it’s microtonal music. Personally I like having maximum control. For harmonica, that means being able to lower a reed’s pitch to match my intent. In other words, temperaments that start with some pitches flat give me less control. Because I can’t，for example, slide up from a nicely intonated pitch if I want, that choice has been (almost) taken away with compromise or just harps.
Harps are generally tuned a little sharp though. And you can take advantage of that provided you are not a hard blower.
To throw more fuel on the topic, some pro harp players stretch their octaves.
Temperament is the kind of thing you can simplify and not worry about， or get passionate about and get some benefit to thinking more deeply about it.
It’s really fun topic because harmonica is an instrument where the player can pick temperament or make up their own.
I also believe there is ample ground to cover once we start talking about music outside the mainstream in US，and if we started talking about the possibility of using temperament as an expressive element (which I would argue blues does!).
The band Morphine does this.
It’s a lovely topic, and this discussion makes me want to learn more and get better at tuning harps. Has not been a strength of mine.
To add more fuel, guitar can’t do equal temperament without funky frets: True Temperament — Johannes Möller
Bass players also have some control over temperament depending on how they tune their 4ths.
And modern keyboards can change temperament at the touch of a button.
It’s a topic of infinite depth for better or worse. But what else can I do while waiting for my family to wake up? I should get one of the midi harmonicas to squeeze in practice time.
Hi Hogie. Early morning here too. Trying to follow what appears to be a really interesting discussion, however, I’m hoping you’ll excuse this instrument novice question. Whats. ET? Could you give us a quick definition of the terms in your discussion. My googling got me answers about standing harps and extraterrestrials.
Hogie, if you want to dig deeper and do your own tuning(s) Im afraid you risk a life time consuming engagement that in the end may increase your confusion. Think twice ! Ive been tuning squeezeboxes for 50+ years. My present standpoint ls just leaving it for myself and stick to my ET harps just like other ET devices and try to persuade others thinking the same
sure. It’s equal temperament.
Imagine a piano keyboard. There’s 12 notes in an octave. They are all tuned to be exactly the same distance apart.
It is a compromise tuning designed to make an instrument equally capable of playing in any key.
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Hogie, adding to my recent reply…if you get yourself into hoping for less compromised harmonies than blues harps (harmonicas is a misleading name for them ) may offer I suggest a stringed harp, a string Quartet or why not a barbershop vocal gang 
Trombones are not too bad either…
An ambitious person could construct a harp with adjustable temperament!