Mystery Train

Beginners with an A harp, work this out and have a ball!

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I like the song but don’t even know where to start to play it. My A harp does sound right in key though.

I’ve mainly learned very easy to identify melody lines, from old-time classics to more contemporary sounds. I was waiting for a harmonica solo but never heard one.

What am I missing?

I remember @Luke telling me once that if you can whistle or hum a song right, then you can likely play it on the harmonica. Maybe that’s what doesn’t click. Can’t whistle or hum this song. I sure like the rhythm and beat of the Stray Cats. I’ve always like their sound.

My next challenge to do the Stray Cat Strut on my A harp :laughing:

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Simplified, the song is E, A (where the vocals are), and B, which is your 4draw.
I’ve been having great fun with it, so I thought I’d share. :slightly_smiling_face:

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Try “Who do you love?” too, that’s just E and A, but wide open for improvisation. :slightly_smiling_face:

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Sorry, sat down again and read your comment again.
This is easy, because on an A harp, you draw 234, to give you an E, and then blow 123, but pretty much wherever you blow, you’ll get some combination of the notes in an A chord (some are better than others!).
Then the only other thing is that 4 draw is a B, for the turnaround, or just to use pretty much anywhere in the song.
So I was meaning that this is great for practising chords, while at the same time, being great for allowing improvisation.
I wasn’t really thinking about the main melody line,
I guess you play the chords, and try to find it in your scales.
I’m a raw beginner, but I think this is great for exploring the harp, an a common chord progression. :slightly_smiling_face:

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It seems like whenever I listen to a song, it’s fairly easy to blow and draw chords along with the harmonica and sound like I kinda know what’s going on, as long as I’m in the right key.

To follow the melody in real time is almost impossible at first, even if I know the song fairly well by whistling or humming. But even when I work the melody out on the harp, I find it difficult to play along with the harmony line in real time. Inevitably I will speed up a little or slow it down, depending on the song and how well I can play it.

I’ve found it much more pleasant for those around me to just humm chords in the background rather than hit the melody line in time.

I love the diversity of the harp to troll along to the back beat when you wanna be in the backseat, or let your harp wail when you wanna come up front and strut your stuff! :joy:

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Hey Blazin Bobby McB - you’re right it’s an A harp playing in cross-harp to jam along with this song in the key of E

The guitar line is like
-1 -1 2 2 -2" -2" -2 -123 234 -123
Or
-4 -4 5 5 -5 -5 6 -123 234 -123

And then blowing on the offbeats during the singing.

That should help get you jamming along with raucous tune. :wink:

Rock on.

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