Tone is?

@expat48 - GREAT QUESTION!!! Everything affects the tone A LITTLE BIT. The shape of the cover plates, the material of the comb.

Now, Richard Sleigh claims that he can hear the difference between a single lacquered pear wood comb in the Marine Band 1896 and the triple-lacquered pear wood comb in the Marine Band Deluxe. Like @Slim, I’d have to see him do a double blind test to believe that!

I do think that comb has a SLIGHT effect on tone because when the reeds vibrate they will bounce a bit off of the comb materials in the chamber before traveling out to listeners ears. As to whether this change in tone is indeed perceptible…it would be quite a bit of work to create satisfactory scientific experiments on this subject so in the meantime we’ll all have to indulge ourselves in our opinions.

But, undoubtedly, the MAIN THING that effects the tone of a harmonica is the Material, Shape, and Position of the Reeds - the objects that are generating the tone with our breath.

My Joe Spiers harps sound different than stock Hohner harps because of the way he works the reeds. It’s rather astounding.

Now that we’ve belabored shop talk about gear, LET’S GET TO THE HEART OF THE MATTER.:heart::notes:

ALL HARMONICAS sound thin if you put them in front of a fan.

What makes any harmonica sound HUGE and WARM and BRIGHT in all of the BEST ways, is the way it resonates in our mouths and throats.

Note that Brendan Power makes Konsheng harmonicas sound AMAZING. (They don’t sound like that when I play them! :rofl:)

So while we’re on this topic - Vowel shapes, throat position, and hands have even bigger impact on tone than reed materials, shapes and positions.

“Uh” or “Oo” like Book are the WARMEST sounds. Also, opening the back of the throat and lifting the soft palette are worth exploring in this regard!

“Ee” is the widest BRIGHTEST sound on the harmonica. Sonny Terry was a master of using this ultra-bright tone especially on the -4, without having to play super-loud, which Joe Filisko refers to as “Icepick Tone.

And of course, closing the hands around the harp (or playing into a coffee mug, or the harp wah with hand covered) produces the warmest tone, and playing open produces the brightest tone.

And then of course we could go down the rabbit hole of mics, pedals, and amps.

@blues_harp_cat welcome to the forum and great catch! Like @Slim said, brighter tones are more harmonically complex waves with more overtones, and warmer sounds are simpler more fundamental waves, which is why if you listen to a sine wave it has a very mellow, warm tone.

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Regardless of harmonica, guitar, trombone, tone is pitch, or the frequency of the note, 440hz is A, but so is 110 (4 times 110 is 440) 110 is a lower pitch or tone.

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No, that isn’t it.

When you breath in & out of a harmonica, do you just breath in most instances, or whisper ta, or other sounds?

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Hi @Paulyz

This is varied and depends upon the effect and feeling that I wish to produce.

Regards,
– Slim :sunglasses:

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Thanks, but I mean in general.

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Green stamps
Pitch is the auditory attribute of a sound, while tone is more about a sound’s quality. Though these differences might seem confusing, they are actually pretty easy to understand.

You know the pitch of a sound by how you perceive its frequency. In musical terms, people speak about a sound’s pitch by assigning it to a musical scale.

You should read this: The Difference Between Pitch Vs Tone - Sloan School Of Music.
Cheers

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Hi @Paulyz

I too mean “in general” because that is the way that I play. Basically said, you should practice all of these “attack” methods regularly to develope a feel for what effects you can produce and then be able to use them without even thinking about which method to use. Instead you play while being guided by your feelings. You might even play the same phrase 2 or 3 times in one song, but using different “attacks” each time.

Do you think that professionals like Luke @Luke or Will Wilde or Jason Ricci always play any given song always using the same “attack” methods for each of the different notes or parts of the song?

Regards,
– Slim :sunglasses:

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Well said brother @Slim! This is where SO MUCH of the individual expression and color comes from in one harmonica player versus another: using various articulations versus just breathing… all these nuances…

I love how you said: You might even play the same phrase 2 or 3 times in one song, but using different “attacks” each time. So true! This is where feeling takes over.

The purpose of all technique is to clear the way for maximum expressiveness.

So the goal is to learn, try, explore, and practice as many things as possible so that whatever comes from within can make it out unadulterated.

Rock on! :sunglasses::notes:

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Hi guys, just some info that might make this easier to understand/talk about. What you are describing is known as the Overtone series/Harmonic series. Every instrument, both as a class of instruments (wood winds, brass, percussion, etc) and individual players, has a different overtone series. A way to demonstrate the overtone series is simple. On a piano, press the sustain pedal and without striking the string, press C5 and hold it, while you play C4 Strike and release, while continuing to hold C5 . C5 will sound loud and clear after C4 is silent. It is a sympathetic vibration responding to the first overtone which is always an octave above the fundamental. Perfect 8th (octave), Perfect 5th, Perfect 4th (also the 2nd octave above the fundamental), Major 3rd, Minor 3rd, Minor 3rd, Major 2nd, Major 2nd, Major 2nd, Major 2nd, Minor 2nd, Major 2nd, Minor 2nd, Minor 2nd, Minor 2nd…(All the maj, min, perfect, etc stuff is just labels for the scale steps. It’s basically 12345678. Theory is (MY OPINION) as much labels as anything. It’s much like a dictionary in that it describes rather than prescribes. Everything expat48 has said is correct. Just want to offer some terms to use to describe a complicated concept.

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Thanks for the clear explanation. Well said.
Cheers

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Everything you do that changes the shape of this part of the tone chamber (your mouth in this context) affects to sound/tone one of the most useful “quirks” of the harmonica. Used correctly it makes the difference between a boring player and someone who catches your attention. Next time you practice, use ta or whisper and use other syllables & use other sounds and see what happens, then see how many different ways you can change the shape of you mouth and how each affects the sound (tone) That including “blowing” with more of a “huhh” (huff) motion instead of blowing up a balloon motion. Also experiment with different ways to start/attack a note just by blowing or by attacking the note. Make the breath push harder gently suddenly gradually, each changes how it sounds in the moment. It’s how you make the harp expressive. You go from playing the notes, to playing the music in the song.

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Hey @GmanG welcome to the forum and thanks for the great post! The overtone series is indeed exactly what we are manipulating with tone.

The “Uh” vowel shape is a warmer sound, more like a sine wave, containing fewer overtones.

The “Ee” vowel shape is a brighter sound which has more overtones. Likewise doing a snore or a growl kind of sound is much more harmonically complex.

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