Free reeders, rise and shine...

[Deleted member 48]

The mouth harmonica has seen a rise in the number of top female players in the last years.
So great young women start with free reeds on the harmonica. A good thing for the free reed family of music instruments.

I recently discovered this free reed goddess, Indiara Sfair :

Ricardo Maranhão feat. Indiara Sfair: Im Tired | Casa da Frente |

Beautiful dirty bluesy sound, and subtle handcupping for wah wah and howlin effects.

The entire sound spectre is availabe on free reeds, from the perfect pitch of a rigid church organ, bending down to a dirty blues joint.
Those little free reeds are dangerous
Lord have mercy

 

[JIM D.]

Nice as video, and not as audio as the 'Cheesecake" would be missed. :tup:

 

[Deleted member 48]

Free reeds are a bombshell's best friend, and a choirboy's.
In Germany also women get loose on free reeds.
Auf Wiedersehen unsere Lieblinge and tremolo harmonicas.
Hello there bluesy sandwich.

 

[Glenn]

I wish I knew what you were talking about


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[george garside]

nice bit of blues playing on the mouthie ( harmonica/mouthorgan/gob iron) or whatever you want to call it!

There , at least, two mainstream ways of playing the mouthie,

Blues as in the video where the whole art lies in 'bending' notes and to facilitate that there is only a single reed per note ( the reeds are much the same as on an accordion but smaller and all mounted on a long reedplate)

Folk , old time, country and western or whatever where the notes are played 'as they are' and in which 'tremelo' instruments are generally preferred i.e. 2 reeds for each hole much the same as on a 2 voice accordion in miniature.

One of the best exponents of the tremolo 'folk' style was the late Will Atkinson and I have seen him playing all night for a ceilidh ( country dance) many times even when he was in his late 80's. I think there may be a youtube or two of him. He was an extremely good box player but took up the mouthie when his arthritis limited hi box playing. Sir Jimmy Shand was also a dab hand on the ''wee mouthie''!

For anyone thinking of taking up the diatonic box it is well worth buying a cheap Chinese mouthie for £5 or so as the blow suck sequence is the same as playing a diatonic 'on the row' and if you can get a tune out of a mouthie you are in with a good chance playing a diatonic box.

 

[Deleted member 48]

Beatboxing with harmonica, also have seen harmonicists with dj's in a duo. The harmonica is in touch with pop genres.

In my experience bending on harmonicas is soo much easier when the harmonica is airtight. Prices usually are between 30 and 100 euro for good harmonicas, like Hohner marine band or special 20, or Seydel 1847, session steel, big six seydel, suzuki promaster,...

The accordion can be hot also. Are the Accordion Babes still active in the USA?
Remember the beautiful teaser photo shots with vintage piano accordions.
I think they are good promotion for accordion starters.

 

[JerryPH]

The accordion can be hot also. Are the Accordion Babes still active in the USA?

Google told me there are still 9 days left on a kickstarter project to get the 2017 Accordion Babes calendar. People in the USA can get one (for $25) from (I think it was) Smythes Accordion Center in Oakland CA. Isnt one of our forum members here either the owner or employee of Smythes?

https://www.kickstarter.com/project...ccordion-babes-2017-album-and-pin-up-calendar

http://www.accordionpinupcalendar.com/pin-up-galleries/2017_calendar/

 

[Deleted member 48]

I surfed to the Cotati festival website. They will attend this accordion festival in june 2017.
Love their exposure of accordions in the calendar.

Month of may soon, worldwide accordion day.

 

[Howie]

Some of the best harmonica playing Ive ever heard is by this lady, Christelle Berthon:


She has a lot of videos on youtube in many different styles. She can really rock a blues, or go slow and sweet. She has extraordinary control over her bends, and to my ear at least, she always plays musically, instead of for effect.