G Harmonica Songs
Billi Plancarte
When you jump holes, you must not move your mouth too far from the harmonica; just try to keep the gap to a minimum to land right at the center of the hole you want to play next. When you jump from holes 6 to 4, you could accidentally play hole 5 by falling short, or hole 3 by jumping too far. At first, problems with playing hole leaps are very common because you may not have a good reference on the harmonica yet, but you will improve this with practice!
Hi Davis, thanks for your comment. Actually the tab is Ok, the 3 hole blow (G note) is correct. Also you could play the 6 hole blow instead the 3 blow (G note one octave higher) and it will sounds good too. Regards!
out of everyone on the internet, you teach a a level that everyone can understand. I use the tongue blocking method for single notes. would you recommend i keep with this method? I would be interested in lessons.
Hi Brenden, losing the clear single note when moving between cells is a very common problem for beginners. I highly recommend you check out this article on how to play the harmonica: -to-play-the-harmonica-an-easy-to-follow-guide/ Regards!
Hi Bruno Berloto its me Maddyson again my birthday is coming up soon and I want to know if you want to wish me a happy birthday.Did you know that my birthday is the day be for Martin Luther King Jr. died?Anyway I just wanted to say hi to everyone.=D
Hello! I played simple tunes on tremolo when I was small. I have recently bought a 10 hole (Hape, without sharp edges) to play simple tunes to my 1-year-old son. Any tips for the change of harmonica type?
Great help as i bought a very cheap tremolo C harmonica just to see if it was easy playing. With these tunes i have the confidence to take the next step and buy a diatonic harmonica in the future. Just sat down watching the telly i have three tune down to a tee, i am sure when i get more serious listening will be a pleasure for other people i decide to show off to.
Hi Robert, thank you very much for your comment and for sharing your experience. Later when you decide to buy your first 10-hole diatonic harmonica, remember take a look to this article with my top 5 recommended harmonicas for beginners: -harmonica-for-beginners-buying-guide/ Regards and Happy 2021!
Hi Alfred, that is not the right type of harmonica. If you want to learn from internet you would need a 10 hole diatonic harmonica type. Here I share my
article with a Top 5 best recommended harmonicas for beginners: -harmonica-for-beginners-buying-guide/ Regards!
Hi Satya, try to practice at least 30 minutes a day and first focus on playing clean single notes (only one hole at a time). Here I give you a tip for getting better on your single notes: put your mouth as if you were going to pronounce a letter U and place the harmonica on the inside part of your lower lip (never outside) as if you were going to drink from the spout of a bottle. Btw new tutorials are coming soon like how to play harmonica among others. Regards!
Brilliant songs for learning but, after learning to play originally on a tre mellow harmonica I am ha ing difficulty playing single notes on my Hohner Special 20. Do you have any tips for a very old learner?
Mikeh, that problem is very common indeed and I call it reference on the harmonica. The correct embouchure for tremolo harmonica is quite different than 10 hole diatonic harmonica, you need to readjust it. For playing single notes put your mouth as if you were going to pronounce a letter U and place the harmonica on the inside part of your lower lip as if you were going to drink from the spout of a bottle. Try these advises and you should have better results with your clean single notes. Regards!
Wow Advance Romance is an amazing song - love the harmonica, LOVE the guitar, and of course Terry Bozzio is just KILLING it (as always.) I could def see how this song would inspire you to wanna play harmonica. This may be my new favorite Frank Zappa song (though I DO love his cover of Stairway to Heaven! )
So far almost all the harmonica songs I have gathered are in lower keys especially the blues ones, as most blues players seem to totally dislike the upper register of low key harmonicas let alone using a higher key harmonica for entire song. I wonder why is this though? Is it because harmonica doesn't sound good in higher pitches?
E is not as common. Once at a jam session the leader called out the key of B, and I had no E harp and was not at the time as familiar with first or third position. I do now own an E and an Eb, but rarely use them.
Most player don't use the upper register, cause they don't know it as well. Sometimes they ignore learning it. It's their loss as it can add more flavor and interest. Sets apart the better players.
Listen to Paul deLay.
Also listen to some Jimmy Reed's first position playing.
Chicago blues through the 1960s saw a lot of use of F-harps, expecially by Sonny Boy Williamson II, Junior Wells, and Sonny Boy I. Same goes for D-harp although Little Walter also used that key quite a bit. Junior Wells and Little Walter both used an E-harp sometimes.
One famous non-blues use of F-harp is Charlie McCoy's recording of "Orange Blossom Special," a fiddle tune that he turned into a harmonica showcase. He actually uses a Bb harp as well for the part of the song where he chugs on three different chords, but most of the song is on an F-harp, which he plays in both second and first positions, using second position for the train whistle and chugs (along with some bluegrass licks), and then first position for the main fiddle melody.
If you need help with your harmonica learning, please send me an email and I would be more than happy to guide you through your guitar learning journey. At Iman Music Studio, I offer Harmonica lessons for all ages.
Learning the guitar feels like a complicated and daunting task for most people. You might not know where to start or what to get started. Still, thankfully there are plenty of resources available for beginners.
I know that melody songs can be easily played on a chromatic harmonica. I have horner Chrometta 12 as well as Horner golden melody. However I feel tunes from 10 holes diatonic harmonica are better than that of chromatic. Also note transitions are better in 10 holes diatonic. Also as 10 holes diatonic harmonica are far more smaller, it is easier to hold and can get better wah-wah effect.
From these reasons, I am trying to play melody songs in 10 holes diatonic harmonica. However, I face some problems while playing few notes on the song.I am playing in key of C. Below is the C major scale:
So songs in the key of C may includes the note 'A'. To produce the sound of note A, I need to bend by drawing in the 3rd hole. However, the 'A' sound produce by bending is odd compare to other notes which are produce without bending. I am trying to play the below notes:
I am not sure whether this oddness of A note is because of my poor bending technique or is it a problem in my harmonica. I am using Horner Golden Melody (Key of C).Just want to know if melody song can be played properly in 10 hole diatonic harmonica.
Start by drawing on hole 8 will give you the notes without bending. An octave higher than where you originally want, though. It can also be played on a G harp, starting on hole 6, with a blow. The trouble with the lower holes is there's no 6th note from the scale, so the 7th needs to be bent a whole tone. To make that A). This isn't easy to do exactly in tune, and the tone it makes doesn't match ordinarily produced notes.
YES. The easy way is on a C/T harmonica with a valve on the 5 hole. This will allow you to play chromatically in the mid range of the diatonic harp. The 5 hole will require a blow bend , giving you a full chromatic scale. If you valve the 2 hole for an additional blow bend you can play whatever you want. Works for me as I am a full time teacher, studio musician, performer.
I think you've got the answer and just need clarification. You could learn to play a convincing A by bending with more practice. You can even learn to bend on the blow notes. And there are also techniques called "overblow" and "overdraw" that give you a lot of range on one reed (or so I've read, I never got past blow bends). As easy as a harmonica is to learn starting out, it can take a lifetime to master. If you do master it, you should be able to play almost any melody that fits in its range with good tone on all the notes.
Yes, you can play all the half notes (black keys on the piano) for the whole range, but as mentioned above, a LOT of practice is needed. I'd guess a couple hundred plus hours of experimenting to get all the notes, now i'm finally getting some convincing quality, but it is very difficult. I wouldn't exactly call it practical yet, but it's a fun challenge.
A diatonic harmonica can play one octave of major scale and one octave of minor scale completely , without the need of bending. So yeah , if you are able to transpose and transcribe on the spot , then you can play almost all the songs on your diatonic harmonica that have notes in a single octave.
Can anyone suggest some more modern songs (rock or pop) that use harmonica? I'm down for other suggestions (folk and country or other) but I am in my 20's, so I never really listened to folk and country, nor do my friends.
If you're primarily interested in songs using harmonica played in a rack, three names that come to mind are folk-rockers Bob Dylan, Neil Young, and Bruce Springsteen. They tend to use relatively imprecise chords as musical intros or interludes. Billy Joel's playing on Piano Man fits in this category.
At a more advanced level are rack-harp blues players like John Hammond and Jimmy Reed, who are more adept at utilizing single notes, bends, and other effects. There's a relatively obscure artist named Mike Curtis who has developed a very sophisticated technique playing a valved harmonica in a rack, while playing guitar and bass pedals at the same time.
If you don't limit yourself to rack players, then it might be worth checking out some of the real harmonica greats, just to see what can be done on the instrument: Stevie Wonder, Toots Thielemans, Howard Levy, Larry Adler, Tommy Morgan, Robert Bonfiglio, John Popper, Charlie McCoy, Norton Buffalo, Sugar Blue, Sonny Terry, Big Walter Horton, Little Walter Jacobs, Charlie Musselwhite, Paul deLay, Paul Butterfield, James Cotton, Junior Wells, and dozens of others.
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