James Rossen writes; A new patented harmonica designed in part by Magic Dick has been touted by its designer and is used in a cut on the Bluestime CD.
What is magic/different about this harmonica? Is it being manufactured?
So far, there's been a lot of talk about the harps, but I've yet to hear a production date.
After much study of different musical genre's (especially swing and jazz I understand) Dick designed a variety of new note arraingements for 10 hole harmonicas. These new note layouts will allow us to blow new and different chords. He also mentioned a layout where ALL the draw notes are higher than the blow notes. This will allow us to play draw bends from the bottom of the harp all the way to the top. Check the archives for much more specific info. I saw Magic Dick and Bluestime last week. He used one Magic harp on one tune. (It may have been a standard harp that he re-tuned by hand) I was hoping to hear a lot more than just one song on the new harps.
I'm still very curious about these harps, but my enthusiasm is starting to cool a bit.
Does Dick have a backer for these things? It wouldn't surprise me if the big manufacturers are a bit wary of investing in all these new tunings. They would have to face some daunting questions. How can they promote them, if they can't let people play them without buying them first? How can they keep the price down if they only produce a small run of harps?
This has got me wondering just what percentage the non-Richter tuned harps make up of Hohner's total Diatonic harp sales. It wouldn't surprise me if the Country tuned, Natural Minor, Minor, solo tuned, and SBS harps, all together added up to less than 20% of their diatonic harp total. What's the scoop Rick? Is Hohner gonna produce these harps for Magic?
