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From: Hugh Messenger
Date: Thu, 12 Sep 1996 14:54:54 -0500 (CDT)
Subject: Re: Filisko

On Thu, 12 Sep 1996, Barry B. Bean wrote:

> I hold you fully responsible. In fact, I'm sending an invoice for the
> difference in one really good MB and a Filisko.

That's about 70 years and 27 cents, isn't it?

> wanted. However, I think the real culprit is that for the specific
> sound I am after, I'll probably have to get the specific harp that
> makes thyat sound.

That may be true, but if you simply can't get the harps you need anywhere
else ...

> >A soaked, "old fashioned" MB is about the closest I could come to describe
> >the note of mine.
>
> Thats the sound I'm looking for, and while the action is there, the
> tone is still a litle brighter than I'd choose. Of course, I'm
> infected with the saxophone disease, and bright/dark differences
> become an obsession, so I may simply be obsessed on that particular
> quality.

It also took me a while to adjust to playing my FMB. It's an A, which is
what I do most of my show pieces on, which I've been playing so long that
I my brain tends to switch off and muscle memory takes over. If I stay
awake and remember that I'm playing on a much tighter, much louder (and
mayhap, possibly, whoknows, a little brighter) instrument, I can make the
necessary face re-arrangements to get the (say) ballsier, mellower or
"darker" tone.

Less wind, seems to be the key.

> I'm sure I would - but I don't think I could live without a favorite
> harp for that long. It'd be akin to putting my tenor sax in the shop
> for a few days - those are the days the phone rings off the hook for
> a tenor player and I wake up at 4 AM with the best idea I ever had
> for a tenor solo...

I know what you mean, but imagine being able to have that favourite harp
re-incarnated every time it died? Joe really *is* that good. Every harp
is different, as we know, and changes with time, being taken apart,
cleaned, tuned, whatever. Joe has this ability to study your current
"this is the one!" harp, and reproduce that setup.

He (I think) still offers the service of taking your regular harps and
setting them all up "right" for you, for some paltry sum per harp. What
you get back is basically the way they *should* have been when they left
the factory, only set up just the way you like 'em.

Unfortunately, he's only one guy, and can only make / fettle so many
harps. His off-the-shelf models are by their nature a compromise, and
anything "personalized" is going to take time, and more money (don't
expect the full service for nothing!).

> Should you talk to Joe, please
> assure him that I'm not trashing his product online.

I'm sure he wouldn't have construed any of this as trashing.

> BBB

-- hugh