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Date: Sun, 20 May 2001 09:29:45 -0700 (PDT)
From: Winslow Yerxa
Subject: [none]

Glenn Weiser writes:

>I always thought holding the slide in and playing Eb
>on the chro was really just 3rd position. I >have
"Blues in the Dark" transcribed in Masters of >Blues
Harp, where Geo. Smith plays it in Eb on a C >chro,
which I describe as 3rd position in the book.

Positions describe the relation of the key of the harp
to the key of the music. Techniques used (or not used)
are irrelavent.

Eb relative to C is 10th position.

So he doesn't move the slide and that makes it
"really" 3rd position and not 10th? Then what about
the Little Walter and Paul deLay records where they
play in Eb, starting with the slide in, but then put
the slide into play in ways that are impossible in the
key of D (3rd position), and impossible on a C#
diatonic? Are they still kinda, sorta, 3rd position?
Or not?

Where do you draw the line? This gets messy fast if
you insist on using an irrelavent criterion (slide
usage) to name the position as something other than
what it is.

Let's turn it around and say someone plays in D (3rd
position), but then starts using the slide. Before he
started using the slide it was 3rd position. Is it no
longer third position once he starts using the slide?
Of course not. He's just adding to his bag of
techniques used. The underlying relation of harp key
to music remains the same.

Once again, techniques used are irrelavent. Positions
describe key music relative to key of harmonica.

>I always thought a chro was two harmonicas double
>decked a half step apart.

When you play a chromatic harmonica, how many
instruments do you pick up, one or two? You pick up
one. One body, one row of holes in the mouthpiece for
you mouth to address. And a slider, something not
found on a diatonic C harp or a diatonic C# harp. You
can do things with that slider that you can't do on a
diatonic harp.

The slide allows you to activate one set of reeds or
another en masse, and those sets do correspond to what
yuou would find in a solo-tuned C and C# diatonic. But
internally, the modern 16-hole chromatic does not have
one C reedplate and one C# reedplate. The reeds for
both keys are evenly distributed between the
reedplates. Physically, internally, you could not
separate the two keys without either sawing the
reedplates into 32 separate slugs, or transplating
half the reeds from one reedplate to another. It's
been that way since about the mid-1950's which is to
say most of the recording career of George Smith, a
good chunk of Little Walter's and all of Rod Piazza's,
Williams Clarke's, Kim Wilson's, etc.

So the way the slide separates the notes into two
groups is just a matter of "user interface" and not
internal construction. Try playing a 64 with the
mouthpiece removed. See how far you get with this C/C#
stuff.

>Aren't you just using the C# harp in 3rd position?

No. You're using a C chromatic in 10th. See above.

>I think of it as being like using a capo on the
>guitar, myself.

Ever see a guitarist slide the capo up and down the
neck at will while he's playing the instrument?
The slide can do that, making it much more versatile
than a capo.

I understand your point, that it's an easy way to
think of playing Eb - the same as D if you just lock
the slide in. But to label it as 3rd position is both
incorrect and restrictive - it closes off the idea
that you can put the slide into play if you want to.

Instead of calling it 3rd-position-kinda-sorta-y'see-
there's-this-one-difference, why not instead say that
it is 10th position, but that the easiest way to
approach it for blues playing is to hold in the slide
and play in the same manner as third position. This
approach can be augmented, however, by putting the
slide into play, as done by some players (cite
examples).

Winslow

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