People play a musical instrument to express a musical idea. Different techniques and different instruments allow musicians to express their ideas easier, better, or differently. The harmonica is an instrument uniquely designed for experimentation because it's a wind instrument that allows a musician to play chords, octaves, and single notes. Diatonic harp playing is also open to experimentation because it's cheap. Even the most expensive custom diatonic harp is cheap compared to other musical instruments. This means a musician can experiment with several mics and several different harps, even try some custom harps, octave harps, and valved harps without breaking the bank. A musician can experiment with techniques for nothing. In fact there are so many techniques and so many tones available in a harp, that unless a musician schedules a full day every day for practice, there are some sounds and techniques that will need work.
It's cool to see which musicians overblow. It would be neat to know what else they're playing with right now. It's also fun to speculate what techniques, if any, are left to be discovered. Do we really know what the harp is capable of?
Rainbow Jimmy http://www.spaceanimals.com http://www.mp3.com/spaceanimals
