Harmonica

For many years I have loved the sound of the harmonica, primarily in the blues. It has an amazingly expressive sound akin to human voice.

Some years ago I decided to try and learn to play this instrument, after all, it’s cheap to buy and can’t be that hard to play.

How wrong can you be?

Yes they are cheap to buy but as for easy to play it all depends. You can pick out a tune relatively quickly but that is about it. Forget the ‘play blues harmonica in an hour’ courses you see all over the place, it just won’t happen. The course might be an hour long but to reach any proficiency will take endless practice.

One thing that frustrated me early on was the sample CD’s that came with some of these courses, showing you what you should sound like. I could never get it. In hindsight I now realise that the samples actually used techniques not directly covered in the courses for example vibrato and timing are the two obvious areas that make a huge difference to the sound but were not really covered.

I nearly gave it up completely until I stumbled across the YouTube video series by Adam Gussow. Adam has been playing blues harmonica for many years, learning his trade as a street performer tutored by some amazing people.

From the first introductory lesson I was hooked by Adam’s open and down to earth approach to blues harmonica. I now understood why I was not progressing and why things never sounded ‘right’.

Don’t get me wrong I wont be performing public concerts but from a personal point of view I am getting more enjoyment from learning to play than I did with the teach yourself books.

You can catch Adam’s first video below.

Adam also has his own site offering additional training at a nominal cost, all of the lessons I have bought have been well worth it.  Take some time to visit modernbluesharmonica.

One other worthwhile resource I would recommend if you are thinking about learning the harmonica is Dave Gage’s site harmonicalessons.com, this site contains a wealth of useful information for new players.

Give it a try, you can buy a reasonable harmonica to start on for less that £20, but check the recommended list at harmonicalessons.com before parting with the cash.

As in everything the bottom line is practice, practice and practice and when you’ve done that it’s time to practice.