Is a harmonica a dobro...or a Swingin' 9th Jazz Steel?

[Tommy Martin Young]

Dang it - not 2 weeks into a new year and I broke my resolution to not talk about tunings. Ever. But this is different, I hope.

After 30 years of playing harmonica I’ve always approached my lap steel learning knowing there was solid connection between a harmonica and an open tuning. The pic shows all blow notes across the top of a C harp give you a C Major chord (it’s 135135 of the chord all the way across like a dobro) so a lap steel tuned to C6 just has one extra note. Easy concept for me to understand but has done nothing in terms of furthering my musical aptitude.


BUT I recently realized - most blues (and what I play) is played in 2nd position. This means the G draw note (2nd hole) becomes your root note and when you diagram it out and make a few tweaks to a standard tuning it gives a classic lap steel G9 chord with the following scale degrees lo-hi 5-1-3-5-b7-2-3-5 (works best on an 8-string) and you need the 5 on the bottom



It’s just a variation on the famous 9th tunings minus the 6th. There’s a finite pocket of notes to choose from in this H9 tuning (what I'm calling it) BUT because lap steel has the same notes in different places some licks are even easier. Not everything works (sounds good)- like you can’t do a classic two-hole shake - but the world probably doesn’t need more harmonica-type instruments anyways.

Kind of weird I never saw it before but makes 100% sense to my harp brain. Basically every lick I ever learned is right there in a 4-fret span. I can choose to play it in other places and harmonize etc...but if I "hear" it in my head - I now know it's ALL coming from there.

Crossover harp players - thoughts?

[Jack Hanson]

Inspired by the tragically underrated Jesse Edwin Davis, the great Duane Allman made a big name for himself by playing Rice Miller & Walter Jacobs licks (among others) with a little pill bottle on a solid-body, humbucker-equipped Gibson electric guitar through a cranked 50-Watt Marshall. I often play the same lines on my lap steels that have been embedded in my head since childhood from playing 10-hole mouth organs in the 2nd position. The parallels are endless. And oh my -- do those tiny vintage amps marketed for Hawaiian guitar (aka lap steel) ever sound wonderful for blues harp.

[Jim Pitman]

Jack, that never occured to me. I am a big fan of Duane Allman and I hadn't put that together. Makes sense.
Tommy, I'm currently in a band with a harp player that only uses two keys of the marine band type and somehow covers all the keys. He told me he sends his harps away to get the reed thinned so he can bend to the notes more easily to adapt. That's something else I've learned about harps this year.

[Paul Arntson]

Great stuff. Thanks for posting all of the above!

[Bob Stone]

Thanks for posting Tommy.

Blues harp was my first instrument. I've been a fan of Little Walter since the 1960s.

I have recently been working on Little Walter's "My Babe" using a wah pedal with a little overdrive as a tone control--very little pedal movement--on my Fender Dual Pro. You can check out Darick Campbell's playing to see the sort of tone I'm getting. Here's one example:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fOg507x6JmU

Of course, it's not Little Walter's harp tone, but to me it gives a similar feel. Right now I'm playing it on my Cajun G neck (high G on top), but have also begun to experiment on the C6 neck, which is really handy for minor pentatonic licks. In both cases I'm playing in the original key of F.

Your take on the relationships of blues harp and C6 in most interesting. For what it's worth, Darick played in an E6 tuning, but I never heard him play the 6th chord--just lead lines.

Darick was a sensitive, inventive, soulful player and a great guy. We miss him so.

[Tommy Martin Young]

Thanks for posting Tommy.

Blues harp was my first instrument. I've been a fan of Little Walter since the 1960s.

I have recently been working on Little Walter's "My Babe" using a wah pedal with a little overdrive as a tone control--very little pedal movement--on my Fender Dual Pro. You can check out Darick Campbell's playing to see the sort of tone I'm getting. Here's one example:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fOg507x6JmU

Of course, it's not Little Walter's harp tone, but to me it gives a similar feel. Right now I'm playing it on my Cajun G neck (high G on top), but have also begun to experiment on the C6 neck, which is really handy for minor pentatonic licks. In both cases I'm playing in the original key of F.

Your take on the relationships of blues harp and C6 in most interesting. For what it's worth, Darick played in an E6 tuning, but I never heard him play the 6th chord--just lead lines.

Darick was a sensitive, inventive, soulful player and a great guy. We miss him so.

Bob, that was waaay cool and I remember picking up the Darick Campbell lesson and sitting in awe.

I know there's no such thing as a "magic bullet" mic or tuning that instantly makes you better than you are - BUT I do believe you have to find what works for you. I don't know how some harp players started playing it upside down and backwards but it works for 'em and when I added the 5th to the bottom of my lap steels everything suddenly fell into place; those 2nd position Draw intervals are in my blood. ( although I keep it 5135613561 etc...not matter how many strings) but I can now go back to thinking of Positions when I play and I love that harmonica FORCES you to play every change using the same set of notes - but with lap steel you can bend up down - change positions etc...but I still have that Core 513561 that acts like an anchor.

I purchased a Hohner harp a few years back and they had a coupon for a free 30 days of lessons so I'm working on one of the teacher's tunes called Blowin' My Horn - it's a grab bag of William Clarke licks and it's the most fun I've ever had learning. (he doesn't have it posted but one of his students posted his own version https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvUFpKTbUgQ) Note: I Am Not playing this at 200 bpm It's in 3rd position but Lap steel is all positions, right?

Cheers!