Specific harps Natural and Minor ? Tabs , how to convert/transpose any advices ? I had sydel but it crashes all time with special tunings, also harping dont have lee oskar natural minor but hohner .

How G major are diffrent from Gm natural minor ? Ther is just some reed tuning altered or what ?

I still dong get it . I have Gm N , C minor , Fm N and MM A all lee oskars but im stucked - where to go further ... i want to play something on them but im stuck ......

I don't know if you can transpose between them. I guess it could depend on the song.
This page will give you the answers.



Post Edited (2010-09-18 23:05:12)

Complicated i cant try to use harpy to get those tabs from midi channel but its to complicated to find good midi and also if i search i can probably just find classical music midi labeled with C minor or other and it will not work if there will be chord or more notes together or other problem on harpy which i can skip on Harping .I also made costume configs for sydel tabtools using labeling charts from lee oskar website but it never worked it just crashes idk maybe not so good cfg i made but i made more try-ed out and nothing.

And now harpy have much more better tab system first one was crazy, ya i know its not on windows in GUI (In linux it have now) in win you need run it in Run - Cmd but its not problem for me.

Natural Minor Harmonica
Article Written By: Cara Cooke and posted to
Bluegrass Harp June 2006
Used By Permission


*[I wrote this out for several folks, including the folks on this list. Recently, Bushman posted a deal on some of their overstocked natural minor harmonicas and that sparked interest in their usefulness. The sites that sell natural minor harmonicas are not forthcoming with information beyond that needed by the blues players, so I played around with a couple and came up with some ideas. I hope the information I have learned is useful to you.]**

Natural Minor Harmonicas

Natural minor harmonicas seem to be confusing to a lot of people. You can get the natural minor on the major diatonic, so do you even need the natural minor harmonica for anything? Is there something special about the natural minor that even makes it an interesting instrument to keep around? How do you even know which instrument to get if you decide to try one? There are a lot of questions.

Initially, the natural minor harmonica appears to be sold primarily for use by crossharp (2nd position) players to play in minor keys. These are people who are most comfortable playing the instrument in the "blues" position and may even be blues players. (Crossharp is one of the most common positions in which harmonica is played.) Since they are targeting crossharp players, they start the natural minor scale in second position (blow 3/draw 2). This also means that, unlike playing a natural minor on a major harmonica, the minor chords they may need for the natural minor are also readily available where they would expect them to be. (The major diatonic, obviously, has major chords in the same locations.)

So now we have a good idea of how useful a natural minor harmonica may be – to a crossharp player. But what about the other common position in which the harmonica is played? What about 1st position (in the key of the harmonica). Well, it can be useful there, too. However, making it useful can be rather confusing at first.

Let's look at the notes of the natural minor scale. A C major scale has no sharps or flats – like the white keys on the piano. (The black keys would be the off-notes found in bends.) A minor is the natural minor for the key of C. It also has no sharps or flats. The C major scale is played on the white keys of a piano from C to C. The A minor (natural) scale is played on the white keys from A to A. So a C major diatonic and a Am (natural) diatonic play the same notes.

A C major harmonica would look like this:
Hole 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Blow C C G C E G C E G C
Draw D G B D F A B D F A

And an A minor (natural) harmonica (keyed in 2nd position) would look like this:
Hole 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Blow A F A D F A D F A D
Draw E A C E G B C E G B

So there is the first source of our confusion in 1st position. Where we would expect an A minor scale, we find a D minor (dorian) scale instead (like the one you find in 3rd position on a major diatonic). But, now that we can see it, we can work around the problem. We can also begin to see some usefulness in the instrument. The chords, for example.

Chords (C major): Blow 1 through 10 on the C major play a C major chord. Draw 1-2-3-4 play a G major chord. Draw 4-5-6 and 8-9-10 play Dm. Draw 5-6 and 9-10 can make a partial F major (with no 5th). Blow 1-2, or 4-5, or 7-8 can play a partial Am that has no root (no A note). (It will blend with the other players, but it will have an ambiguous identity on its own.) Draw 7-8 can play a similarly ambiguous G chord with no root (G).

Chords (Am natural): Blow 1 through 10 on the Am (natural) play Dm. (Really, to 1st position players, this is a D minor (dorian) harmonica.) An ambiguous F with no root can be found at blow 2-3, 5-6, and 8-9. Draw 1-2-3-4 play Am. Draw 3-4-5 and 7-8-9 play C major. A partial G chord (with no 5th) can be found at draw 5-6 and 9-10.

So, while the chords have shifted with the notes, the full and partial chords we are accustomed to being able to find are located in the same places. That is a good start.

More confusion falls upon all players when they try to buy their first natural minor harmonica, though. Hohner sells its natural minor Marine Bands in 1st position keys, but tells you in their blurb that the instrument is intended for 2nd position use. (This would be like buying a D major diatonic to play crossharp in the key of A.) So the Hohner Dm (natural) really has an Am (natural) scale as shown above. This same harmonica would be labeled in the crossharp key on Bushman and Lee Oskars (as an Am natural). So the first job of any harmonica player looking for a natural minor harmonica is to determine how the instrument is labeled as to key so that they can get the key they need.

But I haven't gotten to the most interesting thing about the natural minor harmonicas yet. Looking at the scales written out above you can see that the scale of the instrument between the C major diatonic (labeled in 1stposition, or the key of the harmonica) and the Am (natural) (labeled in 2nd position) are only shifted on the instrument one note over. Blow 4 on the C major is a C, but blow 4 on the Am (natural) is a D. That means that all of the available bends have changed. In fact, where, on a major diatonic, you have no bend on hole 5 or hole 7, you have bends on the Am (natural). Every hole, except hole 8 on a natural minor diatonic, has at least one bent note available. So any tune where the melody hits on a note that "falls between the holes" may have that note available as a bend somewhere on the natural minor harmonica. It has the same notes as the major diatonic, but, because the notes have moved over slightly, new bending possibilities arise.

That the two harmonicas share the same notes, but are shifted off of one another also means that both of the types of harmonicas can be played usefully in other positions.

On a C major diatonic, you can find the following positions without bending notes:

1st = C (straight), 2nd = G (blues), 3rd = Dm (dorian), 4th = Am (natural), 5th = Em (Phrygian), 6th = B (locrian), and 12th = F (Lydian).

On an Am (natural) diatonic, using the same position patterns you find on the major diatonic (for ease of reference), you can find the following positions without bending notes:

1st = Dm (dorian), 2nd = Am (natural), 3rd = Em (Phrygian), 4th = B (locrian), 5th = F (Lydian), 6th = C (straight), and 12th = G (blues).

So that means that we can use either harmonica to play the same things, but the patterns we become accustomed to will change and the bends that are available will be different. Let's put this into action.

Ashokan Farewell: Plays fine in 1st position on a C major diatonic with one bend on hole 3 to get an A, but has an important Bb in the second part that ends up being a 6 overblow. On the Am (natural) harmonica, the Bb is available as a bend. Hmmm… So if I play this tune in C major on an Am (natural) harmonica in 6th position (to get the C major scale), I can play the tune with a bend on 2 to get a G, a bend on 3 to get a B, and a bend on 6 to get the Bb. Now I don't need an overblow to play all the notes in the song. I just need a natural harmonica that can produce the correct major key. (Since this tune is most often played in D major, a Bm (natural) harmonica would produce the correct major key.)

Miss Molly: Plays with some difficulty in 1st position (C major – no Bb for the blue mode of the tune) and better in 2nd position (G major), but the blue, half-tone shift often sung is usually unavailable. In 3rd position (Dm played with the F# bend on 9 blow to make the scale more major), the tune can be played in the upper octaves and the blue, half-tone shift (in this case, on a C harmonica, between F# and F – the 3rd notes of the D major/minor scales) is available with a bend, but the natural note of the Dm scale (F) becomes the blue note and your normal wailing comes off a little differently since you don't need to bend to get it. If it is played in 12thposition, instead, on a natural minor harmonica, then it is already in the correct blue mode and the blue, half-tone shift becomes available as a bend. So if you wish to play it in G (blues), use 12th position on an Am (natural) harmonica. In D (blues), use 12th position on an Em (natural).

So now I can see a usefulness to natural minor harmonicas. Playing in different positions allows more choices between the major and natural minor instruments as to how the tunes are played and what options are available to add to the tune. You have the chords you need available, if you choose your instruments appropriately. Plus, if you play in different positions, tunes with missing notes might play better on another instrument where the notes are available.
Cara Cooke
[www.cyberharp.isonfire.com]

Thanks Cara, For sharing with us.
Everyone make sure to check out her home page if you haven't already
Barry

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Minor tuned harmonicas are an easy way to get minor blues by playing major blues licks, and I recommend picking up one or two on general principles. I have a couple of Lee Oskar natural minor tuned diatonics.

Natural minors are labeled for cross harp because they're not intended to be played in 1st position, so get a D natural minor to play D minor cross harp. Yes it's confusing as #$&@, but that's how it is. At Lee's seminars, he spends about half the day explaining this.

I know you want to keep it simple. I've taught a lot of guitarists to do exactly this - put it in your mouth and breathe. But with a couple of simple tricks, you can multiply your harmonica capabilities. I've shared these with new racked players who didn't even really want to play harp in the first place, and most of them ended up using at least some of these.

It's really not at all difficult to use positions on major diatonics for minor keyed tunes (and you don't need jazz chords to do it). These work just fine with E, A, and B7, etc. I've given all examples for a C major diatonic.

If you use a C harp for D minor blues, that's 3rd position. It plays similar to 2nd position, but it's definitely minor. Charlie Musselwhite uses 3rd position on major diatonics a lot, as does James Cotton (Diggin' My Potatoes). Blues chromatic players use 3rd position almost exclusively.

A C harp in E minor is 5th position. Use blow-2, blow-3, draw-3, and draw-4.

A C harp in A minor is 4th position. It plays very much like "Jimmy Reed" 1st position (a lot of high blow notes and bends), but uses 6-draw for the tonic.

A C harp in B minor is 6th position. Lots of draw notes, very similar to 2nd position, and a VERY minor, mournful sound. I taught Jon Gindick 6th position. He mastered it in no time. And Jon doesn't use jazz chords, either.

For The Thrill Is Gone in B minor, 6th position on a C major diatonic is by far the best, even better than any minor tuned harmonica. It's a sad tune, and the turnaround goes to G, the 2nd position draw chord. You can make people cry with your solo (and not because you sound terrible )

So that's four different minors out of one lowly C harp. Try 'em, just for laughs, when you're ready to experiment.



This post has been edited by IronManMC on December 30, 2009 02:24 am

IronManMC
Posted: December 29, 2009 10:45 pm
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Hi everybody

I am playing a C key diatonic harmonica(10 hole) about 4 weeks. Now i can play some simple songs. But i want to play chromatic harmonica too.

But i dont know which harmonica i should buy chromatic 10 hole? 12 hole? Most of the chromatic harmonicas are 12 hole, so i am confused which is better. if i buy 12 hole chromatic , could i play it?

I dont know what is the differences between 10 , 12 ,16 or etc holes of harmonicas. Can anyone tell me the differences of hole numbers.

[coast2coastmusic.com]


sydundar this page should answer your basic questions about chromatic layouts. I personally would not get a chrom smaller than 12 holes as a starter, actually not one larger either, as the low notes on a 16-holer are a bit of a challenge. IM me if you have specific questions or else start a new thread so the other chrom players can "chime" in
Walt