Jamming with Harmonica tips

[fred4321]

Hi all,
I have a friend who has a collection of harps and we get together occasionally jamming with some blues riffs/strumming and his harp.
Hit and miss sometimes, but when we get it right its great.
I need to understand how do we get it right and other times wrong.

I strum a major blues progression is say A for example.
We experiment with different harmonica keys till we hit it.

Works some of the time.
I have read some of the previous threads from the past, and my theory is not strong.

Could anyone suggest strumming patterns in keys in A or G and which key harmonica we need to use over it?
cheers

[Mr. Jelly]

If I remember correctly, about blues harp, the harp key would be the IV chord of the key you are playing in. So in the key of A you would use a D harp. In the key of G you would play a C harp. In the key of E use an A harp.

[12barBill]

Its about playing harmonica in cross harp position.

To try and make this as simple as possible, with a standard diatonic harmonica the key of the harmonica is based on the note of the 4 hole blow. There is a major scale going up from there with a blow/draw pattern (that reverses from hole 6 to 7). The root is 4 hole blow. This is called playing straight harp.

Playing in cross harp, the root is the 2 hole draw (or 3 hole blow, see video). With playing in cross harp position you can play a blues scale (or minor pentatonic) over the key of the song.

If you are playing a 12 bar blues in A your harmonica buddy should play a diatonic harmonica labeled in the key of D and play in cross harp position.

There is a lot of info on line you can research.
This guy has some good lessons. This video may be a little confusing if you don't understand some background, but it does explain and demonstrate playing cross harp blues scale.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7GykBnoOCBo&app=desktop

[DCCougar]

Originally Posted by Mr. Jelly

If I remember correctly, about blues harp, the harp key would be the IV chord of the key you are playing in.

Yeah. Or taken from the harp's perspective, a G harp plays in D - the V chord from G.

Here's a blues piece with harp I recorded over 30 years ago....

[12barBill]

Originally Posted by Mr. Jelly

If I remember correctly, about blues harp, the harp key would be the IV chord of the key you are playing in. So in the key of A you would use a D harp. In the key of G you would play a C harp. In the key of E use an A harp.

[QUOTE=DCCougar;6174837]Yeah. Or taken from the harp's perspective, a G harp plays in D - the V chord from G.


...to be clear, only when playing in second position (referred to as cross harp).

[roylor4]

Bill is correct. There are several different approaches to harp playing buth the two most common are cross-harp and straight harp. Cross harp is most common in Blues while straight harp is more chordsy and used for a lot of Folk type stuff.

In cross harp, I find it simpler to say that the harp plays the IV chord of the guitar part.

Guitar in A, harp in D.
Guitar in G, harp in C. etc.

I've been blowing harp for 30 years and didn't learn this until I was already a proficient player. I simply didn't know why certain harps worked w/certain songs.

here is a link to a chart your friend can print. There are others too - just Googlr "images" cross harp chart.

https://www.harmonicalessons.com/overview_chart.html

Blues progressions are most commonly in E or A, so an A & D harp are needed respectively. If you play some country type stuff in G, then your friend needs a C to play cross harp.

[fred4321]

Thanks everyone for the great advice. Had a jam over the weekend and the information provided a great road map for us to work from.
BTW harmonica through a tube screamer and a 5 watt tube amp sounded terrific.
cheers