[BILL HOLLAND PLAYING ON THE HOHNER MARINE BAND HARMONICA]

BILL HOLLAND: Now I personally, I've kind of -- I was kind of opposed to it for a while, but I still do like the ABS harps that are made with the ABS plastic. The Marine Band Special 20 is especially good.

Now, let me compare this real quick to the Great Little Harp from Hohner and the Special 20, just to show you the difference in sound between paying for a less expensive harp and a little more money for a good harp. So here we go. We have the GLH.

[BILL HOLLAND PLAYING ON THE HOHNER GREAT LITTLE HARP]

Still a very warm good harmonica sound, but then compare that to the Hohner Special 20 Marine Band.

[BILL HOLLAND PLAYING ON THE HOHNER MARINE BAND SPECIAL 20 HARMONICA]

It's much easier to breathe with this harp so it allows me a lot more flexibility in terms of how I can bend the notes.

And now we get into technique. Let's talk about technique while comparing these harps. There's a drawing and pulling which create different notes. For example, with the GLH, I breathe into the first position.

[BILL HOLLAND PLAYING ON THE HOHNER GREAT LITTLE HARP]

You hear me draw, it brings out a completely different note.

[BILL HOLLAND PLAYING ON THE HOHNER GREAT LITTLE HARP]

So much like an accordion or a melodica or other similar instruments, it changes the note as you pull out. Now, a lot of times, like in a C harp for example, it'll be the next key in the scale.

[BILL HOLLAND PLAYING ON THE HOHNER GREAT LITTLE HARP]

Notice how when I hit the middle of the harp, it changes and I have to blow in order to get the previous note that I was getting from pulling, so it reverse on the sixth position here, so keep that in mind when playing harp. It's going to reverse when you get into the higher notes.

Now, something else to keep in mind is that there are techniques that you can do both with your hands and with your mouth. Now, if you have an amplified harp and you're holding like a Green Bullet, for example, you won't be able to take advantage of some of those tremolo effects, so for example.

[BILL HOLLAND PLAYING ON THE HOHNER MARINE BAND HARMONICA]

That vibrato I'm getting there isn't really possible to do if you're using a Green Bullet because you're cupping the mic. So, if I cup this mic for example, it's not really a harmonica mic but you get the idea.

[BILL HOLLAND PLAYING ON THE HOHNER MARINE BAND HARMONICA]

You don't really get that. Now, you can play in front of a mic like a Shure SM58, I know people who do that, and then you can do this again.

[BILL HOLLAND PLAYING ON THE HOHNER MARINE BAND HARMONICA]

Now, another thing you can do is you can do what's called bending and overbending. Bending is simply using a combination of like circular breathing and mouth movements to create a bent note to get semitones and flat or sharp notes.

[BILL HOLLAND PLAYING ON THE HOHNER MARINE BAND HARMONICA]

And if I blow harder on that, I get what's called overbending.

[BILL HOLLAND PLAYING ON THE HOHNER MARINE BAND HARMONICA]

And I can overdraw where I draw harder than I normally do, so normally I draw like this.

[BILL HOLLAND PLAYING ON THE HOHNER MARINE BAND HARMONICA]

That's my overdraw, so you hear the difference between two of those, so again drawing.

[BILL HOLLAND PLAYING ON THE HOHNER MARINE BAND HARMONICA]

So air, both air and your lip technique both determine how you're playing. Now, one thing a lot of people don't understand is how do I play a single note. You need to get good, a kind of basically puckering around the harmonica. It's not about eating the harmonica. It's about putting your lips up to an almost like you're giving a really firm kiss, so.

[BILL HOLLAND PLAYING ON THE HOHNER MARINE BAND HARMONICA]

Again, really, really easy way to get cool effects out of a harmonica, and it's not that hard. Practice for a few weeks and you usually get the hang of how to do that. And there's also cross harp playing where you play chords. Now, that's done by grabbing the first four notes or notes up the way and playing them. Typically, in blues you're going to play a -- you're going to push in on the first four notes then pull out, and then go up to the second position and pull out again, and then go back down pull out on the first four and then push in. I'll show you what I mean by that.

[BILL HOLLAND PLAYING ON THE HOHNER MARINE BAND HARMONICA]

Well, that's a pretty simple walkthrough of the different kinds of harmonicas and what you can do when you kind of learn to play harmonica from the beginning. Pretty basic. But for now, I'm Bill Holland and this is Gearwire.Com.