Choosing a Harmonica

Matt Bradshaw: Hi, my name is Matt Bradshaw, and I am a musician in the Washington DC area, and right now I'm talking about what kind of harmonica you want to buy, when you're trying to play.

Basically, the two types of harmonica that I would recommend are the Hohner Blues Band and the Hohner Special 20, the difference is price, and the quality, but just by a little bit.

The Blues Band is available everywhere, in music stores, and they're really cheaper, about $5, $10, $15 and they are good if you're just starting out and just trying to get familiar with the harmonica, but if you want to take a step further, then I would recommend moving on to the Special 20, which is a little high quality, a little more pricey, they are about 28 bucks at your local music store, they are sold exclusively at music stores and at online stores. But they are good quality, they last a while and they are really easy to use and that's the harmonica that I have here. So that's the type of harmonica that you are going to watch and buy.

Now I'm going to talk a little bit about holding a harmonica because you'll be doing a lot of that, and it's pretty simple. What you're going to want to do is just grab the harmonica with your left hand like this and just grip it like that, and then you're going to take your right hand and bring it around the back. So you have created this little chamber that's easy for the harmonica with, and we'll talk about why a little later.

Next, I'm going to talk about breathing when playing the harmonica.