Summary – For over 30 years Walter Buchinger taught harmonica at the Musikschule in Laakirchen, Austria. He took groups of children to perform at festivals and concerts in Europe, Israel and the USA.
Walter was born in 1943 in Laakirchen. He learned to play harmonica and accordion and in 1963/64 he attended a seminar for music teachers in what is now the Hohner Konservatorium, in Trossingen, Germany. In 1973 Walter was teaching accordion in the local music school when he was asked to teach a harmonica course to beginners. He had no experience of teaching harmonica, but with the help of the Austrian Harmonica Association, Helmuth Herold, a professional chromatic player from Trossingen, Germany, agreed to do it. Helmuth taught beginners and advance students twice a year until the early 1990s. When Helmuth was no longer able to do it, Walter took over the classes.
The Landesmusikschule (LMS) was established in 1971. The teaching of harmonica (Mundharmonika) in the school was officially recognised in 1975 and classes started with four pupils. More soon followed. Other teachers wanted to learn to play and soon they had a harmonica group. In 1984 the current music school building was opened.
In 1985, the first school orchestra (Harmonicachoir) was formed. It had 20-25 teenage members and was led by Walter Buchinger and Margareta Rathner. The repertoire included original music for harmonica, classical and well known International popular music.
Soon they were playing concerts away from the school, beginning with one on Austrian TV. Their international appearances started with a harmonica festival in Innsbruck (Austria) in 1986, and in 1987 they performed at the Hohner 130th anniversary festival. Later that year they appeared in the first World Harmonica Championships in Jersey (Channel Islands), organised by Jim Hughes. They won the youth competitions (group and orchestra) and played in the evening concerts. This brought them worldwide recognition.
In 1988 they performed at the festival in Helmond (Holland). In 1989 they held an international festival in Laakirchen and were invited to the first of the new Hohner World Harmonica Festivals in Trossingen, Germany. They continued to take part in this four yearly festival until 2005.
The concerts continued with one in Beer Sheva (Israel) in 1990. In 1991 they released an LP containing pieces of music from their performances called ‘Our Music– Our World‘ (Unsere Musik – Unsere Welt).
1991 also brought the biggest journey for this group of children and adults when they took part in the SPAH/IHO festival in Detroit, (USA) again winning prizes in the solo, group and band categories.
Festivals followed in Portugal (1993), Austria (1994), Trossingen (1993,1996, 2001, 2005), and the IHO Millennium Festival in Bournemouth, UK (2001) where they again won many of the prizes and featured in the concerts.
When pupils left the music school many went on to form their own groups and solo careers.
Maria Wolfsberger – World Champion (1991-1993)
Trio Mahabri – Maria Wolfsberger, Johann Ortner/Thomas Stockhammer, Brigitte Laska (1989)
Vigorous Quartett/Quintett – Mara Bachlechner, Anna Waldl / Martha Kreutzer, Judith Kreutzer, Marlene Hummelbrunner
Walter stopped teaching at the Music School in 2003 after 30 years in charge.
His last major performance with the harmonica orchestra was at the World Harmonica Festival in Trossingen, Germany, in 2005, where he conducted a group of 60 young and adult harmonica players.
Some harmonica teaching is still going on in the Music School led by Nicola Feichtinger and Olivia Winzer They are good teachers so the golden years may come again – we will see.
Walter is now in his 80s and enjoying his retirement. He continues to play with a group of senior players and has taught himself how to play the Chordomonica which was developed by Cham-ber Huang because of the chords it can play. With a growing family, house and garden he says he is the ‘chief cook and bottle washer‘ – a phrase he learned from his old friend Jim Hughes.
Walter always insists that the orchestra was a group activity with many school staff and parents providing help and support, especially on their many visits to foreign counties. There are far too many people to mention by name but please accept his thanks to all of you that you that contributed.
Here are the tracks from the LP released by Walter in 1991 of the orchestra playing some of their favourite light music and popular pieces.
Here are a couple of videos from the World Harmonica Festival in Jersey (UK) in 1987.
Scherzino
Puppet on a String
The Mundharmonikachor Laakirchen
This is the full performance of the Harmonica Society of Laakirchen, Austria, in the Evening Concert at the IHO Millenium Festival in Bournemouth (UK) in 2000, organised by John Walton.
The orchestra was composed of children from the music school, parents, helpers and teachers from the town.
Toots died in 2016 but he would have been 100 if he had lived until 2022. This year there was a series of events including concerts in Brussels and around the world to celebrate his life and music. You can see more on the event website – 100 years of Toots Thielemans .
I love his music and enjoyed his enthusiastic personality which came across in his interviews.
Here is a great edit from the many conversations he recorded over his long career as whistler, guitarist and one of the best harmonica players. The compilation was put together by a Belgian DJ, Nico Kanakaris, who goes by the name of BlueNotes (Facebook).
Here are some memories of Toots and his life broadcast in German by ‘Das Feature – Deutschlandfunk’ with contributions from harmonica players – Steven de Bruyn, Hendrik Meurkens, Yvonnick Prene, Gregoire Maret … – and many top jazz musicians. Download the music from their webspage – Der Weg der Mundharmonika – Toots Thielemans und der Atem der Melancholie
Here, Julian Joseph and Julian Jackson talk about Toots Thielemans in the Jazz Legends series broadcast by the BBC in the early 2000s. Julian Jackson is one of the top UK Jazz harmonica players and a session musician. He was been inspired by and had visited Toots. They play a number of recordings by Toots.
Phil Hopkins wrote this for me in 2010 when I was Editor of Harmonica World. He is a chromatic harmonica player when he is not the percussionist for London stage orchestras.
Here he is with Tommy Morgan in California in 2010.
The name of Tommy Morgan, Hollywood’s favourite harmonica player, is assured of a prominent place in any history of the instrument’s development. Morgan’s extraordinary career, during which he has racked up more than 7000 recording sessions for entertainment industry bluebloods such as The Beach Boys, The Carpenters, John Barry, Randy Newman, John Williams, Barbara Streisand and James Taylor, to name but a few, is still going strong – and recently passed a significant milestone. For September 2010 witnessed the 60th anniversary of Morgan’s session career, commencing with a recording for the Andrews Sisters in 1950 and recently seeing him booked in the studio for sessions for projects such as the film “Toy Story 3” and a new Barry Manilow album. And he still keeps busy with live classical engagements with the world-renowned LA Philharmonic.
I personally experienced the Tommy Morgan sound as a part of the soundtrack to my formative years as a youngster growing up in the 70s, even though at that stage I didn’t know the name of the man who was behind it. The mournful intro to “Rainy Days And Mondays”, the funk/C&W fusion of the Rockford Files theme, the spooky middle section of “Good Vibrations” (borrowed from my elder brother’s record collection) – all were manifestations of the master harmonicist at work in different disguises. But it was only when I heard John Barry’s orchestral album “The Beyondness Of Things” in 1998, with Morgan prominently credited for some gorgeous solos, that I connected the name of Tommy Morgan to the harmonica work which I had enjoyed for many years hitherto (via information on Morgan’s website). And for me as a harmonica student, Tommy’s sound on “Beyondness” soon became a reference work, a template of how the harmonica at its best could sound. Forget about whether it was chromatic or diatonic (actually mostly chromatic, with a little diatonic on “Dance With Reality”), this was an amazing harmonica sound, rich, full, controlled and completely attuned to the lush orchestrations which surrounded it.
What did it take, I wondered as the years passed, to develop a sound and a career to this level? Then in October 2010 I found myself passing through Tommy Morgan’s home city of Los Angeles and was lucky enough to find the man himself in town, graciously agreeing to spend a morning explaining to me and Harmonica World readers how it all came together.
“People call me a legend,” he says, settling into a chair in my hotel room – before modestly adding, “which means I’m old.” But I am soon to learn that this particular “legend” was erected on a bedrock of sheer old-fashioned graft. “When I was 26 I realised that I didn’t like my sound,” he explains. Although everyone else seemed satisfied with it – Morgan had already been a soloist with the US Airforce Band and had worked studio sessions along with guesting on the top-rated Ed Sullivan Show – he wanted to attain the sound he heard in his mind’s ear. “I had weaknesses. I hadn’t gone through the pedagogy that other instrumentalists go through to play in orchestras. So I started on the Rubank flute book. It’s still around. I spent several hours a day for 6 years, while also working dates. I started with the first page and didn’t skip any exercises, I played them all. I now have a stack of sight-reading two feet high. Then when I got to a level where I thought I was getting better, I would spend a week in A Major. Then a week in B Flat.”
I mention that I dislike A Major. It’s a sharp key and tricky for chromatic players. “You’ve got to like A Major,” Morgan cautions. “I just finished an album with Gregg Nestor the classical guitarist where every piece bar one is in a sharp key. I play in D as comfortably as I do in any key. I’m as prepared as anyone who’s been through a European Conservatoire. I stuck with the flute and oboe tutors. Clarinets get a little too arpeggiated.” He chuckles. “If you want to be humbled, go get a clarinet book.”
But how to get that big, rich sound? “I practised long tones. Just like wind players do at music college. The note has to be in tune, and the tone mustn’t waver. It’s not easy.” He spots a harmonica in my room and asks me to play a scale. “That’s good but you don’t play every note in tune.” He asks to borrow the instrument and plays a single G, hole number 3, which starts imperceptibly, builds to a crescendo and dies away. The pitch is perfect, the sound fills the room. Then he demonstrates a Bb scale at breakneck speed to show that, at age 77, the technique is as strong as ever.
I find Morgan direct, but not intimidating. He likes to communicate clearly, and he is generous with information. “When I was sixteen or seventeen I studied with Jerry Adler, Larry’s brother. Jerry was a superb ballad player, he opened my eyes to what could be done. It wasn’t so much totally improvised jazz solo as an interpretation. It was more like, here’s the tune….and second time around he’d add and subtract things. And now when I give a lesson I sit close to the student, and we play. The best way to learn from someone is close-up. Without equalization or effects.”
Morgan adds that the hours spent listening to playbacks in the studio have been essential in building his sound.
“Hearing your sound back in the studio is the best way of developing it. I have heard myself more than any other harmonica player. You don’t hear yourself when you play alone. Most students I have play introspectively. They don’t project, they play with their heads down and slump a little bit. If I were teaching you today we’d go into a corner with hard surfaces where the sound bounces back in your ear. When there was a lot of studio work I’d hear myself daily…you’d hear a solo back and change a little bit here. This sounds good…but this is a little better.”
Another key to the Tommy Morgan sound is the area where the sound is actually produced, the contact zone between player and instrument. Morgan favours the square hole found on the classic Hohner 270 chromatic. “There’s more area than the round hole,” he confides. “And there is nothing on the inside of my mouth that covers the square. When I’m tongue-blocking, which I mostly use for chromatic, the right side of my tongue is flat. When I’m giving a lesson we both face the mirror with mouthpieces and you’ll see on mine that there is nothing covering the edge.”
Did he consciously set out to flatten the right edge of his tongue?
“I played for so long not liking the sound that I gradually improved the embouchure. As I uncovered a bit more hole it became a more open sound. I get the full air passage. I proved you can make a square mouth.” He raises an eyebrow ironically. “I have lived the harmonica, believe me. I didn’t take anything for granted, and I have tried a lot of things. But I didn’t set out to make a square mouth. I set out to make a good tone.”
This, I realise, is at the core of what Morgan is about. A relentless and restless desire to make better music. And at this point it comes as no surprise to hear that serving the music is the end result, not showcasing the harmonica. When I mention how much I enjoyed a little bend Tommy played on a solo on the James Taylor album “October Road”, he smiles. “That worked for James’ album. And I never forgot whose album it was. I played that way to enhance James’ album, not to make me stand out. You’re listening and then fitting in – how do you fit in to the overall picture? That’s the main question.”
And the ability to fit into a musical score, whether classical or pop, labelled Morgan as a team-player, embraced by the Hollywood session world.
“It’s all about blending. I did seven years of the Waltons, playing with probably the finest woodwind section in the world. Flute, oboe and clarinet all have different vibrato and I matched my sound to theirs. I took a lot of care over tuning. When you blow the harmonica hard it goes a little flat. I developed a very pure sound where I don’t cut off too many vibrations [cycles per second] but I also beat the problem by carrying chromatics tuned to 441, 442, 443 and 444 kHz. My diatonics are blues and equal-tempered [one is better for chords, the other for individual melodies].”
In case this all sounds very cosy, it should be remembered that Morgan did not walk into a ready-made studio career. “When I started, the job didn’t exist in Hollywood. George Fields had done some good things in the studios, but to be able to play full-time did not exist as a possibility. Then I did a session for Jerry Goldsmith. Goldsmith said, “You read pretty well. I’m going to write you like a third clarinet. Instead of having two harmonica solos, we’ll have you come in and play nine cues.” And when people found I could read pretty well, they started to use me. On one occasion, a composer asked Eddy Manson to play a melody up a third. It didn’t work out, but I was there and because of my training I was able to do it. And after that one thing led to another.”
Morgan sees preparation as a vital component in his success. “I played piano when I was young, plus some guitar. When I got out of the service I could see the nightclub and theatre industry was dying. My folks suggested I go back to school, so I did. I was studying for my masters degree in music, writing up my thesis, when I started getting called for sessions. And that’s when I thought, “This is what I want to do. Recording.” And I’ve used my experience as an orchestrator to interpret, or interpolate, a part. Interpolation is when I try to work out the effect a composer is trying to get, and then try to improve it. Sometimes I won’t even tell him what I’ve done. As an example, if I got asked to play a trill from D# to E [difficult on chromatic], I’ll do it on an E harmonica. Then the trill sounds much better….it kind of floats more. But I never tell anybody what I’m doing. Another player will work with the same composer and say it’s impossible. Then the composer will say “Well, Morgan did it.” I carry 45 pounds of harmonicas, all the chromatics and diatonics. So I can do stuff that nobody else can because nobody else has figured out how to do it.” Morgan shrugs and smiles nonchalantly, seemingly at ease with divulging these tricks of the trade.
But working for John Barry didn’t require a huge stack of harmonicas, just the ability to convert Barry’s melodicism onto tape as purely as possible. Tommy is unstinting in his praise for Barry. “John can say more with a unison string line than most people can with a full orchestra. John has a melodic sense that is incredible and he writes great harmonica. Take “Dances With Wolves”…people say to me, I know your sound from “Dances”. And do you know how many cues I played for “Dances”? One. It’s so poignant, and so correctly used. I played a 2 minute 15 second cue and people remember my sound. Two takes. Twenty minutes. That was it. “That’s gorgeous”, said John. “You can go home.””
I ask about the tricky F to F octave leap from hole 2 (draw) to hole 6 (draw) on the “Dances” theme. Morgan explains the use of portamento, the classical violinist’s technique of leaning up to an expressivo high note. “It’s not quite a bend, you just lean up to and into the note,” Tommy explains, singing the phrase by way of explanation. But he is quick to add that technique, while important, is just the means of achieving musical communication and not an end in itself. He says, “I get asked “Which way do you practise C major? Which holes do you play going up, and which coming down? And I reply that I practise it every way. I worked on several different slide/hole combinations for a passage in “Ritual Fire Dance” before deciding on the best one. Which was not the easiest one to play – but was the one which sounded best. And my answer to every technical question is “What does it sound like?”
I realise that Tommy has sung several musical examples during our conversation. I quiz him on this. “I’ve been a choir director for 25 years [amongst his other achievements – Morgan is also a qualified glider pilot, a black-belt Hapiko Karate expert and has an accountancy qualification]. I pattern my playing on vocals,” he confides. “My vibrato is similar to a vocalist – I establish the sound and then add vibrato afterwards. If you can’t sing what you’re trying to do – and it doesn’t matter how good or bad your voice is – then you can’t play it. And whatever style of music you are playing, I would recommend you go to the source for your inspiration. If you want to play blues harp, don’t just listen to the players – although there are some amazing ones, like Howard Levy and Jason Ricci. Listen to BB King. And I would suggest to a jazz clarinettist to listen to Toots. As a friend of mine once said, Toots would have been a giant on any instrument he chose to play. But while I have studied the way oboe, flute and clarinet players produce a sound, I pattern my own sound on the human voice.”
Perhaps it is that very vocal quality of Tommy Morgan’s sound which explains why it has communicated its message so unerringly to so many people for so many years.
I ask Morgan to help me summarise his contribution (and by extension the harmonica’s) to the Hollywood industry in the 500-plus movies his playing has graced. “I was an extra dimension for composers,” he explains. “Another colour in the sound palette. I lived at the right time and I had the opportunity. But I worked for it.”
Morgan feels that his playing is best represented away from the commercial world, on his discs Classics Lite 1 and 2. “The weird thing is, you spend 20 minutes on something like the theme from “The Rockford Files” and you are judged on it for the rest of your life. But I think the Classics Lite albums represent the full range of my playing.”
Whilst there is a lot of information on the use of the harmonica in Scottish and Irish Traditional music, little has been written about its use in England. This reflects the lower profile of traditional music in England and the relative isolation of most of the harmonica/mouth organ players. Musicians usually use tremolo or diatonic harmonicas. Here is a brief summary of what we could find. More details will follow about specific players from England. This is work in progress.
This review was written by Roger Trobridge with the help of Katie Howson. Thanks also to Jane Bird and others for their input.
Northumberland shares a border and many cultural links with Scotland, especially musical ones. It’s mainly rural location in the North of England has helped it to retain its musical traditions when other regions have struggled to do so.
The Northumberland Moothie Tradition
Will Atkinson (1908-2003) from Northumberland is the best known English traditional harmonica player. Will came from a musical family and was a shepherd for most of his life. He played mouthorgan and melodeon as a child before moving to the accordion and playing in a local group. Later in his life he returned to the tremolo harmonica. Will knew and played with many of the musicians like Jimmy Shand at musical festivals in the Scottish Borders. His repertoire included a very large number of local and Scottish tunes and he was renowned for precision of his playing. There are several CDs of him playing solo or with The Shepherds (Joe Hutton and Willie Taylor).
Ernie Gordon (The Geordie Jock) from Alnwick was a friend of Will’s and spent a lot of time with him, learning many of Will’s tunes. He is a fine musician who also plays the pipes and drums as well as music from countries like Greece where he lived for a few years. Ernie has been a big supporter of HarmonicaUK for 20 years which has help to raise the profile of the moothie. He has recorded one CD. You can see many videos of Ernie Gordon and Will Atkinson here.
Roy Hugman is another Geordie moothie player from Morpeth, who has promoted music from Northumberland and taught tremolo for HarmonicaUK is . He plays locally with his band and has an active YouTube and Facebook page.
Jimmy Little is a prominent moothie player from the Alnwick area who has released a couple of CDs.
Jimmy Hunter was recorded by collector Peter Kennedy in 1954 at his home at Haydon Bridge, Northumberland, England, when Kennedy was working for the BBC’s Folk Music & Dialect Recording Scheme.
Other Geordie moothie players include Anita James and Rob Say.
Other Regional Traditional Players
Some other areas, particularly East Anglia and the West Country also held onto their traditional music, including harmonica players. Here are some who have been picked up by collectors and local clubs.
Jim Small (1913-n.d.) Learned to play from his father and played for folkdancing at school as a teenager, growing up near the Mendips in Somerset. He was involved in national radio broadcasts from 1938 to the mid 1950s, playing mostly folk dance music, and was then rediscovered by the revivalists of English traditional music in the 1970s. He was featured on a cassette / CD on Peter Kennedy’s Folktrax label, which sadly, no longer exists.
Alfie Butler was a Gloucestershire gypsy who played harmonica as well as piano accordion.
Bill Elsom and Jasper Smith were Travellers recorded in southern England; the latter can be heard on the CD “My Father’s the King of the Gypsies” on the Topic label.
Peter Roud, from Hampshire, was the subject of an article in EDS Spring 2011. He made a few recordings which are held by his family.
Sam Bond, again in Hampshire, played polkas, step dances, marches, singalong tunes etc, and recorded a cassette on the Forest Tracks label.
Stan Seaman was, a Hampshire melodeon player who also plays harmonica who made some recordings.
Dave Williams (1934-1997) was a harmonica, melodeon and banjo player in the New Forest area, who performed with Stan Seaman on many occasions, and was part of the Forest Tracks record label which recorded both Stan and Sam Bond.
Two more Hampshire players, Jimmy Dixon and Ron Whatmore can be heard on the Topic CD: “Rig-A-Jig-Jig – Dance Music of the South of England”.
John Cole played chromatic with a few of the folk song and skiffle groups in the London area in the 1950s before moving to Spain.
Bill Train of Teignmouth recorded a selection of old song tunes, polkas hornpipes and a nice jig.
The musical and dance traditions from the Dartmoor area have been well documented through the twentieth century.
Jack Rice (1915-1994) and Les Rice (1912-1996), cousins from Chagford, Dartmoor, played harmonica, concertina and accordion in the pubs, and for dancing. There is a CD of their playing available, called “Merrymaking” on Veteran (VT144CD).
The county of Suffolk has been well covered by folk music collectors throughout the course of the 20th century and just a cursory scan of the sources produces: Albert Smith, Tom Thurston, Harry Fleet, Charlie Philpots, Fred Pearce and George Ling in the coastal village: some of these can be read about on the “Sing Say and Play” pages on the Musical Traditions website – https://www.mustrad.org.uk/ssp . In Mid Suffolk there are even more names to be found including George Wade, Glyn Griffiths, Clemmie Pearson, Tom Williams, Lubbidy Rice, Jack Pearson, Bill Smith and Reg Pyett, who are all featured on the double CD “Many A Good Horseman” on the Veteran label. Others including fiddler Fred Whiting, melodeon players Walter Read and Fred List were known to play the harmonica as well. Most of these men played in the their local pubs on a Saturday night and for outings with darts and quoits teams, and their repertoire would include sing-a-long songs as well as hornpipes and polkas for stepdancing.
Harold Covill (1910-1993) from March in Cambridgeshire started by playing his father’s mouthorgan and played all his life for local entertainments and dances. In later life he featured on Topic Records’ 1974 LP “English Country Music from East Anglia”. He also taught children through a local youth club.
Jack Hyde played for Abingdon Traditional Morris Dancers (now Oxfordshire, but then Berkshire). There are tracks of him on two CDs on the Topic label: “You Lazy Lot of Boneshakers” and “Rig-A-Jig-Jig – Dance Music of the South of England”.
Players In English Ceilidh Bands etc.
Martin Brinsford (b. 1947) started playing drums in 1962 and then discovered traditional English dance and music and took up playing tremolo harmonica. He was a founder member of Old Swan Band, England’s premier country dance band, and Brass Monkey with Martin Carthy and John Kirkpatrick. He has played in many other bands and recording sessions He plays a wide range of music drawn from around the world as well as England. currently plays vintage Québécois dance music with The Pigeon Swing. He has played at HarmonicaUK festivals. You can read more here.
Terry Potter (b. 1935) is another tremolo player who has been active since the 1960s with the modern tradition musicians like Ashley Hutchings (‘The Compleat Dancing Master‘, ‘Kicking Up The Sawdust‘) as well as playing with the Etchingham Steam Band, Potters Wheel and his family group, Cousins and Sons. You can read more here.
John Tams (b.1949) is a multi-instrumentalist, singer, songwriter, composer and actor. He is known locally in Derbyshire for his work with the Derbyshire Volunteers, but is known worldwide as the driving force behind such hugely influential groups such as Home Service and the Albion Band and also for his creative input into productions such as “War Horse” and “Lark Rise to Candleford” at the National Theatre, and for composing TV and film music including “Sharpe”.
Katie Howson (b.1956) is known mainly for playing the English melodeon/ diatonic accordion but has in fact played tremolo harmonica for nearly as long. A member of several English ceilidh bands, including PolkaWorks, whose 2014 CD “Borrowed Shoes” features her harmonica playing.
Chris Taylor (b.1946) from Kent, played in the Oyster Ceilidh Band, Gas Mark V and Polkabilly. Gas Mark V released a number of recordings featuring his harmonica playing.
Simon Booth (b.1955) from Lancashire, plays tremolo harmonica and recorded with the Ran Tan Band.
Barry Parkes (b.1952) from Cheshire, plays tremolo harmonica and recorded with Dr Sunshine’s Pavement Show, All Blacked Up and The Ironmasters.
Des Miller whilst living in Norfolk played and recorded with the Old Hat Concert Party and Rig-a-Jig, both bands specialising in localised repertoire.
Jaime Gill was featured in “Harmonica World” playing his large Hohner “683” double sider with the Clog Morris Band. He plays in “The Bicton Inn” in Exmouth.
Steve Harrison played mouth organ (and melodeon) in a couple of barn dance bands around Halifax (Yorkshire) and occasionally further afield. He was a member of HarmonicaUK and played tremolo and later, diatonic, until his death in 2018.
Eddie Upton took up harmonica more seriously in the 1970s. He played and recorded with The Pump and Pluck Band and toured Internationally. He set up Folk South West in 1992 and he appeared at a HarmonicaUK festival.
Ted Crum (1947-2020) from Coventry played blues style harp to accompany folk songs with Somerville Gentlemen’s Band, and driving dance music with “rock ceilidh band” Peeping Tom and jazz-influenced Steamchicken.
Jon Fletcher plays diatonic, chromatic and tremolo harmonicas and is a guitarist and singer, performing both solo and with the band Magpie Lane.
Keith Holloway plays tremolo harmonica, although he better known as a melodeon and bass player in bands iincluding Random, The Old Chapel Band & Bosun Higgs.
The New Generation
Traditional music never stands still and young musicians will always find a way to keep it fresh and relevant for the new generation. Two in particular are very talented, original International performers who include traditional music in their compositions and performances, but in very different ways.
Will Pound comes from a folk music family and he has worked with other musicians like Dan Walsh (banjo) to develop his own style and repertoire. He has been nominated for the BBC Folk Awards ‘Musician of the Year’ and has released six varied CDs. You can find out more about him here and on his website.
Phillip Henry is one of the UK’s top guitarists as well as a harmonica player who has developed his own style of beatboxing and diatonic harmonica playing. He has been nominated for Instrumentalist of the Year in the FATEA Awards and has released several CDs alone and with collaborators like Hannah Martin (Edgelarks). You can read more about Phillip here and on his website.
Sean Spicer and Simon Joy are two younger players who are continuing in the tradition. Sean played in the National Youth Folk Ensemble and at Twickfolk and Simon looks after traditional music within HarmonicaUK.
Jane Bird plays diatonic and tremolo harmonicas, mainly in sessions. She also plays anglo concertina and is probably more widely known as a dance caller and event organiser.
Scottish Traditional Harmonica Players
Nigel Gatherer has a list of Scottish traditional recordings and musicians including moothie players
Dave Hynes has assembled a large gallery of images of Irish traditional harmonica players, as well as a list of the All Ireland Champions and BDs and DVDs of harmonica music.Additional Information
Additional Information
Will Atkinson – 3 CDs (2 were LPs) have been released – Mouth Organ (Solo), Harthorpe Burn (Joe Hutton, Willy Taylor and Will Atkinson), An Audience with the Shepherds (Joe Hutton, Willy Taylor and Will Atkinson). Will also plays on several CDs of Northumberland Traditional music. Here is a video from a concert at Morpeth Town Hall.
Martin Brinsford – He has recorded one CD under his own name, Next Slide Please (Keith Ryan with Gareth Kiddier) and he is present on several recordings with Brass Monkey. He has several videos on YouTube from the HarmonicaUK festivals.
Ernie Gordon – He has a privately recorded CD, The Geordie Jock and several YouTube videos including this Tribute to Will Atkinson from an HarmonicaUK concert in 2003. You can see many other videos of Ernie Gordon and Will on my Vimeo site.
I originally published this article in Harmonica World in June 2006. I think it is worth including it here. Dror wrote:
I have been a member of the Adler Trio since we formed it in 1963.
Here is a little bit of history and the background that led to the recording of my new CD, The Classical Project. A unique 8 year activity in which full symphonic works were recorded by myself playing all the parts on harmonica.
I have been a recording freak ever since professional tape recorders became affordable. The Adler Trio’s first LP record was recorded on a British made ‘Brenell’. Other LPs were recorded using Swiss ‘Revox’ recorders. At the end of the tape recorder era we owned an 8 track Tascam machine with DBX noise reduction system, on which we recorded our last vinyl record of Israeli music.
Next came hard disk recording, which revolutionised the recording industry and made it affordable for anyone to achieve recordings of unprecedented quality. When I first started recording on a computer it was not possible to handle more than about 6 separate tracks of music and yet the feeling was like leaping from the Stone Age to the Space Age. The pristine sound, the editing possibilities and the ease of work were amazing. After gaining reasonable control of the computer recording I started an experiment – the experiment that led to the Classical Project.
Since I can play chord, lead and bass harmonicas, I decided to record a classical piece that I loved – all by myself – playing the different harmonicas on different tracks. That was in 1997.
The piece was taken from Khachaturian’s ‘Spartacus’ Variations of Aegina-Bacchanal.
The score I had was for two pianos, out of which I made an arrangement for two chromatics, chords and bass. In some cases the bass role was separated to two different tracks.
I was so excited by the results that I decided to record another piece, and this time, a more ambitious one – Elgar’s ‘Pomp and Circumstance March Op. 39 No.1’. For this I went to the Tel Aviv Music Academy and got the orchestral score from which I made an arrangement for about 8 different roles. For trombones and french horns I used several tracks of bass harmonicas. I also used Hohner special effects chromatic harmonicas and any other type of harmonicas to get different ‘colours’ of sound.
After completing the second piece I knew that I would not rest until I had completed a full CD. As time went by, the computers got more powerful and the software smarter and I got more ambitious. The last piece recorded was the most ambitious one: again, from Khachaturian’s Spartacus – Adagio of Spartacus and Phrygia (This was used as soundtrack of the British TV series ‘The Onedin Line’). Here I recorded all the different roles of the original orchestral score. This is a short extract to show what I achieved.
I did the same with the full ‘Dance of the hours’ by Ponchieli. These are the two most demanding works in this project. The fact that I was able to record each role in it in short phrases or musical sentences made the whole thing possible. Here is how I did it.
I learned the phrase on the Lead, bass or chords and recorded it by loop recording, playing it again and again until I got a good take, and then on to the next phrase. The auto punch-in function of the computer enabled seamless continuity. I always started with the lead role. Each role was recorded on a different track. For all the treble instruments I used chromatics – Hohner 270 and Suzuki Magic Garden. For a piece of ballet music from Faust I even played the harp arpeggios on chromatic. For violas, bassoons, contrabasses, horns, etc., I used standard Suzuki bass harmonicas and the Tombo Contrabass harmonica. Chords were played by my unique slide chord, developed by me and built for me by Suzuki.
In order to play the score as written I sometimes had to retune my harmonicas to produce the correct trills or passages. I tuned a bass harmonica so that impossible passages would be on one deck only, and in a row, to allow them to be to be played as written. In fact, this project can be compared to the movie making process where small segments become a one full length creation. There were many times when I almost decided to quit, but when I listened again to what I had already done, I could not help going back to it. It was finally completed in October 2005.
For further information and copies of the CD, contact Dror Adler email: droradler3@gmail.com
I stepped down as editor of Harmonica World magazine after the August 2019 issue and I decided to do the simple blog I never seemed to have time to do before .
I used to use the blog to announce when the new magazine was being mailed out. Now I want to make it more of a diary where I can share bits of research or news.
Tommy Reilly set the standard for playing chromatic harmonica and he was mainly responsible for the acceptance of the harmonica as a solo instrument on the classical stage. He had a prolific recording career. He was born in Canada in 1919 but spent most of his life in the UK.
Here Tommy talks about his musical life and plays some music on two BBC radio programmes – Music Weekly (Michael Oliver, 6 May, 1979), and Studio Portrait (Wilfred Parry (piano), 10 February, 1967).
Tommy’s silver chromatic harmonica was developed before the first radio programme in 1973 and after the second one in 1967.
Tracklist
1 – Music Weekly – Talking about the harmonica – Tommy Reilly
2 – Music – James Moody
3 – Talking playing the harmonica and repertoire – Tommy
4 – Villa Lobos Concerto for Harmonica – Tommy Reilly
5 – Talking about his Silver Harmonica – Tommy Reilly
6 – Parash’s Aria – Stravinsky
7 – Studio Portrait – Talking about composers – Tommy Reilly
8 – Caprice – Gordon Jacobs
9 – Scherzino – James Moody
10 – Talking harmonicas – Tommy Reilly
11 – Strawberry Fair – Leonard Morris
12 – Seventeen Come Sunday – Leonard Morris
13 – Talking history and harmonicas – Tommy Reilly
14 – Chanson Russe – Stravinsky
15 – Talking film music – Tommy Reilly
16 – Après un Rêve – Faurè
17 – Talking about Polish customs – Tomy Reilly
18 – Bulgarian Wedding Dance – James Moody
Pat Missin has created the best harmonica site on the internet. Everyone ought to visit it at least once so they are aware of the vast amount of knowledge he has assembled on all aspects of harmonica.
One web page contains a selection of vintage harmonica performances recorded between 1904 and 1940. It includes recordings and historical information about Pete Hampton, Professor Dickens, Arthur Turelly, H. J. Woodall, Henry Whitter, Borrah Minevitch, Moore and Freed, Sandlin Brothers, William Haussler, Haussler and Coutlee , W.V. Robinson, W.W. MacBeth, Gwen Foster, Willie “Red” Newman, John Sebastian and Rhythm Willie.
Here are the main sections of Pat’s website – www.patmissin.com – The main index page.
Sit back and listen to Joe Filisko introducing 31 solo harmonica recordings from the 1920-30s. The recordings include many examples of train imitations, fox chases and early blues tunes. Joe mentions which harp and key he thinks is the correct one so maybe you will be inspired to play along. Part 2 is now available here – Rare Early Blues Harp Recordings by Singers and Sidemen introduced by Joe Filisko.
You may have heard of some of the performers but there will probably be others that are new to you. Most of the recordings are from rare 78rpm shellac records, so be ready for the surface noise. In most cases there are no master recordings and for some of the performances only one or two 78s are known to have survived intact.
This video is dedicated to Joe Filisko for sharing his awesome knowledge of the early blues harmonica players and the techniques they developed to play the instrument, and also to Ben Hewlett for contacting me when the recording had been taken offline and explaining how valuable this resource is for teaching blues harmonica. This is an updated version as a video with subtitles to help people with difficulties in understanding the speech.
Over to Joe…
Rare Early Solo Instrumental Blues Harp Recordings introduced by Joe Filisko. Introduction , Joe Filisko, 0:00 1 Cracker Cops , Sonny Terry, 0:30 2 McAbee’s Railroad Piece , Palmer McAbee, 4:15 3 Fox Chase , DeFord Bailey, 8:00 4 Middling Blues , George “Bullet” Williams, 11:30 5 Fast Train , Lonnie Glosson , 15:00 6 Rain Crow Bill Blues , Henry Whitter : 19:00 7 Train , Salty Holmes , 22:40 8 Red Pig , Kyle Wooten , 22:20 9 Train Imitations and the Fox Chase , William McCoy , 28:15 10 Up Country Blues , DeFord Bailey , 32:24 11 The Fox Chase , Wayne Raney , 36:21 12 Frisco Leaving Birmingham #3 , George “Bullet” Williams , 39:15 13 Mocking the Dogs , Edward Hazelton , 42:55 14 The Fox end the Hounds , Roger Mathis , 44:30 15 The Alcoholic Blues , DeFord Bailey , 47:4616 16 Mama Blues , William McCoy , 50:30 17 Train and Model-T Race , Curly Fox , 54:45 18 The Old Time Fox Chase , Henry Whitter , 57:40 19 Riding the Blinds , Eddie Mapp , 60:40 20 Dixie Flyer Blues , DeFord Bailey , 64:40 21 C & N.W Blues , D.H Bert Bilbro , 68:25 22 Fox Chase , Salty Holmes, 72:30 23 Devil in the Woodpile , Noah Lewis, 74:20 24 Lost John , Lonnie Glosson , 77:50 25 Pan-American Blues , DeFord Bailey , 81:35 26 Lost John , Walter “Red” Parham , 85:15 27 Mocking the Train , Edward Hazelton , 87:05 28 Lost John , Oliver Sims , 88:25 29 Muscle Shoals Blues , DeFord Bailey , 92:15 30 When the Saints Go Marching In , Jesse Stroller, 95:55 31 Poor Little June Bug , Sonny Terry , 97.15
You can buy the original double CD without Joe’s added information from – Bluebeat Music
The history of the harmonica is told by the performers and the music they recorded. Most of the major music collectors have died but this website shares some of the recordings from their collections – shellac, vinyl, cassette and reel to reel tapes, CDs, film and video tapes. It includes all music styles and harmonica types.
