Midi Harmonica vs Harmonica + Midi

After spending most of my performing career playing standard harmonicas through microphones, I was introduced to the world of MIDI four years ago, after being sent the first prototype of the Lekholm DM48 MIDI Harmonica to evaluate. Not having any experience of playing a MIDI instrument, it was quite a shock to discover all the amazing possibilities opened up by accessing this alternative music universe via an instrument that looked and played like a harmonica, but was something else entirely! You can tell how awestruck I was in my first demo video of the DM48 in January 2017, showing off many of its astonishing features: www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwgIAFOnJVs&t=26s MIDI HARMONICA vs The DM48 is part of a family of electronic wind controllers (EWIs) that emulate saxophones, flutes, etc.HARMONICA+MIDI It has no reeds, just tiny breath sensors that trigger as you blow and draw. It makes no Brendan Power noise of its own, but sends electronic signals via a USB cable to any Patron synthesizer that can generate sounds using MIDI. Here is the Wikipedia definition: “MIDI /midi/; an acronym for Musical Instrument Digital Interface) is a technical standard that describes a communications protocol, digital interface, and electrical connectors that connect a wide variety of electronic musical instruments, computers, and related audio devices for playing, editing, and recording music.” The DM48 is amazing, giving you access to literally millions of sound patches for thousands of synth hardware and software choices. My favoured sound generator is the iPad; it’s so simple to use, and is a nice small size - great for home playing or live gigs. The iPad has a large and growing range of brilliant synth apps (free, or very reasonably priced), giving you sounds ranging from the utterly bizarre to very realistic emulations of real acoustic instruments. You can play it in any key with a press of a button, with a range of up to eight octaves, and in any tuning you want - all in the one instrument! It’s also very expressive, with great dynamics between hard and soft blowing. Since it makes no noise of its own, you can play it silently through headphones at any time of the day or night: a boon for good family relations in these lockdown days! I love the DM48, but found it had one glaring flaw: I couldn’t bend notes using my harp embouchure technique. This was a big problem for my playing since I use bends all the time, on both diatonics and chromatics. I partially solved the issue by creating a little finger-operated gizmo called the Mini PitchBender, which can be stuck to the top of the DM48 to give note bending: www.youtube.com/watch?v=EZZkkb_qBqo It works, but it’s not nearly as easy and intuitive as bending on a normal harp.

Now that I had discovered MIDI, I looked for ways to somehow access this amazingly powerful world of sounds with a standard harmonica. Actually, there are quite a few possibilities available, from MIDI microphones to little digital interfaces that you can plug a microphone into, and I tried as many as I could find. All of them have their good points - but in the end I found the best solution so far lay right there in my iPad! It’s an amazing app called MidiGuitar 2. As you can tell from the name, MG2 is designed for guitarists who want to access MIDI sounds through standard electric guitars - but I found it works with harmonica mics too! You have to play cleanly, and it’s best in monophonic mode (no chords). But once I adjusted my playing a bit and got the mic levels right, suddenly I was able to sound like anything I wanted - whilst blowing on a standard harmonica! Not only that, I could use all my normal harp bending technique, and it came out perfectly in the MIDI sounds I’d chosen. And, as with normal harmonicas, to play in a different key or tuning you just pick up the appropriate harp and it’s reproduced faithfully by the MIDI patch. Wow! That was as big a moment of revelation as when I first played the DM48. It inspired me to make a bunch of videos showing how it works, for others to learn from (if interested, search for “Harmonica & iPad” on YouTube). However, whilst allowing any decent harmonica player to trigger the amazing world of MIDI sounds with their standard harps (diatonic or chromatic), playing via a mic into MidiGuitar2 is not perfect. Because the software has to translate an audio signal into MIDI messages, there is slight latency: the MIDI sound comes out a tiny bit behind the audio sound. With the DM48, the response is instant. Another issue is that, since you’re playing a real harmonica, you’re hearing it along with the MIDI sound. This can be minimized by using headphones, but it’s still there. Thirdly, unlike with the DM48, the MIDI signal has no dynamics of loud or soft - it’s simply on or off. (A way to get around this is to use a volume foot-pedal, but that takes some time to master and is not as responsive as breath dynamics.) I find the best solution to all these issues is to make a virtue of necessity: mostly play with a mix of the harmonica and MIDI sound. You minimize the issues described above and get the best of both worlds. So… what’s the best: playing a real MIDI Harmonica like the DM48, or triggering MIDI with a standard harmonica? Different players will have different answers, but personally I find that I like to use both, they each have strengths and weaknesses. I’ve made a special video covering this topic to go with this article, which will help you decide for yourself. Here’s the link: www.youtube.com/watch?v=BS50Fuu04M0

1 Marion Walter Jacobs 2 Blues Brothers 3 Jack Bruce 4 Rod Piazza and George Smith 5 James Harman 6 Leonard and Phil Chess 7 Mark Feltham 8 Magic Dick 9 Charlie McCoy 10 Terry Lee McMillan 11 Paul Oscher and Jerry Portnoy 12 Jerry Portnoy 13 Cyril Davies 14 Junior Wells 15 Irish 16 Microphone 17 He played left-handed and upside down 18 DeFord Bailey 19 Lee Oskar 20 Jerry Portnoy, Rick Estrin, Kim Wilson 21 Keith Parker, Gary Potts, Giles King

Silverfish Harmonicas

Full bodied and glorious fat crunch tone with good bass and very very hot Handmade, artisan microphones that are rich in tone, robust and comfortable to hold www.silverfish-harmonicas.com

• High impedance • Unique rubber O-ring / sleeve to improve hand-seal • Two-stage mesh/foam to reduce breath noise • Shock-mount design reduces handling noise • Robust construction for rigour of touring • Volume/gain control – optional • 1/4″ (6.3mm) jack connector • Great feedback rejection • Small and very light weight • Stainless steel mesh grille • Leather and hardwood finish • Holster-style leatherette case • Guarantee