Bending was hard… until I learned this

Ready for a breakthrough with your bending skill?

[MatameVideos]

I tried bending for years until I thought I broke my Golden Melody for trying too hard and then I stopped playing for a couple of years. Then my father got me a Tremolo for Chris and I had a great time playing classic songs and anime bgm songs, and for no apparent reason decided to dust my old harp and turns out that the instrument wasn't broken, I just mastered bending so well that I forgot how to play normally so whenever I played the first 4 draw holes I played the full step bend all along and that's why the sounded so different. Now I have to harmonicas and when I discovered your channel started to really, really improve with the blues. Thanks a lot. I love your channel.

[hakulakhe]

This video was god sent. After so long with no progress it help me break through.

[EZLProductions]

Fortunately, my notes bending faiures only lasted 4 days of practice. I have seen many videos on bending and couldn't get it at all. That was until I started learning blues riffs and scales on the harmonica and playing with the sounds that I accidentally and finally stumbled on note bending. Alas, eureka.

[vantarinitel]

That "cello drone" idea is amazing thank you!

[joeldavis]

dude i love it! your tip on mouthing the "eaor" sound was GOLDEN. i went from "how tf is this supposed to work, to being able to at least get a somewhat presentable bend out!!!!

[JustinMcKinney-mb]

Damn you're good. I just started practicing my harp a couple of days ago and I have maybe an hour of practice time and thanks to this video, I'm starting to be able to bend the lower notes. Thanks!

[checagou]

"altered notes" are the result of "sympathetic vibration with vowel formants." I've been a professor of linguistics, played harp first in 1949 at five years old -- my father was a harmonica virtuoso who toured the world. Carl

[AgressiveElevatorMusic]

So I also have a history of RSI (guitar is a nightmare ergonomically tbh) and you just saved my ass on harmonica. I’ve absolutely been struggling with soreness in the throat from bending and tension. I tried the tongue bending and it’s way easier. No throat tension. Uhg now I have to reprogram my muscles memory.

[youtubeaccount]

Very useful tips about drawing the tongue back and diaphragm breathing. Thanks.

[urmakinitworse]

Apparently you had a similar path of discovery as I had, I recently learned about throat tension while singing, and now I’m learning how bending works on a harmonica 🤷‍♂️

[PhillipLandmeier]

This is driving me nuts.

I'm using a Hohner Marine Band in C. I speak several languages and can make all kinds of sounds with my mouth. I play piano, pipe organ, violin, guitar, sax. I can bend a sax all the way around a fencepost and make it dance.

The harmonica seems intuitive. On a single note I can make a whole range of tonalities by changing the acoustics of the resonant cavity in my mouth, ranging from deep and thick to thin and trebley. But I can't bend the pitch to save my life. Growling is easy, just as it is on the sax.

By shading the hole like you do on flute or recorder I can create a very slight bend. But that's obviously not how it's done.

I CANNOT figure out the trick to bending a harmonica. Even following your (excellent) instructions I still get nothing.

What the heck???

Over the years, I've known several people, just ordinary people, who played some really nice bendy blues harmonica. And I can't do it. This is ridiculous. Hahaha. Haaaalp!

[sessionz]

The point here is there's no special way to learn it other than learning how to use your airflow up and down. Besides many are already bending without knowing it.

My advice is just keep practicing and it'll come definitely because it took sometime for me to know that I've already been bending without it.

[jertres]

NICKEL ALLERGY: i wondered about the Sydels because though the reeds are stainless steel they say the plate they are attached to is "German silver" which is usually an alloy of 60% copper, 20% zinc and 20% nickel!!! have you ever had any nickel allergy problems with your Sydels? thanks

[KluiKaraoke]

I found it easy to bend the notes on 4-6th hole but it's very difficult on the 8th to 10th, how to please.

[hillarycourchaine]

My gal pal who plays the recommended your videos because im learning how to play harmonica. Wishe luck 🤞🤞🤞🤞🍀🍀

[xenonpanther]

So far the only luck I've had is to pucker so much on a single hole that I can restrict the airflow itself. I've tried pulling my tongue back, dropping my jaw, making throat noises, and even sticking my lips out to manually lengthen my mouth, but I still get the same crisp, clean note with no bend. Can't for the life of me figure out why these techniques work for everyone else and not me. Even tried three different harmonicas just in case I had one that couldn't bend for some reason.

[SKILLSKILLS_QC]

Kah wah oh woah wrrr all these sound change the shape of the mouth and the cavity inside the mouth also makes ya change the shape of your tongue so these sounds will give more depth to the bend and differant style

[arseburgers]

I've always draw bent by choking the lower edge of the hole I want bent with either my tongue or lower lip, relearning this is gonna be fun!

[TEDBOVIS-hn]

I sound like a "mong" when i do them noises ! . . . . 😂😂😂

[gastonpiget]

Thanks for the tips. I come from flute and chromatic harmonica. Recently I picked up an older Hohner Meisterklasse (pre-MS). All the notes sound fine played straight. So far I have only been able to bend the lowest D consistently. The sound is muted however. Is that just a phase I will have to pass through? The other bends are still tough to get. Will practice your some more.