Practice Makes Perfect in Harmonica and Life

by: Kyle Vallone

If you want to be good at anything you must practice. Like they say about voting in Chicago “do it early and do it often.” There is no substitute for it in sports, life and love and music. The effective execution of any process requires it. So if you want to get better on the harmonica, play the harmonica.

Sure that sounds simple enough, but it’s not. To practice effectively requires patience. The patience to take your time, the patience to listen to the lesson you are working on, the patience to slowly play the piece of music you are working on and get it right. I don’t mean partially right I mean completely right. Let’s break down the process of practicing the harmonica.

Listening

This is the key activity of music because if you cannot hear what is being played, you will not be able to accurately reproduce it while playing the harmonica. And that is the key to reproducing a lesson or a song or playing your own song. Professional harmonica players listen to what they are trying to learn 20 times before they attempt to play a particular passage in a song.

Sight Reading

As harmonica players, we don’t have to know how to read music (although it is a huge benefit if you do). There is a wonderful tool we can use called “harmonica tab”. After listening to the music you are trying to learn, try to follow along and sight read the music on the harmonica tab as it is playing. Read the tab and hear the notes as they are playing, and follow along.

Playing along

Now comes the fun part: playing along. Look at the tab wherever you have it (on a book, computer screen, piece of paper) and try to play it. Blow and draw with the harmonica tab to the corresponding numbered holes on the harmonica. Try to play the first few notes of the music, going very slowly at first. Once you have memorized the pattern of notes on the harmonica, try it a little faster. Then add on the next segment of the music you are trying to learn the same way until you can complete playing the entire piece slowly. Then keep playing it over and over. Little by little you will get faster until you can play the song melody or lick you are trying to learn.

Recording yourself

A really handy thing to do is to record yourself while playing the music you are trying to learn. With all of the inexpensive recording technology that is available today this should be easy to do and can be very helpful. You can use a small portable tape recorder, video camera; even a smart phone will work too.

Practicing outside

One of the most enjoyable aspects of the harmonica is its portability. If you play piano or bass or guitar, they are not the most portable instruments and, as someone with a busy life, they are not easy to carry around with you. But the diatonic harmonica can go anywhere. Just put it in your pocket and head outside. Walk through your neighborhood or take a hike up a hillside and look out over the landscape, and play that song you have been trying to learn. Hear the notes ring out. It is magic.