Re: [Harp-L] New Suzuki Diatonics



Hi Folks,

I was given one of the "Pure Harps" about 2 months ago and Mojo is pretty much right on in his review of the instrument. It is all Rosewood including the covers. It has a very warm and wooden sound to it. I liked it immediately. My suspicion is that it would record very very well. Like Mojo, my only complaint is the shape of the cover plates which have a pronounced angle to them. It is certainly more steep at the mouthpiece than anything that's out there now. The only other harp I can remember that was similar in shape on the mouthpiece was the Huang Bacpac? harp, although I have not seen one in years so don't hold me to that. I suspect that some of that design is driven by the fact that it is wood and not stamped metal. A lesser angle would most likely be very fragile since it is made of wood...although I'm just speculating here. As far as the feel of wood and the angle, it is all minor and I have found that it just takes some getting used to. I half-valve all my harps and did so right away on this harmonica and found it to be very nice indeed. On a technical note the reed plates are held down by only 2 screws with no noticeable air leakage between plates and comb!!! I briefly played the "Fire Breath" which is a clone except for the cover plates, and while I thought it was a nice harp, the Pure Harp has certainly got a unique sound to it. I sure there will be a lot of discussion about this harmonica next month at SPAH....
See You there...


PT Gazell
pt@xxxxxxxxxxxx
www.myspace.com/ptgazell
www.ptgazell.com
http://www.sonicbids.com/PTGazell
www.cdbaby.com/all/gazell

----- Original Message ----- From: "Mojo Red" <harplicks@xxxxxxxxx>
To: <Aeskow@xxxxxxx>; <harp-l@xxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, July 19, 2006 9:15 AM
Subject: Re: [Harp-L] New Suzuki Diatonics



--- Aeskow@xxxxxxx wrote:

Is anybody playing the curiously-named new Suzuki
diatonics--the Pure  Harp
and the Fire Breath--yet?  If so, what's your
take on them?

Peace and Respect
Johnny T

Hey Johnny,


I don't own any of these new Suzuki's yet, but when
Jason Ricci was blowing through town here a few
weeks ago, he showed me couple that they'd sent him
to try out, unmodified, out-of-the-box harps. He
let me look them over and blow on one for a minute.


The "Pure Harp" has dark wooden cover plates and a wooden comb and played beautifully, though I didn't care for how the wood ~felt~ on my lips (just not used to it, I guess). However, the thing has ~awesome~ response (very similar to a good custom harp) and overbent easily. Both the overblows and overdraws seemed effortless and I'm no overblow god by any means.

Though I didn't actually play it, Jason says the
"Fire Breath" is built to the same exact specs
(including hard-wood comb), but black the covers
are not made from wood (not sure what they're made
from). I'm sure it plays just as well as the "Pure
Harp" but appeals more to me because of the more
conventional cover plate material.

Jason is very impressed by them and told me that
they will be even better after Suzuki makes some
further tweaks at the factory. I told him I wanted
one, but he suggested I wait until after the 1st of
the year to buy one.

In short, great, great harps... very much
approaching custom harp responsiveness. Jason told
me that harp customizer Brad Harrison has been
working with Suzuki to get his custom-harp specs
into the factory-build. I own a Harrison harp I
bought from him back in 2000 and it's killer.

I certainly intend to get a "Fire Breath" at some
point. Very impressive.

Harpin' in Colorado,
--Ken M.


__________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com _______________________________________________ Harp-L is sponsored by SPAH, http://www.spah.org Harp-L@xxxxxxxxxx http://harp-l.org/mailman/listinfo/harp-l







This archive was generated by a fusion of Pipermail 0.09 (Mailman edition) and MHonArc 2.6.8.