Re: [Harp-L] purpose of windsavers

[Larry Marks <larry.marks@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Windsavers are there literally to save your wind. On an instrument with 
windsavers on all reeds, air will not be drawn through the blow reed 
when you are playing a draw note and, likewise, air will not pass 
through the draw reed when you are blowing. The net effect is so that 
you can use less wind  for each note you play.

Windsavers are commonly used on chromatic harps and are increasingly 
appearing on diatonic harps.

On the diatonic harp, however, they may have a different purpose. On the 
diatonic, they may be referred to as "valves". A properly set-up (half) 
valved diatonic will permit the player to bend the blow reeds in holes 1 
- 6 and to bend the draw reeds in holes 7 - 10. The addition of the 
notes obtained through the extra bends that are available makes it 
possible for the player to play a chromatic scale over the entire three 
octave range of the instrument.

The (half) in the description denotes that only the draw reeds in holes 
1 - 6 are "valved" while the blow reeds are not. Same but opposite for 
holes 7 - 10.

Note that a valved diatonic cannot be overblown or overdrawn, but you 
use the extra bends to get the notes you would get by overblowing 
(overdrawing).

Hope this helps...

 -LM