Toot…

Despite what you might have heard, there IS a way of preventing metal fatigue occurring on your harmonica reeds - don’t play the harmonica at all!

Sure, that’s easy enough. However, for those who are interested in playing the harmonica, perhaps what I have to say will be of use to you. And if you are a really poor and stingy harmonica player (aren’t we all?), what I have to say will really benefit you.

Back when I was young, stupid and ignorant (now I’m not that young, but still somewhat stupid and ignorant), I did not think harmonica reeds can actually break. Sure enough I knew how to bend and break a paper clip, but that’s different for harmonica reeds, isn’t it? I’m not going to bore you with the physics behind metal fatigue, but harmonica reeds do break, just like how you’d bend and break a paper clip.

I remember the first reed of mine which succumbed to the sad case of metal fatigue was the D note, an octave above middle C. That was about after 5 months faithful service from my Hohner 280. It so happened that it was also the time when I was learning bending (for non-harmonica players, bending here means playing the reed in such a way that a lower frequency is produced then would normally be). I don’t deny that bending as produced by a person new to the harmonica is really putting a lot of stress on the reeds. That D note of mine started to drop in pitch, which sounded something like a bee dying, if you have ever witness it before. First thing in my mind, “Toot! what should I do?”

Well, you have two choices: the easy way, or the not-that-easy way. The easy way is obviously asking your teacher to repair it for you. You can also try googling Harmonica Repair, which gives you nearly 800 thousand results. Luckily, thanks for Google’s brilliant PageRank feature, the first result is normally the best one. In this case, you’ll find Welcome to Fathead Musical Instrument.

Clicking it, you’ll see a picture of a guy (Michael Easton) with all his harmonicas, and not to forget, 2 super accurate strobe tuners made by PetersonTuners. Then you may start thinking, “hmm… this guy must know what he is doing…” After that, you click on the picture, which will bring you to this page. You’ll start noticing that he actually offers a lot of services, including reed/valve replacements, retuning, restorations…… If you are new to the harmonica, it might be a little confusing, I know. And if you are a stingy person like I am, you’ll see that the pricing of the services is starting to make you think twice.

To be fair, I am not criticising that Michael Easton is pricing his services too expensively. In fact, they are reasonably priced! If you go to other websites, you’ll find similar prices, if not more expensive. It is just that I’m poor and stingy…… Seriously though, Michael is a helpful person who would answer your questions.

Alright…… For those of you who are actually patient enough to read what I wrote up there, and are still reading, here’s what I really want to say, the not-so-easy way.

Imagine yourself playing the guitar, or the violin, or most other stringed instruments. Do you actually seek help from a instrument repairer just because one of your string’s broken? To be fair, you don’t actually change the string when it’s broken, but you actually….. Sorry, I digressed. As I was saying, NO, you DON’T go to a repairer just to restring your instrument. What you’d do is buy a packet of strings and restring the instrument yourself. Better still, you should have spare packets of strings ready at hands.

Why should it be different for harmonica. If you are serious about playing the harmonica, you should learn how to replace worn out reeds. Replacing a harmonica reed is not as hard as you’d think, and there’s no reason that the new reed will not work as good as new, that is if you do it right! You should get yourself a couple of cheap china made harmonicas and experiment on them first. No point putting your Hohner through all the torture for now.

Learning how to replace a worn out reed is not easy at first, but it will can really save you some money. More importantly, you don’t have to say, “Oh crap, there goes my only harmonica. Now what do I do?” You will not have to wait for weeks or even months before you can find somebody to get it fixed, and that is certainly important if you are serious about playing the harmonica.

I find it rather absurd to support Suzuki harmonicas. Suzuki reeds are welded! That, my friend, is not what normal people like you and I can repair. Seydel, on the other hand, is actually selling single reeds for those who want them. Great news for Seydel harmonica players. Not so great news for Hohner harmonica player like me. Nevertheless, it’s a good sign that a harmonica manufacturer is seeing things from a player’s point of view.