The Complete Idiot's Guide(R) to Playing the Harmonica

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Summary: If you really want to learn to play....
Review: I really like this book. I have been playing around with the harmonica for a couple of years but had never taken lessons or tried an instruction book. This book helped me understand the mechanics and improve what I thought I already knew, like bending notes and tongue blocking. But it also does a good job of explaining some of the more advanced aspects of playing the harmonica like playing different positions and chord progressions. The chapter on playing blues was the clearest explanation I've seen on the underlying fundamentals.

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Summary: A good starter, but that's it
Review: I think this book gets you thru the basics pretty nicely, but, as things start to get harder, the book isn't as useful.

At one point you are advised something like this: "from this point out we aren't going to advise you when to play chords or single notes, just go with what sounds good". Great for the musically creative, but not me.

The section on reading music doesn't clearly show you what notes go with what holes, is another example. And the section on playing blues was odd, not even explaining how 12-bar blues really works.

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Summary: Something finally works for me
Review: I've tried to learn to play the harmonica several times and even though it looks easier, it's not. This book is great. I have only had it for a few days and I can play some songs that sound like songs. They explain everything really well, AND this book was fun to read -- even funny. Also, I couldn't read music very well and this helped, even though you can use it even if you don't read music and don't want to learn.

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Summary: Surprisingly good instruction
Review: If you tried Jon Gindick's harmonica technique (he wrote a simple method and bundled it with an inexpensive harmonica in the Klutz books series) you might find you are interested in learning more. There are a lot of books on harmonica method, and they range from too simple to too complicated.

This book is surprisingly good. It covers what harmonicas to purchase (and the advice is good, the listing of brands fairly complete.) There is a section on bending notes, an essential technique for getting more notes out of a diatonic harmonica and for creating a bluesy sound.

The best chapter, for me, was on the structure of 12-bar blues with an explanation of the "call-and-response" structure. It's easy to understand and essential for structuring your blues riffs to make musical sense. There's also a fine chapter on the etiquette of jamming with harmonica when you join up with a guitarist, singer and other instrumentalists. The harmonica plays support, mostly, but does get to solo. When should you chime in and when do you fade to the background? This chapter tells you how not to make a fool of yourself.

The only thing this book doesn't have is a CD with guitar or piano for jamming along with. If you are getting started in harmonica, especially blues harp, you will need some CD's, especially of the greats like Little Walter and Charles Musselwhite, to provide examples. You can't listen enough to get the ideas down. But this book is a really worthy text to go along with your practice.

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Summary: lots of fun to read
Review: This book is fun to read, full of cool info on the harp, and can teach anybody to play in a hurry. Witty, clear, good book.

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Summary: Not Just for Complete Idiots
Review: This book is surprisingly good for a book written for "complete idiots". I expected something very basic but it covers just about every aspect of learning to play a harmonica up to a pretty high level. It goes way beyond simple techniques. One thing I found unique is that the authors treat the harmonica like a real musical instrument instead of just a toy. They explain concepts and techniques from the standpoint of real music but it doesn't get bogged down or complicated. They even give you the option of learning to play the harmonica by reading music or by the more standard tab system, and the chapter that teaches you how to read music is extremely easy to understand. It also includes some information not usually included in harmonica books such as the history of the harmonica, buying and repairing harmonicas and how to play in a band. There are other books that may be better on individual topics, but this is by far the most complete soup-to-nuts harmonica instruction book. I recommend this be the first harmonica book you buy and then you probably won't need to buy any others.

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Summary: Covers a lot of ground
Review: This is a great book. It shows you a bunch of harmonica techniques, with hands-on examples, so you can try them out in a variety of songs. Very informative and fun to read.

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Summary: The best that's out there
Review: This was one three harmonica instruction books I bought, and clearly the best. for the best part is its organization, which is easy to follow even for a beginner. It has the usual Complete idiot's Guide structure which emphasizes making it easy to read and find things, like a complete index, easy to read forma, and tips and tricks which are hi-lighted. The resource guide at the end is also useful and gives you additional instructional material, harmonica websites and organizations, magazines and places to purchase harmonicas, etc.