by Daniel V. Garcia
Daily Lobo
I remember watching my grandfather use a harmonica to accompany himself while he sang rancheras.
Since then, this tiny but versatile instrument has fascinated me.
At 15, I bought a harp and began to teach myself how to play. As I was learning, I turned to the blues players of the '50s, like Sonny Boy Williamson. He is credited with the innovation of the cross-harp technique, which is essential for blues playing.
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Little Walter, the most musically quoted player in the history of harmonica, had the uncanny ability to make a harmonica sound like a saxophone. If you go to any open-mic blues jams, it is guaranteed that you will hear phrases lifted directly from his timeless solos.
Later, harmonica players displayed their speed and virtuosity. Country-harpist Charlie McCoy emulated the smoking licks of a country fiddle on his harmonica. Sugar Blue, who played harp on the Rolling Stones' "Miss You," used the Dorian mode of the diatonically tuned instrument to come up with a new sound and faster speed. John Popper of Blues Traveler was directly influenced by him.
Players like Howard Levy tweaked their harps so they could be played chromatically in spite of their diatonic limitations, and so the harp has found a home in lots of jazz arrangements. While Frederic Yonnet, Alfred Hirsch and Yvonnick Prene are three noteworthy players who are breaking new ground, there is one exceptional harmonica player from the '20s whose name will draw blank stares from even the most schooled blues harmonicists of today. His name is DeFord Bailey.
A few years ago, I found five of his recordings on a compilation disc. Since then, his life has been featured in a PBS documentary. Although he played some of the most difficult and amazing harmonica phrases anyone has ever tried to create, he never received his just desserts in his lifetime. Last year, the Country Music Hall of Fame finally got wise and inducted him.
Bailey was the first African-American artist to perform on the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn. He was unjustly fired and thereby relegated to obscurity, but the fact that no other artist of that era was as accepted by audiences of all races is a testament to his virtuosity.
Bailey had the ability to play two harmonica parts at the same time on a single instrument. Overdubbing was not yet utilized in the studio, so one can hear him chugging out the rhythm at the bass end and playing the melody on the treble end. This is like using one hand to play Rachmaninoff on the piano. Carlos del Junco and a handful of other players are able to do this today, but there aren't many. Bailey himself knew this.
"I am an old man now," he said in the PBS documentary, "but they will never get out of a harp what I can."
DeFord Bailey, you're my harmonica hero.
