From: "Michael Polesky M.P.A." Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 11:51:16 -0700 Subject: [Fwd: Re: Soaking - playing the wet towel]
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Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 11:49:21 -0700 From: "Michael Polesky M.P.A." Organization: New California Business Associates X-Mailer: Mozilla 2.01E-PBXE (Win16; I) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Mike Curtis Subject: Re: Soaking - playing the wet towel References:
Mike, I was intrigued by the "perception" that so many players have about soaking their harps. I picked up a little trick from Ron Kalina that I use in upon accasion when my chromatic valves start getting real sticky. Essesntially, a harp with a plastic body, like most of our new model chromatics, shouldn't be affected by water and the reeds should be able to handle significant moisture as they are metal and ut up with this regularly anyway. Thus, dipping a plastic body chro in some clean water should help to remove some of the gunk in the harp that doesn't belong and still leave the instrument in good playing condition. I must admit that I hesitate to do this regularly, but experimenting with old harps and eventually ones that I use regularly I have found that there is no "damage" as a result. To the point, I have also noticed that, when the harp hasn't dried, the extra water gives the reeds a little more resistance and the result is a louder, sometimes clearer sound. My Herings sound particularly "brilliant" when they are wet. If I could get rid of the sound of water "gurgling" at the same time I might prefer this effect. Anyway, as I postulated, I think that the resistance of the reeds is a little greater when wet and that they play well with a heavier air stream than normal at this point allowing for the louder sound/briliance I have experienced. The difference is on the "macro" scale for the chromatics and cannot be mistaken. I haven't tried this with wood bodies, but, aside from perhaps closing some gaps with the plates, some of the difference may actually come from water in the reed area. What intrigues me the most is that, as a fan of thick reed plates and high resistance, perhaps this technique could be used to produce a better sounding harp? I think resistance is one of the keys to the "control" we have over pitch & sound quality. I certainly like the thicker plates. I just received my CX-12 Nickel plated plates and put them next to new CX-12 regulars and found the difference "noticeable" (Siegfried - I hadn't put bot together yet and didn't have a good comparison when I wrote you). What do you all think?
