This piece shows Jason Rosenblatt in performance with a killer oud player. The music is hot, loaded with Middle Eastern sounds, and full of blistering harmonica runs played to perfection. if you don’t like this, you don’t like harmonica. Catch Shtreiml (based in Montreal) when you can.

I’ve been steadily working towards the release of my patch set for the Digitech RP360/RP360XP, and we’re pretty close to go. There will be a few changes in this set versus previous sets:

The RP360XP: give us a few weeks, and it’ll have our patches in it

I’ve bitched a lot about the uselessness of Digitech’s Nexus application for editing the RP, and I still have my problems with it. However, it’s actually pretty useful if you do initial patch editing from the RP360′s front panel, and use Nexus for the finishing touches, like balancing the relative levels of patches and assigning the footswitches to particular patch parameters for Stomp mode. The former is accomplished with a slider in the software, and the latter by dragging and dropping the effect you want to control into a slot representing the footswitch. Fast and tidy. For people who don’t change patches frequently in the middle of a song, Stomp mode looks like the way to go. If you do like to change patches in the middle of a song, Stomp mode isn’t ideal, because the footswitches in Stomp mode turn FX on or off, and you can’t use them to change patches in that case. (You can still change patches by rotating the large dial on the front panel, but that’s not ideal when you’re in the middle of a performance.)

My RP360/360XP patch set will retail for $50, and it’s my best work to date. I’ll be updating my RP500 and RP1000 patch sets, in that order, with the refinements I’ve made for the 360, so if you’re using one of those devices, stay tuned–that’ll be a free upgrade for current RP500 and RP1000 patch set licensees. In the meantime, give me a few weeks–to mid-May 2014–and the 360 patch set will be lighting up your RP.

I met Dutch composer and player Wim Dijkgraaf in the late 1990s in Amsterdam. We had a great evening listening to music and talking. I saw Wim again a couple of years ago in Sao Paolo, where he lives now. Through all that time, he’s remained true to his art and the harmonica. Living in Brazil, the Most Musical Place on the Planet, for a few years hasn’t hurt, as you can see from this very cool piece with gorgeous chromatic harmonica.

Wim Dijkgraaf, chromatic harmonica master

Check it out here: Wim Dijkgraaf, Nightfall

It’s been a long time coming, and it’s almost here. I will offer my first patch set for a non-Digitech device within the next few weeks: my ultra-cool setup for the Zoom G3.

The Zoom G3: it runs on batteries! Need we say more?

Amp modelers don’t all sound the same, and the Zoom G3 doesn’t sound exactly like a Digitech RP. The amp models in the Zoom tend to sound a little bit tougher than the RP’s, which is a plus for some people, and the Zoom also offers a sound designer (e.g., me) more flexibility in the sequence and type of FX than Digitech’s RPs do. You can only use one modulation effect–for example, a pitch shifter, or a phaser–at a time in the RPs, but you can string up to four of them in a row in the Zoom and still have room left over for an amp model and a delay or reverb. The FX in the Zoom aren’t quite as brilliant-sounding as the RP’s, but they’re decent, and when you stack them up they make a pretty big roar. One of the patches I’ve set up for the G3 has 3 pitch shifters, a vibrato, and an auto-wah in it; it can produce 8 simultaneous pitches from a single note, and it can make those 8 pitches wobble and quack too. That’s some heavy artillery when you want it, and did I mention that it runs on batteries? Yup. It runs on batteries, which means that you can take it to a jam session and set it up onstage in the amount of time that it takes to run a 1/4″ cable from the G3 to the PA.

I’m taking the G3 with me to London when I visit that town on June 9-10, and I expect to use it onstage when I sit in at the blues jams at Ain’t Nothin’ But the Blues, which venue I’ve always played with my Tech 21 Blonde pedal up to now. The Blonde sounds nice, but it doesn’t do reverb, delay, vibrato, or anything other than amp modeling, and it doesn’t do amp modeling any better than the Zoom. What can I say? Sometimes more is more.

I still prefer the sound of the Digitech RPs when it’s convenient to use one, and my regular performance rig isn’t going to change anytime soon, but the G3 is a good-sounding, flexible alternative when fast setup time is required. I expect to price the patch set for the G3 at $35 for 30 patches, which is actually more than it seems given that the G3 gives you 3 dedicated footswitches for turning FX on and off, meaning that the same patch can be reconfigured dramatically in performance with ease.

Stay tuned for the announcement of this patch set within the next month.

My latest patch set, for the Digitech RP360, is coming soon. While you’re waiting, you can see what’s in the set here:

Huntersounds v18 patch list for Digitech RP360/360XP

The RP360XP: give us a few weeks, and it’ll have our patches in it

We think these patches sound great. For anyone who doesn’t need to switch patches frequently in mid-song, the RP360 is probably the Digitech tool of choice. If you need to do a lot of manipulations in mid-song, the RP500 is the preferred device. Whichever you choose, our new RP360 patch set is killer, and the things we discovered while making it will find their way into the rest of our RP setups soon.

I arrived in London this morning (Sunday 8 June), and I plan to visit the Monday night jam at Ain’t Nothin But the Blues. When I do, I’ll be packing the Zoom G3, as opposed to the Tech 21 Blonde pedal that’s been my go-to jam session box for a while.

Zoom G3, Shaker dynamic, two cables–just add harps and you’re ready to rock

There’s nothing wrong with the Blonde. It just doesn’t do everything that a Zoom G3 can do. Like the Blonde, the G3 runs on batteries, which means that the road kit can be stripped down to the G3, a mic, and two 1/4″ cables, one to connect the mic to the G3, the other to connect the G3 to the PA.

For this trip I brought the Shaker dynamic mic that’s been in my kit for years, during which period I’ve barely used it. I’ve discovered recently that this mic sounds very good with amp modelers in general, and its very light weight and handy ergonomics make it a good choice for a road trip.

This’ll be the first onstage test of my new patches for the G3, which I expect to release within days of my return. Stay tuned–I may get audio or video of this jam.

Ed Abbiatti and Chris Cacavas have just released their latest CD, “Me and the Devil,” a tough rock record with plenty of classic rock and Americana in it. I’m playing harp on two of the tracks, including the title track, where I contributed two parts recorded through the Digitech RP355: an organ-like rhythm track recorded with a Bassman amp model and a rotary speaker effect, and a lead line recorded with my “devil sound,” a Matchless amp model with a pitch-shifted line a perfect 4th below the original tone.

I recorded all my parts for this record using the RP355 as the audio interface, direct via USB into Cakewalk Sonar 8.5. The recording was done in my kitchen in Idaho last summer. (Kitchens work well as recording studios with this setup.) The mic on these tracks is an Audix Fireball. That’s the gear list.

You can find out more about this release at http://www.harboursong.co.uk/artists, where you can buy it too if you’re so inclined.

Me and the Devil: red-hot Americana

I used the Zoom G3 onstage with two different sets of players at the Monday night jam at Ain’t Nothin’ But the Blues in London this week, and the results were mixed.

The setup I used for the jam at ANBTB on Monday 9 June: Zoom G3, Shaker Dynamic mic, 2 cables

Good stuff first: the basic sound of this setup was very nice for blues. Plenty of guts, gratifying shifts in tone as my playing went from soft to loud.

On the not so good side, I couldn’t seem to get the setup loud enough to compete with two guitars effectively. I had feedback issues from the start. I was able to reduce the feedback by turning off the graphic EQ and delay FX in my patch setup (a basic Fender Bassman patch), but I was never able to get the setup as loud as I can get one of my Digitech RPs.

The situation is somewhat complicated by the fact that I was using the Shaker Dynamic mic for the first time at this jam. When there are two moving parts in the picture, it’s tough to know which is the main culprit. I hereby remind myself not to test more than one piece of gear at a time going forward.

Anyway, the G3 needs more testing and adjustments before I release this patch set. As an interim step, I’ve asked several people who’ve expressed interest in this set to do a little beta testing, which should take around a month. Stay tuned for more information on revised release dates.

It’s official: our patch set for Digitech RP360/360XP is available for sale at our store. You can get it now for $50. It includes 50 great patches, all of which make the most of the RP360′s performance features and its huge palette of great amp models and FX.

The RP360XP: a very nice device, and the host of our latest patch set

We’ve carefully balanced the output levels of the patches in this set to ensure smooth volume transitions between patches, too. All in all, this is our best set to date, and that’s sayin’ somethin’.

On a related subject, we’ve updated our RP500 patch set to v18. This version includes a few new patches, as well as the same balancing on patch levels that we put into the v18 RP360/360XP set. It makes a very good thing even better.

All current licencees for our RP500 patch set will be updated to v18 for free. We expect both the RP360/360XP set and the updated RP500 set to be available for sale at Rockin’ Ron’s within a week.

We’re delighted to offer these terrific sounds to harp players everywhere. Get yours now!

Jason Ricci has been pretty quiet for a little while. It’s great to see him here in fine form, using a big auto-wah sound on this blues classic. There’s been a lot of noise about this video on the Modern Blues Harmonica forum, much of it to the effect that the sound Jason is using here is weird, or buzzy, or tinny, or less-than-blues-worthy in any number of ways. So far as I’m concerned, it just sounds great. Rock on!

I spent the weekend in Jackson, Wyoming, where I had a gig with the cream of the local rock scene: Derrik and the Dynamos, Derrik Hufsmith’s stellar band that on this occasion included Phil Round on bass and backup vocals and Ed Domer on drums along with Derrik on guitar and lead vocals and yours truly on harp and keys. The occasion was a wedding, and the groom had specifically requested a harp player for the wedding band. How often does that happen? Not often enough…

I traveled from Connecticut (2250 miles away) with a road kit that included my Audix Fireball mic and my Digitech RP360XP, plus a Roland JV1010 synth module for organ and piano sounds. (This is the rootsy side of rock, and the spacier sounds in the Roland were not required.)

The RP360XP: a very nice device, and the host of my latest patch set

I keep a Peavey KB2 amp, which has a built-in 3-channel mixer, and a Casio CZ-1 synthesizer keyboard at my place in Idaho, and that coupled with the gear I brought with me was all that was required. The Casio has nice sounds of its own, of course, its 1980s vintage notwithstanding, but for this occasion all it was doing was sending MIDI to the Roland, which in turn made the sounds. I put the keys and the harp (the latter via the RP360XP, which is loaded with my latest patch set plus a few other goodies I’ve worked up recently) through the Peavey, which functioned in this case as my stage monitor, and we ran a line from the Peavey’s XLR out to the PA.

The setup was plenty loud and clear for both monitoring and front of house, and it was certainly simple enough to set up. It’s SO much easier to play when you can really hear yourself (and when the other players can you hear you too), and I had lots of tools in the kit to work with.

I used about a half-dozen harp sounds for this gig, including a “tenor sax” patch that I put together earlier this week for the bride and groom’s first dance to Van Morrison’s “Days Like This”, and a few sounds from my Huntersounds v18 patch set for RP360, including my TW_SLP patch (which uses a Twin Reverb amp model and a slapback analog delay), a sound that’s both clear and big, for Stevie Wonder’s “Isn’t She Lovely”, and a few different amped-blues variations, including my ChampB (Champ amp model with Bassman cab) and GA40 (Gibson GA40 amp model and cab model) patches for the heavier blues-rock stuff like the Rolling Stones’s “Honky Tonk Women” and “Miss You,” as well as the Smokey Robinson tune “The Way You Do the Things You Do,” where the harp sounded big and ballsy with chording on the tune’s signature I-IV vamp and a solo that channeled Magic Dick (whose own solo in 1970 on Smokey’s “First I look at the Purse” was one of the recordings that shaped my early ideas about what could and could not be done on harp). I’d never really been all that enamored of “Miss You,” but playing Sugar Blue’s lines on that tune in 3rd position on a Seydel 1847 G harp with a screaming GA40 tone was a hellalotta fun.

I leaned heavily on my Seydel Session Steel and chromatic harps throughout this gig, and they did not let me down. I’d brought a total of 52 harps with me and ended up using, oh, about 4 or 5 of them. As Don Covay said decades ago, better to have and not need than to need and not have.

The players were plenty experienced. I realized in conversation with Phil that I’d seen him perform with the Teton Valley-based bluegrass band Loose Ties at the Pyralisk performance space in Montpelier, Vermont in 1994, when I was resident in that town. He practically fell over laughing when I sang the chorus from “Singin’ Through My Nose,” the song Loose Ties used to end their set on that occasion. (Ed Domer couldn’t believe that I remembered the song. Hey, it was a memorable lyric.) Phil has been performing a weekly gig at the Stagecoach in Jackson for 45 years (with a hiatus in the middle to tour with Loose Ties and various others). He’s an accomplished guitarist, but he stuck to the bass for this gig.

Phil Round, guitar in hand

This is the second time I’ve played with drummer Ed Domer–the first was the gig I played in Jackson a couple of years ago with George Kilby Jr., which is chronicled here. Ed has been in Jackson for close to two decades; before that he spent 18 years in LA working a variety of stage, studio, and tour gigs. His drumming was top-notch, with lots of precision and drive. We had a brief discussion about drummers Steve Gadd and Bernard “Pretty” Purdie; I’d heard the former in concert with James Taylor in Tanglewood about a dozen years ago, and I had the pleasure of playing with the latter when I sat in with Rob Papparozzi’s band The Hudson River rats a few years ago in NYC. Ed obligingly played a few hihat grooves for me that represented those players’ styles; very educational.

I’ve jammed with Derrik at his house or mine in Tetonia, Idaho on several occasions, but this was the first time I’ve performed with him in front of an audience, and man was he on fire. It was immensely pleasurable to hear him beat those strings to pieces on song after song, and pleasurable indeed to play with a trio of such accomplished players.

Derrik Hufsmith getting his groove on for the farm equipment

I didn’t record this show; Derrik’s not fond of being recorded, for reasons that will ever remain obscure to me–y’know, plenty of people who will never play half as well as Derrik does on a bad day, let alone a good one, seem to record themselves every time I turn my back for ten minutes–and it was his gig. But I did find this nifty video of Derrik, Phil, and Ed playing a recent show. Check it out.

SPAH has announced that part of its program for SPAH 2014 will be the Harmonica Band reboot, in which attendees will have the opportunity to perform with a harmonica band featuring bass, chord, and diatonic or chromatic lead harps. I don’t have much desire to perform with a harmonica trio–its artistic appeal aside, it’s a format that excites little public interest in 2014, and I don’t see why that’s going to change–but the announcement made me think about some of the loops I’ve done lately in which the harmonica fills all the roles of a modern rock band except drums.

When you’re armed with a Digitech RP and one of my patch sets, you’ve got all the essentials for a basic rock or blues band. You’ve got bass sounds, sax sounds, organ sounds, chunky sounds for guitar-type chording, traditional amped harp sounds, and modern, exaggerated synth-y sounds. You can lay down multiple layers in a loop that fill out the sound spectrum from top to bottom. In other words, you’ve got a band.

My setup in the RP355 days. The looper is just to the left of the silver Nady mixer, just to the right of the RP355. The RP355 has been replaced by either an RP360XP or an RP500, depending on the occasion.

The three loops that follow all illustrate this principle in practice. They were recorded with a Digitech RP360XP into a Digitech JamMan Stereo looper. All of them feature a bass line played on a harp that’s pitch-shifted down two octaves; one or more low-midrange harps, courtesy of the same pitch shifter set to an octave down; and a lead line played with an amped tone. There’s a “slide guitar” sound on the second piece, too. I did some crude beatboxing on the first two pieces, just enough to show that you can put percussion into the picture if you want to.

The RP360XP: a very nice device, and the host of my latest patch set

These are rough performances, not polished pieces, and they’re intended to make a simple point: the range of sounds available in a Digitech RP with my patch set loaded is plenty enough to support a harp player who wants to create a full band sound. There’s no post-recording processing except for fades in and out. If you’ve got my patch set loaded on your RP, get a looper going and give it a try.

“Big Horns” This piece features one harp layer with my MA4D patch, which adds a perfect 4th down to the original tone, and another layer with an octave-down patch; the combination makes a power chord of root-5th-root. The harps jump out like a horn section.

“Quartet” The groove is a slow blues shuffle; the harp tones are dark blue. There’s a double-octave down patch for the bass, an octave down for low chords, a “slide guitar” sound and an amped blues patch for the lead.

“Trio” This is the closest thing to a traditional harmonica trio in this set. Three parts: bass (double octave down), chords (octave down), and clean chorded lead. All parts played on a dorian minor tuned diatonic in second position (key of G minor).

I just learned that “Me and the Devil” by Chris Cacavas & Ed Abbiatti, the title piece of which features two (count them, two) harmonica parts by me, is a “Tip” on the Euro Americana Chart:
http://www.euroamericanachart.eu/

As per my previous comments on this site, I recorded my parts for the title song with a Digitech RP355, using a rotary speaker patch for a backing part and a pitch-shifted sound with an added 4th down for the solo. In other words, harmonica is the featured instrument on this track. Both these patches, of course, are included in my latest patch set for Digitech RP355.

You can hear the music and buy if you like at iTunes or CDBaby.

Me and the Devil: red-hot Americana

I arrived in Tetonia, Idaho on Friday last week, and on Sunday morning I headed to Pendl’s, my favorite bakery in Driggs or anywhere else, to sit in with my friend Michael Batdorf. Michael greeted me warmly, and I was set up in time to start the first set at 9 AM. Before we were done, the crew included local stalwarts Greg Creamer and Brian Maw, the latter of which I of course played plenty of gigs with a couple of summers ago.

The RP360XP: a very nice device, and the host of my latest patch set

I used the Digitech RP360XP and a Peavey KB2 amp for this gig. The rig sounded great, of course, but I learned something about playing with FX at low volume. Did I mention that the volume was VERY low? The amp was positioned ahead of me and to my left, and the volume was set so low that I had trouble hearing what the FX were really doing. The audience could hear it easily; everyone in the place went bananas when I started soloing through my new tenor-sax-with-wahwah patch (which I’ll distribute to my patch set licensees soon). But what I heard mostly was the harp in my hands, not the amp. Lesson learned: for very low volume gigs, put the amp behind me, not in front. It’s not like feedback is an issue under those circumstances, and it’s a lot easier to hear what you sound like than to imagine what you sound like.

The tenor sax wah patch aside, mostly I was pretty conservative with my amp and FX choices. I used my DIRROOM and DIRHALL patches, direct signal from the mic with room and hall reverb respectively, on a lot of stuff; acoustic harp with reverb works with acoustic guitar, duh. I also used the TW_SLP patch, Twin Reverb amp with slapback delay, on a few tunes; it’s a clean sound with a lot of power and cut. I used my BASROTON patch–Bassman amp model with rotary speaker on/off under footpedal control–on a lot of stuff, especially the rockers where I wanted to sound like an organ on the accompaniments and like an amped-up harp on the leads. And I used a few octave and double octave down patches for various bass and low-saxish stuff. When I wanted Chicago in the sound, I used a range of patches based on the Gibson GA40 and Fender Champ with various cabinets. I especially like the sound of the Champ amp model with the Tweed Deluxe 1×12 cabinet model, the patch I call CHAMPD in my patch sets for the RP360XP, 500, and 1000.

RP355 in the middle of the red board: it’s great, but the RP360XP is great-er

I keep an RP355 at my place in Tetonia just in case, and I had the opportunity to do a side-by-side comparison with the RP360XP. No surprises there: the RP360XP sounds better. The 355 sounds great–just check out “Me and the Devil,” the new release by Ed Abbiatti and Chris Cacavas–but the 360XP is noticeably more articulate and vivid. From this point on, the 360XP is the default device for most of my gigs, with the RP500 the leading choice for my solo looping gigs.

I’ll post some samples of the latest RP360XP sounds soon. Stay tuned for those. In the meantime, if you’re planning to be near the Teton Valley anytime soon, I’ll be sitting in with Michael again on Sunday 17 August, with Brian Maw’s band at the Knotty Pine in Victor on Saturday 23 August, and with Phil Round’s band at the Stagecoach in Jackson on either Sunday 17 August or Sunday 24 August. Fun fun fun…

I’ve been in Idaho for a couple of weeks with only my RP360XP for a looping device. The 360XP has a usable but limited looper: 40 seconds maximum loop time, can’t have more than one loop in memory at a time, can’t remove the latest layer of a loop (as you can with the JamMan Stereo and Solo XT), can’t save a loop for later use. So it’s really a live-only looper, and its usefulness there is hampered by the fact that you have to step on it twice in rapid succession to turn a loop off, which makes timing an ending pretty difficult. But for simple loops, it’s functional enough, and it records audio through whatever patch is running on the RP at the time. So it’s ideal for showing off what kinds of sounds you can make, and roles you can play, with the RP360XP.

I took this opportunity to learn what the looper will actually do to record a funky loop that uses the new Tenor Sax Wah patch I’ve developed for the RP360XP. When you bring this patch up, it’s a tenor sax sound with volume under footpedal control. If you step on the footpedal hard enough to trigger wah-wah mode, you get a very funky wah wah sound, which I explore here in a number of ways: as single note and chordal rhythmic device, as lead instrument high and low, and so on. We hear about 2 bars of the tenor sax sound followed by an extensive statement with the wah wah. Maybe I shoulda recorded a few more bars with the tenor sound. What can I say? I was really liking those wah sounds. This patch will be made available to current RP360XP patch set licensees very soon. All the other patches used on this recording are included in the most recent huntersounds patch set for Digitech RP360XP.

Funky RP360XP Loop Jam

I used my BASDSSLP patch, which has a Bassman amp and cab model, DS distortion, and slapback delay, with the delay turned off in this case to record the basic rhythm part. The harp I used in this piece is a C harp in Dorian Minor Tuning, meaning that 2nd position gives you a G dorian minor mode. You can get some nice 7th and 9th chords with this tuning in 2nd position, and it helps create the illusion of a guitar, not a harp, playing the chorded rhythms.

Next come double octave and octave down bass riffs, in that order. Then comes the tenor sax, followed immediately by a wah wah sax sound. Sounds new, different, and funky to me. One of the things I learned from Brandon Bailey and Son of Dave is that you can leave something out and it’s okay. They leave out any kind of bass; I left out the beatboxing and/or drums in this case. The initial rhythm harp part is really the drum in this piece.

The RP360XP: a very nice device, and the host of my latest patch set

This piece was recorded as I performed it with the stereo 1/4″ outs on the RP360XP running directly into the Zoom H4′s input jacks. I mixed and mastered the recording in Sonar X3 Producer, using Izotope Ozone 4 for various EQ, compression, and other processing duties. I made a few structural edits, like for example cutting the ending a little more precisely than I was able to do with the RP360XP’s looper controls. No musical parts were added to the live recording; everything you hear was played in real time.

I’m continuing to explore the range of emotional and musical material I can do with a looper, not only in terms of my own recordings, but in the things I hear from players like Bailey and Son of Dave. I’ve noticed that these artists don’t aim for the full frequency spectrum that I’m going for. In particular, they don’t use a pitch shifter, so they’re not attempting to put a lot of low end into the sound. That’s not to say they don’t use FX. I heard a piece by Bailey where he used a very prominent delay to distinguish a lead line from a looped harmonica rhythm. But in general, these artists don’t mind putting a couple of different harp licks into the same frequency range. It’s an interesting perspective, and one that I will surely explore.

RP360XP setup during soundcheck in Milan with Lowlands

In the meantime, enjoy this groove.

I spent August 8 through August 26 in Idaho this summer, and I sat in with Michael G. Batdorf, notable singer/songwriter, twice at Pendl’s cafe in Driggs during that period. (On a third occasion I showed up to play and found that Michael was held up behind 600 bicyclists conducting a road trip from Jackson Wyoming to Victor Idaho, so I ended up playing the gig solo.) I recorded the entire two hours on this occasion, and this piece, which I think is titled “Beyond My Eyes,” is one of my favorites from the set.

Michael G. Batdorf in studio

The piece is a beautiful ballad in Eb minor; I heard it for the first time during this performance. The only harp I had in my kit that could manage that key was a Hohner CX12 chromatic in the key of E, which meant that I played it in the equivalent of B minor on a C chromatic. That wouldn’t necessarily have been my first choice, but it turned out that the low chromatic harp (a minor 6th below a 12-hole chromatic in C) worked very well on the piece.

The performance here is entirely improvised. As always when I sit in, I tried to create an arrangement for the piece, not just play licks, and this arrangement has a beautiful, yearning feel to it, with variations on the basic line that include octaves and various chords. I recorded the performance live with a Zoom H4 positioned about 20 feet from the stage, and while there’s some crowd and ambient noise, the overall quality is thoroughly listenable. The gear I used in this performance includes a Digitech RP360XP running my DIRROOM patch (direct amp model with room reverb) from my latest patch set, an Audix Fireball mic, and a Peavey KB2 amp. It all sums to loud and clear, which works for this music.

Beyond My Eyes by Michael G. Batdorf, harmonica by Richard Hunter

I have more recordings from the gigs I did in Idaho on this trip, including some good takes from a show with Derrik and the Dynamos. Stay tuned.

I had the opportunity to perform with Derrik Huffsmith and his band Derrik & the Dynamos at a gig near Wilson, Wyoming this August. The band included Phil Round on bass and vocals, Ed Domer on drums, and Don Christenson, who I’d never met before, on keys. We played a lot of covers at this gig; this performance, of Dylan’s “Ill Be Your Baby Tonight,” is one of my favorites from the gig.

Derrik is singing lead on this piece, Phil harmonies. The harmonica solos at about 2:41, after the piano, by which time the song has built significantly, and maintains a prominent presence from that point on. The emotion in the entire performance is very strong throughout.

I played the gig with my Audix Fireball mic, Digitech RP360XP, and Peavey KB2, as usual, and it took about 5 minutes to set up, as usual. Derrik didn’t have a spare XLR cable, and neither did I, so we ran a 1/4″ cable from the Peavey’s FX send to the PA, and I used the Peavey as on onstage monitor, also per usual. I don’t recall what patch I was using on the RP, though I know it’s one of the standard ones from my patch set for RP360XP. It’s a clean sound with just a touch of reverb or slapback on it; it could be a patch based on a Tweed amp model, a direct amp model, or something else. Anyway, it does the job here, which is allow the harp to cut through the band without grating on single notes, chords, and octaves, all of which are in use in this arrangement. Lots of clean gain in this patch. The harp is an orchestral element on this piece, and the clarity in the sound helps make the changes in tones and textures come through clearly.

The harmonica is a Seydel Session Steel in A, played in second position. I like Session Steels–they play hard and stay in tune, two qualities on the top of my list for harmonicas. I took to the A and Bb Session Steels right away; for some reason it took me longer to love my C and D, but I do now.

The piece was recorded via the internal mics on the Zoom H4, with the Zoom hanging at one side of the stage, near the edge of the outdoor tent that surrounded the dance floor, and its mics facing the band from about 20 feet away and a height of about 6 feet. The recorded sound is surprisingly good, largely because there was a clear line of sight from the Zoom to one of the band’s PA stacks, though of course the crowd makes noise.

Enjoy.

“I’ll Be Your Baby Tonight” performed by Derrik & the Dynamos with Richard Hunter, harmonica, August 2014

This piece is a very impressive performance involving looped and live harmonica, beatboxing, singing, and percussion. The harmonica is a Natural Minor (haven’t checked the key) played in second position. Bailey uses two vocal mics, both apparently direct to the PA, one for the vocals, one for the harp with a delay line on it. The delay is nice and fat, probably analog, and he makes it loud in the mix to reinforce the rhythm for the piece. I can’t tell from the video whether he’s triggering tap tempo for the delay with his feet, but whether or not he is, the delay is closely synced to the beat.

The song is great, the arrangement is great, the harps sound great, looped or live, the beatboxing sounds great, the singing sounds great. Like, it’s great. He’s obviously coming from some traditional roots, but there are no traditional roots that involve natural minor harmonicas and the chord voicings he’s using. (If he was using a bullet mic on the harp, those nice chord voicings would be totally smeared.) It’s a fully formed performance of some highly original high-quality stuff. The lead harp reminds me of early Jazz trumpet styles; it’s sophisticated in unexpected ways, always surprising. I found myself listening very carefully all the way through this piece. You will too.

We’ve updated our version 18 patch set for the Digitech RP360XP to include a few new patches and some needed adjustments to the existing patches. Does it sound great? Sheesh. It sounds great.

The RP360XP: now with new and improved patches from us

We’ve been delighted recently by the comments we’ve received on this set. One guitarist/harmonica player told us that he’s using our patches with his guitar as well as the harp, and he loves them. We’re glad to hear it! We always thought that the Digitech factory patches were 1) too loaded in the FX chains–do you really need all that stuff between the instrument and the output?– and 2) too heavily oriented towards heavy metal, with not enough stuff for the guitarist who likes a little crunch and some smooth FX in their sound. So it’s delightful to hear that our perception coincides with guitarist realities.

The v18 update has been distributed to all current customers, and will be the default set for new RP360/360XP patch set customers going forward. If you want these sounds in your kit, visit our store.

By the way, we haven’t forgotten our RP500 and RP1000 licensees. We’ll be making the same updates to those patch sets, in that order, in the next few weeks. Stay tuned.

I was informed this morning that the UK-based mag Rock n’ Reel (R2 for short) has rated “Me and the Devil” by Chris Cacavas (formerly of Green on Red) and Ed Abbiatti 5 stars, and called it “a work of genius.”

For those who haven’t checked it out yet, I’m playing on two tracks, including the title track, where the harp is playing heavily effected lead and accompaniment (FX courtesy of the Digitech RP355).

You can check out the review here:
https://www.facebook.com/edward.abbiati?fref=photo

And check out the record here:
http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/chriscacavasedwardabbiat
or here:
https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/me-and-the-devil/id883668480