Blues Harmonica Episodes

Tom Ellis joins me on episode 62 for something a little bit different as we do a retrospective of the legendary Paul Butterfield, with Tom our resident expert. Born in 1942 in Chicago, Butterfield frequented many of the South...

Will Wilde joins me on episode 61. A sixteen year old Will stole his first harmonica while at a party and proceeded to put the rock into the instrument. He first started performing with his sister, Dani, as the harmonica player in her band. But Will has always had ideas of his own and soon formed h…

Bertram Becher joins me on episode 58. Bertram is the Product Manager at Seydel harmonicas. He first landed this dream job when he made a name for himself by creating a software tutorial called The Interactive Blues Harp Work...

RJ Mischo joins me on episode 56. RJ hails from the twin cities of Minneapolis-St Paul, where he developed his craft with a little help from local player Slim Lynwood. He then teamed up with Mojo Buford to perform around the cities, including recording an album with Mojo. With numerous albums out u…

Jim Conway joins me on episode 55. Jim is an Australian harmonica player who rose to fame at the age of 19 in the jug band: The Captain Matchbox Whoopee Band, with the first two albums from the band receiving gold record status. Jim also played kazoo with Captain Matchbox to great effect. The band …

Tom Ball joins me on episode 54. From Los Angeles, but long time resident of Santa Barbara, he started playing guitar in the popular local folk scene before Sonny Terry turned him on to the sound of acoustic harmonica. He then met Kenny Sultan, to form possibly the longest surviving acoustic blues …

Billy Boy Arnold joins me on episode 53. Today we have a little part of blues harmonica history, as Billy lived through the heyday of the blues in Chicago and was a peer of the many great players at the time, being born just five years after Little Walter himself. He took a couple of lessons with J…

Richard Gjems joins me on episode 51. Richard hails from Norway, with its many blues clubs demonstrating how popular the music is there. Richard is a real student of the blues, and the place of the harmonica within it, and he is involved in archiving music at the National Library in Norway. Richard…

Greg Heumann joins me on episode 46. The focus of this episode is all about gear, as I talk to the founder of BlowsMeAway Productions. Greg has released an album of his own and uses his knowledge of playing harmonica to understand what is needed to make great harmonica products.The first product in…

Tony Eyers joins me on episode 45. Tony is an Australian who first picked up the harmonica while studying at Yale in the US. Returning from America he started a successful blues band in Adelaide. He also plays baroque recorde...

Adam Burney joins me on episode 44. Adam is a south London boy, from Croydon. A stint playing with the punk bands of this area has helped shape his sound with an edge of Blues punk, including in his own band, The Brothers of ...

Phil Wiggins joins me on episode 41. Phil was one half of one of the best known blues duos around, Cephas and Wiggins, playing with John Cephas for over thirty years. They progressed from their early recordings in Germany to go on to tour the world, and even played at the White House to the Clinton…

Bob Corritore joins me on episode 40. Bob grew up around Chicago and absorbed the best blues scene in the world, attending the blues clubs in his youth, seeing his harmonica heroes in action and befriending many of them. He m...

Mat Walklate joins me on episode 39. Mat is based in Manchester and has worked as a professional musician throughout his life, playing mainly blues and traditional music using a variety of harmonicas. He started out with a lo...

Mark Hummel joins me on episode 36. Mark is a West Coast blues harp player who has put out some great harmonica songs in his catalogue of over 30 albums. A real connoisseur of the Blues, he has drawn inspiration from a wide range of the classic players. Mark felt a particular affinity with Little W…

Steve Baker moved from his native London in his early 20s to become part of the vibrant music scene in Hamburg. His brand of punk folk won him recognition and he was soon a regular on the German session circuit, as well as co...

Filip can be described as the complete harmonica player, being adept on the diatonic, chromatic and bass harmonicas, as well as being able to play numerous other instruments. He started out on diatonic, with a love of the blu...

Errol Linton is a south London boy, with roots in Jamaica. His brand of ‘Brixton Blues’ music merges his Caribbean heritage with his love for the blues to create a distinctive reggae-infused form of blues. Starting out buskin...

Greg Zlap hails from Poland, where he played along with black market blues records on his one harmonica. He moved to Paris in his late teens where he discovered the great French harmonica player, JJ Milteau. Greg started up a...

Charlie Musselwhite grew up in Memphis, rubbing shoulders with Johnny Cash and Elvis Presley. Work took him north to Chicago were he discovered the South Side blues scene, where he befriended several legends of the blues harm...

Sugar Blue has certainly pushed the boundaries of the harmonica, with his rapid fire licks, lots of high end runs and gorgeous tone. It was perhaps his early jazz influences that shaped his distinctive sound, although there i...

Grant Dermody first picked up the harp in Alaska, where he emulated the greats before developing his own acoustic sound playing American roots music. He played as a session man on various albums before releasing the first of ...

Mark Feltham grew up with a love of country music and just knew he had to play harp when he heard Stone Fox Chase on the UK music programme, Old Grey Whistle test. As he entered the London music scene he found he had to adapt...

Jerry Portnoy joins me on episode 20 of the podcast. Jerry grew up with the sounds of Maxwell street in his ears. It took him a few years to pick up the harp, but when he did he enjoyed a tremendous career. Starting out with Johnny Young’s band, he had only been playing for six years before his tal…