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Award-winning songwriter Amy Wadge investigates the history and potential of the harmonica

4 Extra Debut. Grammy award-winning songwriter Amy Wadge investigates the history and global influence of the harmonica. From 2016.

Grammy Award-Winning songwriter Amy Wadge fell in love with the harmonica after winning one in a fancy dress competition (she was dressed in a bin liner!).  

Here she investigates the history and potential of the diatonic instrument, a European the toy which in the hands of expert players became the the iconic sound of the Mississippi Delta and the Chicago Blues. 

According to music historian Christoph Wagner, the very first example of the instrument goes back to Vienna. But millions would soon find their way to the USA, taken there by German emigres fleeing poverty. The poor person's introduction to music, the harmonica would soon find its way to around the globe, from Britain to Australia and even China. 

But it was in America that it scored its biggest success. Joe Filisko reveals it was there that harmonica technique underwent a transformation. Instead of exhaling air, blues players would draw air in, and bend notes to achieve the characteristic sounds of the blues. 

Amy tries her hand at bending, under the expert tutelage of Steve Lockwood - one of very few people to have studied the harmonica to degree level, and she speaks to one of Britain's best-known players, Paul Jones. 

Canadian beat-boxer Benjamin Darvill - "Son of Dave" - has explored new possibilities with the instrument, and with an original sound that's been heard in edgy TV dramas  and commercials. 

Proving that for all its limitations - 10 holes and 3 octaves - there's life yet the harmonica.

Produced by Geoff Ballinger.

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in March 2016.

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