Harmonica

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A harmonica is a free reed musical wind instrument (also known, among other things, as a mouth organ, French harp, tin sandwich, blues harp, simply harp, or "Mississippi saxophone"), having multiple, variably-tuned brass or bronze reeds, each secured at one end over an airway slot of like dimension into which it can freely vibrate, thus repeatedly interrupting an airstream to produce sound.

Unlike most free-reed instruments (such as reed organs, accordions and melodicas), the harmonica lacks a keyboard. Instead, the player selects the notes by placement of their mouth over the proper airways, usually made up of discrete holes in the front of the instrument. Each hole communicates with one, two or a few reeds. Because a reed mounted above a slot is made to vibrate more easily by air from above, reeds accessed by a mouthpiece hole often may be selected further by choice of breath direction (blowing, drawing). Some harmonicas (primarily chromatic harmonicas) also include a spring-loaded button-actuated slide that, when depressed, redirects the airflow.

The harmonica is commonly used in blues and folk music, but also in jazz, classical music, country music, rock and roll and pop music. Increasingly, the harmonica is finding its place in more electronically generated music, such as dance and hip-hop, as well as funk and acid jazz. Harmonica seems to be an instrument that crosses ethnic, musical, and cultural divides in a manner that is not as well duplicated by many other instruments.

Parts of the harmonica

The basic parts of the harmonica are the comb, reed-plates and cover-plates. The comb is the term for the main body of the instrument. These are traditionally made of wood, but plastic (ABS) and metal combs are perhaps more common today. The comb contains the air chambers which cover the reeds - the name comb comes from the fact that in simple harmonicas it does indeed resemble a hair-comb. In some designs, however, the comb is in fact very complex in arranging how the air is directed, particularly in more modern and experimental designs.

There is much debate about whether comb-material has an effect on the tone of the harmonica or not. While this has traditionally been the assumption, several recent attempts at blind testing have not been able to show that people can hear a difference when comb material is the only variable, and the main advantage one comb material truly have over another one is usually its durability. In particular, a wooden comb can absorb moisture from the player's breath and contact with the tongue, causing the comb to expand slightly. This can become uncomfortable to play. Conversely, some players used to deliberately soak their wooden-combed hamonicas to cause a slight expansion which was intended to make the seal between the comb, reed plates and covers more airtight.

Read more at Wikipedia.org