Many Blues and Jazz enthusiasts unknowingly are drawn to the Dorian Mode - an arrangement of notes caught between the Major and Minor worlds (think Nat Adderly's Work Song).
For diatonic harmonica players who favor 2nd position (cross harp) this means the notes you play on a C Major Harmonica will match the band playing in G Dorian, as shown below:
Ten Second Music Theory Lesson
By definition a Dorian scale is constructed of notes which include a flatted (lowered by one half step) 3rd and 7th relative to the major scale. This means that counting from left to right (not to be confused with the harmonica hole numbers) the third (B) and the seventh (F#) notes will be lowered:
1st G 2nd A 3rd B (to B-flat) 4th C 5th D 6th E 7th F# (to F) Octave G
Relative to a C Major harmonica, many players find it difficult to bend down the third hole draw to a clean B-flat, sounding out of tune with the rest of the band. The F is easier to achieve on the 2 draw whole step bend, and already exists on the 5 draw without bending!
But Why Not Play Minor Tuned Harmonicas for Dorian Songs?
By definition a minor scale lowers the 3rd (B to B-flat), 6th (E to E-flat) and 7th (F-sharp to F-natural). When playing a Dorian song, however, the player needs to avoid the lowered 6th (holes 2+, 5+ and 8+) or else the song will sound too minor-ish. The solution could be to bend down a step and a half on draw hole 2 and/or bend down one half step on hole 5 to play E. Some players, however, find this a little clumsy.
The Easy Solution is to Build a Dorian Tuned Harmonica!
The Lee Oskar harmonica system provides all the materials you will need:
- Refer to past issues for the proper tool kits. Pull aside the small Phillips tip screwdriver.
- Referring to the cross over chart below, select the desired Band Key you would like to play along with. For this example, I will select Gm/Dorian.
- Remove the cover plates and reed plate screws from your Lee Oskar Gm Natural Minor harmonica.
- Carefully remove the top (blow) reed plate from the comb and set it aside, keeping the bottom (draw) reed plate intact. This is a good opportunity to adjust the reed curl and offset, and maybe even apply the Micropore tape technique. Refer to past issues of Monster Harmonica Workshop for a refresher course.
- Option one: purchase C Major Diatonic replacement reeds and install the top (blow) reed plate onto the Gm Natural Minor harmonica. Set the unused draw reeds aside. Replace and the reed plate screws and carefully apply even clockwise torque until the screws "bottoms" out - otherwise you will have a bad seal between the reed plates and comb. Be careful not to over tighten as this could strip the threads and/or bow the reeds and cause air leakage, the enemy of a good playing harmonica.
- Option two: similar to option one, except you use a Lee Oskar C Major Diatonic harmonica as a donor. This means you are sacrificing the entire harmonica for it's top (blow) reed plate only.
- Reattach cover plates, insert harmonica into your mouth, then go have some fun!
Examples
Here are some examples that work exceptionally well with this Dorian tuning.
G Blues Scale
"Work Song" type lick
Here's a line that would work well with "Green Onions" or "Help Me."
In upcoming issues, be on the lookout for my first impressions of the new Hohner Marine Band Deluxe 2005, which I sampled at the recent NAMM show in Anaheim, California.
Kinya Pollard,
The Harpsmith
