Thinking a lot of how to find my way in the minor keys playing the bluesharp. Consider blues and jazz I got two very different favorite styles:
1. Root bluesharp like from Sonny Terry, to Jimmy Reed, Big Walther Horton, Little Walther, but also Slim Harpo and Paul Butterfield. Thats it. I use to play in crossharp, dorian, 2nd position - basic the same scale, different name. Plane folk-melodies even in first position or chromatic harps. The old bluesguys often played in major keys, but with blues-scales. 40 - 50 years ago it became more usual to use minor scales and gears, pedals, cool microphones. I can listen to a couple of tunes in Ragtime, funk, swing and soul. After a couple of songs I use to be bored. Like when I listen to the great Toots Thielemann. I like and enjoy for ten minutes then its too clean for me. I never liked big band swing like most of Duke Ellington, Tommy Dorsey. Oscar Peterson and Earl Hines orchestra felt more alive and dynamic. I dont like when musicians feels like slaves mastered by a conducter. Thats the same for me in classic music. I like the old guys from Palestrina to Mozart, Bach, Händel. Then comes Bethoven and several great ones in his generation. The last hundred years it has to be guys like Stravinsky, Prokofjev, Bartok, and Schönberg (12 notes scale) I also like opera a lot, the drama. I hate when people tries to be opportunistic, flirting with fashion and like putting Turandot in some thin modern envirorment, you only can laugh at ten years later.
2) So what do I love in jazz? I love whats left of great blues in jazz and even more I love Bebop. My outstanding favorite is John Coltrane (he even made Ellington to sound great ) and his generation with Miles Davies, Bird Charlie Parker, Tony Scott and more. No matter orchestra and style the jazz and bluessingers, Bessie Smith, Billie Holiday, Ella, Odetta, Nina Simone...
So when I play I love to practice root bluesharp or I prefure to play clarinete or saxophone in bebop mode inspired by Coltrane, sometime Tony Scott or in older style by Sidney Bechet.
I have a great respect for all music styles and musicians. What I wrote above is just my taste, my cup of favorite tea, my blend...
In rock there are a lot of great music and musicians. I most like those who has deep roots in the blues. But when I met Jimi Hendrix he had the same genius like Coltrane and Davies, crossing all earlier limits.
Back to my bluesharp. Now I want to get a better way to play minor scales. I have tried 4th position, the aeolian mode and thats ok but I am not pleased. In harp you have 20 notes in 7 centimeters and then to bend them to get a bluesy feeling. You cant look at the instrument, like look at the strings, fretboard, or keyboard. You really have to get it automatic into your brain. Feel the instrument with your lips and tounge. You have a couple of doussin instruments. My aim now is to play all minor keys in Pentatonic minor mode (scale) and make that sound bluesy. That means I got to reduse the seven note scale into five notes and make my brain understand that. Good luck Brain. My goal is to have this ready in 8 - 10 month if I train every day.
I start with A-minor and skips crossharp when I play minor keys. So its back to a harp tuned in C-major. Starting the scale on hole nr 3 root note A, with a blow, then to blow nr 4 the C-note. then a draw in nr 4 to the bluesy devils note D. Then move to blow nr 5 an E-note and finish on nr 6 and blow the G note.
In crossharp you are mostly playing with draws. Now 4 of 5 notes you blow so there is a lot of work to make that sound like blues.
I start with A-minor on an instrument tuned in the parallell key C -major.
Then I use instruments tuned in other major keys to the parallell minor key. Like a harp tuned in G-major I can play in the same way in E-minor and so on (same positions of the holes with blow on 3,4,5,6 and a draw on 4 in the middle mot..
Until this on a basic level, is OK, I will only play rythm, triads and single notes when Im rehearsing. No solos. In all major keys I will play crossharp, dorian, 2nd position and do as much solos and licks I can get.