Looking for fiddle harp duets
My daughter is learning to play violin, and so I thought it would be fun if we could learn some songs to play together. I'm wondering if anyone can point me toward some songs/sheet music that we could play. The songs would have to be very simple, since we are both beginners (albei, her violin skill level is well beyond my harmonica skill level). Any ideas would be appreciated. Holiday tunes would be extra fun.
Hello Dorothy, your explanation helps a lot. I have a Special 20 in C, so I'll be printing out the sheet music you referenced and give it a go. Thank you!
Some follow up questions:
1. Is it David's lesson on accompaniment to correct one to start working on for playing the baseline?
2. My understanding is that on the Cmajor harmonica, I can play the chords Cmaj, Gmaj, and Gmaj7th. It seems to me that I can also play a partial F chord by drawing on 5/6 and 9/10. Is there any other way to "hack" the harmonica to get more chords out of it? I ask this because I see one of the songs has an F major chord in it, and also just in general trying to better understand my harp.
Thank you!
I'm an old hat at the violin and a new hat at the harmonica but I'll do my best to give you my ideas on what I would do if I were trying to accompany myself at a young age. I used to take my violin house to house carolling with a little group when young and it was so much fun!
I've been watching all the videos to get an overview of the blues harmonica and really glad because this part of the course shows you how to play baselines without first having to understand all the theory:
https://www.bluesharmonica.com/lessons/accompaniment_study_7
That will show you how to break up chords into notes to make a baseline but you don't even need to do that. If you are brand new you can play very simple rhythms of the entire chords to back up your daughter.
When you are playing a C harmonica you can play in the key of C, but the instructions here on the site are going to make it much easier at the beginning to ploay things in the key of G and that should be very easy for your daughter. The key of G is cross harp or starting in second position (the draw of the second hole on your C harmonica).
The G, C and D chords come easily playing on the C harmonica and all the lessons here are geared to do that, just different chords because David has everything on the A harp which plays in the key of E in second position. You are actually lucky that you have a C harmonica because the Key of E has 4 sharps in it and your daughter might not be up to that yet.
I would play the easy Christmas songs transposed into the key of G. Most websites will let you do that these days. Many sites will have music that you request for different instruments! You can print out yours in the key of G for say the guitar or ukulele and it will tell you the chords - and for the violin or flute in the key of G and they will give you the notes written out in that key for your daughter. Your daughter will have no problem with that key and that would be the best key for the harmonica you have to play the chords to back her up as far as I can figure out that is. :)
To play the G chord all you have to do is play a draw starting at the second hole. For the C it's a blow from the first hole and a D is a draw from the first hole. Easy Peasy! There is an F sharp in the key of G so playing the melody is not going to work for YOU, but with a violin it will be easy and you playing backup to your daughter I think is going to be the nicest anyway.
Any other chords your might have troubloe with you can just play a G and it will be ok since that will be the root.
When something is a major 7th it's just adding in yet another note. If that is too confusing, you can just play the major. If it has just a 7 after the name of the note that means that that note is lower and "bluesy" - so not likely in Christmas songs but is everywhere in the Blues. Christmas songs are all going to be in a major key and not with bluesy notes so you using the bottom part of your harmonica to give her some rhythm and harmony should work out nicely.
If you need help finding a website that will let you transpose and has both parts for violin (which is the same as flute or women's voices or anything else that takes notes written on the G clef) let me know and I'll search for you. You don't want anything with notes that are below the clef with more than two extra lines (that's a low G and as low as a violin can go) or anything with more than 2 extra little lines on the high side since to reach higher your daughter would need to know how shift and she might not know how to do that yet.
This will be such a nice project for the two of you! I hope that was helpful. Please don't hesitate to ask if anything was unclear or if other questions come up and I'll do my best.
Best of luck to you both!
BTW, if I gave any bad harmonica advice (I am a newbie to harmonica) please others with more experience correct me and give Matt advice.
He can depend on what I say on the violin advice though. :D
I think I might have found something really great for you Matt. Here are very easy violin Christmas duets! That means both you and your daughter can play these together with you playing the single notes of your C harmonica and it will be in harmony.
https://www.8notes.com/violin_duet/christmas/sheet_music/
You can transpose any of those songs to the key of C at that website.
The C major chord, C E G can be found in the blow notes throughout the range of the harmonica:
C E G C E G C E G C
The G major chord, G B D, can be found in full in the first four holes: D G B D.
Above hole four you can make it a seventh chord (NOT a Major seventh, just a plain old 7th) by adding Draw 5 (F), and even a ninth by adding the ninth (A) in Draw 6. Draw 7 up is B D (part of the basi G chord) then F and A again.
The D minor chord is not available in the first three holes. It starts in Draw 4:
D F A
You can add the sixth to create a minor 6th chord, with B in Draw 7. Draw 8-10 are D F A again, more D minor.
Yes, you can create a partial F Major chord with Draw 5 and 6 (F and A) and again in Draw 9 and 10. If you he good bendin ontrol, you cn create them in the first octave by bending Daw 2 and 3 down to F and A respectively (these notes are also part of the D minor chord).
You can add Draw D to this chord to make it an F major 6 chord, but for the fifth of the chord (C), one of the foundational notes of the F chord, you need Blow 1, 4, 7, or 10.
I was thinking that Winslow but the DFA up at the 4 draw is actually going to need an F sharp in the key of G and seems like a kind of a leap for chugging for a newbie and it seems to me that Matt is as much of a beginner as I am so seemed kind of complicated for him? I know I couldn't do it.
I was trying to come up with a way for him to do some easy chugging in the lower register. I know that the D chord would actually be more like only a D and G on the first two holes but thought it would be easier and when I play the lower holes in the key of G while playing my violin, it all seems to fit ok together. David teaches a jug like that in the very first lessons.
Maybe just some C blows and G draw chords only for the key of C would work out better?
I'm really curious to know what you would suggest to do in a situation like this with newbies.
Dorothy,
Thank you so much for all the delightful information. You really helped to clarify things for me. I am looking forward to having fun making music with my daughter!
Warm regards,
Matt
Fiddle is going to be quite different than the violin. If your daughter is just starting out on the violin I would suggest finding easy sheet music that has guitar chords and not try for anything fiddle style that would usually mean some double stops (harder). That way your daughter can read the music and you can play backing chords for her. David teaches us how to do that early on in the course. Maybe you could play the baseline for her that David shows how to do later in the course, but is not difficult.
This is the kind of thing that might work for you, if you have a harmonica that you can use to play in the key of C
http://easymusic.altervista.org/violin-christmas-song-the-first-noel-sheet-music-guitar-chords/
Many websites will now transpose music into different keys so if you only have one or two harmonicas you can transpose the music into a key that will work for your harmonica, but your daughter will have to have some experience playing in different keys. If she is brand new to the violin you will want to stick to C, D or G for her. Hopefully one of those will work for you.
Hope you two have fun!