Bushman Music Works

The old saying, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” definitely applies to harmonica care.  The best way to clean a harmonica it is to prevent it from getting dirty in the first place!  Don’t play with a dirty mouth.  Before playing, brush your teeth, and make sure there are no food particles in your mouth.  Whiskers and rogue food particles have killed more harmonicas than anything else!  Don’t put ’em up wet.  Tap out saliva and debris by wrapping your harmonica on the heel of your hand, or on the top of your thigh, and leaving it out to dry before putting it back in its case.  Do not take a harmonica apart unless there’s a problem.  Period.  The old saying that applies here is, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”. 

Exploring how a harmonica works, and learning to tune and adjust it are great ambitions, but know this, reeds are fragile, and the skills required to tune and actually improve the playability of the instrument are learned with lots of time and effort.  Repairing and tuning harmonicas are tasks best left to the pros, and to people who are probably willing to work for lots less per hour than you!  Think about it, our beloved and popular Delta Frost harmonica cost’s $29.99.  Are you better served spending an hour or two putting retuning it, or just buying a new harmonica?  If you research how to clean a harmonica, you’ll read about using  cotton balls – DON’T DO THAT – cotton fibers can stop reed vibration.  People recommend running water through a harmonica,,,eye, yi, yi,  NO!  Water pressure carves canyons out of rock, and can certainly damage reeds!  Normal wind pressure from your mouth is about all reeds can handle.  Water pressure can change the gapping, and thus, the playability of a harmonica.  It also leaves behind excess moisture which is another harmonica reed killer.  

If you have a sticking reed, just unscrew the cover plates, and look for the reed in question – the blow reeds are on the top reed plate and are attached internally making them a little harder to get to, and the draw reeds are on the bottom reed plate, and are attached externally making them easy to get to.  Once you’ve determined the reed with a problem, look for any food or debris that might be hampering its movement.  Make sure the reed is dead center in its slot – if it’s bumping one side or the other, that will stop it from vibrating.  Using the flat side of an Exacto knife or some comparable tool, simply push the reed back to the center of the slot, if necessary.  Make sure its gap – which is the distance from the free end tip of the reed to the plate – is not significantly more or less than the reed next to it.  Too small or big of a gap will keep a reed from responding properly.  You can adjust the gap up or down if it needs it.  Again, don’t attempt to make any of these adjustments unless it’s absolutely necessary.