How to Change Music Notes into Harmonica Tabs
Harmonica tablature is a system of music notation that uses a graph to tell harmonica players how to play a song on the harmonica without reading standard music notation. Many harmonica players, even if they can read traditional music notation, prefer to use harmonica tablature. Others simply cannot read traditional music notation and rely solely on harmonica tablature to show them how songs are played. Regardless of your skills reading standard music notation, learning how to notate songs with harmonica tablature can help you interact more efficiently with other harmonica players.
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Instructions
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Transcribe a piece of music for harmonica by focusing on the melody, which is the part of the song a harmonica player will emphasize. If you want to include chords, you can write in chord names above the harmonica tablature graph, but you must notate the melody of the song. In a majority of songs, the melody line will be the vocal line of a song, which is the most recognizable part of the song.
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Turn a piece of blank paper on its side and draw a vertical line across the paper. Draw as many of these lines as you will need to transcribe the song you're working on. You will probably have no need for more than four or five lines, unless the song you're transcribing changes melodies frequently. For parts that repeat, you will be able to use a repeat sign rather than notating the part again.
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Draw a short vertical line attached to the beginning and end of your horizontal line. Write the letter "B" before the first vertical line and above the horizontal line. This indicates where you will place the notes you blow on the harmonica. Write the letter "D" before the first vertical line and below the horizontal line. This indicates where you will place the notes you draw (suck in) on the harmonica.
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Identify the melody line of the song you want to convert to harmonica tabs and do the conversion one measure of music at a time. Use a vertical line to separate the music measures on the harmonica tab in the same way they are separated on the sheet music you're transcribing.
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Place the notes from the sheet music above or below the line on the graph, as appropriate for the song. If the note you want to transcribe is a C, for instance, place a number 1 in the first measure of your harmonica tablature graph above the line, indicating the note is to be played as a blow note on the first hole. A typical harmonica has 10 blow notes and 10 draw notes, so each note you convert from the sheet music will have a number indicating the hole and will be placed above or below the horizontal line to indicate blow or draw.
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Draw a line after notes that are held out. For example, if you have a whole note on your traditional sheet music, convert that to harmonica tab by writing the harmonica tab down, then drawing a line extending for the rest of the measure. This tells the player to hold the note for four beats. For half notes, draw a line after the note that extends for half the measure. There is no need to draw lines indicating quarter notes or eighth notes. Separate measures on the harmonica tab with short vertical lines, the measures even with the traditional sheet.
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- Photo Credit harmonica image by Claudio Calcagno from Fotolia.com
