In terms of range, trumpet, flute, clarinet, and soprano sax all match the range of mid-range harmonicas. (Guitar, too, come to think of it.)
That said, the kinds of note sequences that fall easily under the fingers on those instruments can be devilishly hard on harmonica - or not. So there's no easy answer.
Still, listening to other instruments can get you away from the stereotypical lines and phrases that harmonica players tend to fal into , partly because of what lies easily on the insturment, but also just because of the monkey-see, monkey-do aproach that so many players take to learning the instrument, copying what other players do without trying to think outside that particular box.
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition
Blues Harmonica For Dummies
Learn from the best at the Harmonica Collective
by winslowyerxa 2019-11-17
My two books, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition and Blues Harmonica For Dummies, both get high marks from reviewers/readers. Both are available on Amazon. While the blues book comes with an audio CD, HFD, Second Edition comes with online audio, video, and animation.
by winslowyerxa 2019-07-21
When you bend a note, you tune your mouth to that note and persuade the harmonica reeds to go along and alter their pitch. You can do this while breathing normally. It's not a matter of overwhelming the reed with a temporary jolt of force, which might bend the note momentarily but without any sustain.
But even if you are breathing normally, the bend may be elusive. Every bent note has a sweet spot, where the placement of your tongue along the roof of your mouth will give you a place to stay and sustain that bend - the roof of your mouth is sort of like the neck of a fretless guitar that's being played in the dark - you have no visual cues, and nothing like frets to guide your sense of touch. You develop muscle memory as you learn the bends, though, and it's a matter of trial and error.
My book Harmonica For Dummies walks you through learning four stages of bending - you are currently at Stage 1.
Before tabbing, try to figure out what key of harmonica is being used. Without that information, you can't write tab - which describes which hole and breath direction (and bend if applicable) is being use to play the note.
(The alternative would be to figure out the actual pitch of the note (is it a G? an E, etc.), write that down, and then try to to transfer it to a specific key of harmonica. This exercise is great for developing your ear and your musical knowledge, but is a lot more work.)
Once you have this information, you can start transcribing.
Pour the audio file into an audio editor (such as Aaudacity, which is free and runs on all types of computers). This lets you do two things needed to transcribe music:
Take it a phrase at a time, or even just one or two notes. Audacity (or whatever editor you choose) lets you stop and start at precise points in the audio, which makes the job much easier.
You can select a portion of the audio and slow it down without changing the pitch, when you need to figure out things that are going by too fast for your ears to catch.
Test everything to ensure accuracy by sounding it out, either on a harmonica or, if you're transcribing the pitches, on a keyboard or other instrument.
Note the time in the audio file for each phrase of the music so you can go back to check or edit when needed.
Tab doesn't give timing or rhythm information, and this can be important. Count beats and figure out where the strong "1" beat occurs. Make some kind of mark to indicate this in your transcription.
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition
Blues Harmonica For Dummies
by winslowyerxa 2019-07-21
My book Harmonica For Dummies starts from the very beginning and progresses through advanced intermediate level.
People are sometimes surprised that there's actually 300-plus pages worth of information about the harmonica. Bu the fact is, I had to figure out what to leave out!
Still, it can be a bit overwhelming to see all that stuff. And Dummies books are actually designed to be reference books, which kind of puts them at odds with learning a skill progressively.
Picking up on the "by ear" subject. I'd suggest that you go to Chapter 5, and start working on the exercises that begin that chapter, then start working on some of the songs that come later in the chapter. The exercises prepare you for the songs, and the songs progress in difficulty and in the skills added as you go.
But how does that relate to playing by ear?
Let's compare playing by ear to singing by ear. When you know a melody well enough to hum it, the translation to singing it is seamless. There are no buttons to push, no strings to pluck, no right and wrong frets or piano keys to press on, no fingers.
But when you pick up an instrument, all those concrete physical actions come into play. A musical instrument is an external object, not part of your body. So you have to learn all those actions, and the sequences of actions that make notes, and sequences of notes (that is, melodies) come out of the instrument.
But as your mind and muscles learn to make notes come out of the instrument, your ear learns which notes are where. Even if you don't learn the note names, you still learn the relationships between the notes. And you start to develop a connection between actions and the resulting sounds. That's where you ability to begin playing by ear starts to develop.
Playing exercises gets you familiar with both the action sequences that get notes and sequences of notes to come out and which notes are where. Then you have a certain familiarity with the territory and the actions, and melodies get a bit easier to play. Meanwhile, your ear is mapping out all the results.
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
You can bend with a tongue block just fine. It takes a bit of practice to learn, but once you get the hang of it, it's completely natural.
Tongue blocking has so many cool techniques and effects that you can't get any other way that it's worth learning how to bend with a tongue block.
Great players vary a lot. Pretty much all of them use a tongue tongue block at least part of the time. Some tongue block all the time. Almost none don't tongue block at all.
My own history started with being puzzled by the advice on the slip of paper that came with my first harmonica, that showed putting three holes in your mouth and then using you tongue to block out two of them. I found I could just get a single note by puckering my lips. And pretty soon I could bend notes as well.
But then I started to notice all the cool things that great players were doing with a tongue block. So I learned to incorporate it. But I could still only bend with a pucker and sometimes I would have to switch back and forth real fast to incorporate a bent note into a line that was mostly tongue blocked. You'd see the harp bobbing in and out of my lips as I switched back and forth - way in for the tongue-blocked splits, then back out for the single note bend.
Eventually I got curious about bending with a tongue block and decided to figure it out. At first it seemed hard and awkward, but after awhile I got the hang of it and didn't ned to make a lot of awkward switches just to bend notes.
So, over the course of a long time, I went from being 90 percent pucker to 90 percent tongue block.
Don't give up. Tongue blocking has too much to offer and it's already your embouchure of choice.
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
The tone quality of bent notes is different from unbent notes.
However, a bent note can be just as full in tone as an unbent note.
When you bend by forcing he reed to change pitch, you'll get that strangled, thin sound.
However, if you tune your mouth to the desired bent note, you can persuade the reeds (both the blow reed and the draw reed sound the bent note) to sound the bent note with full tone.
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
Is it worth playing? I'd ask you the same questions that I ask my new students:
What inspires you to play the harmonica?
What would like to do that you can’t do now?
What experiences do you bring to playing the harmonica and to making music?
The second and third questions are important because you're asking how easy it is.
It's easy to get sounds out of – just put it in your mouth and breathe.
You can find melodies more or less intuitively by just sort of noodling around in the middle four holes, breathing both in and out.
If you want to get really good at it, t's no easier or harder than any other musical instrument.
One big advantage of the harmonica is that you can take it anywhere and take advantage of micro-opportunities to play a little and even do short bursts of concentrated practice.
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
I disagree with the animations at harmonicaclub.com.
Actual medical imaging of note bending shows the tongue RISING at the place where you'd make the "K" sound to constrict the airflow.
The idea that you lower the tongue to bend is a widespread misconception.
When you constrict the airflow by humping up the K-spot, you create a tuned chamber between the K-spot and the front of your mouth. You can change the size (and tuning) of the chamber by sliding the K-spot forward and backward along the roof of your mouth, and by raising or lowering the front part of your tongue.
When you don't tongue block, you have more front-to-back range of motion with the K-spot.
When you do tongue block, you have less front-to-back range of motion (though you do have some). But you can use the raising and lowering motion to help tune the chamber.
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
My book Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition, has helped a lot of players begin and also deepen their skills as they progress. It's written in clear language, making no assumptions about what you already know.
The book has audio and video content, which you can check out for free at http://www.dummies.com/book-extras/harmonica-dummies-2nd-edition-resource-center/
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
The Manji low harps are very good, and much less expensive than the Thunderbirds, which run in the $120 range.
The 365, no longer made, came in two versions:
Original 365, which was made for the life of the model, was simply a Low C with an extra four holes at the top end, or a regular G with the same setup.
The SBS (Steve Baker Special), which came out in the 1990s, was a 365 with the first three holes in low tuning, and the next 10 in regular tuning, with an extra hole at the top. It came in Low+Regular C, D, and F, and in Regular+High G and A.
Since the 365 went away (both versions), Brendan Power has come out with the Lucky 13 - a 13-hole harp using the same idea as the SBS, but with 13 holes instead of 14 with the useless 14th hole, and with all keys in Low+Regular tuning (regular+high was a poor implementation).
The Low Eb is a cool-sounding key. But you have to get used to low harps. They take a bit more air, aren't as loud as, say, an A or Bb harp, and the low holes can be challenging to bend because the pitch is so low and the reeds carry a lot of weight to make them sound such a low pitch.
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
Beginner books generally won't focus on composing, which is a more advanced subject. A beginner needs to learn which way the holes need to face, how to breathe through the instrument and get from note to note.
Harmonica For Dummies does all that and much more. It does get into the area of improvisation some, as this is an integral part of playing blues, rock and even country. You can check out the table of contents at Amazon.com to get an idea of what it covers.
====
Winslow Yerxa - available for lessons in person or online
Bends in Draw 2 and especially Draw 3 can be challenging, as they bend farther than 1, 4, 5, or 6 (and yes, 5 does bend slightly, but very effectively).
It's not unusual to get the shallow bends in 2 and 3 at first, and struggle to get them deeper.
Check out some of the bending advice on the audio and video tracks for Chapter 8 of my book Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition:
Also, pay attention to what you're doing to get the bends.
You won't get far using your lips, which some players stumble on. It works a little but not very well.
Lowering your tongue, like using your lips, has limited effectiveness.
Constricting your throat, likewise, does a little but not enough.
Raising your tongue, as if you're making the sound of "Khhhhhhh" is the most effective way of initiating, sustaining, and controlling bends. By narrowing the airflow at that point you can tune your oral cavity to the note you want. Moving that K-spot forward raises the pitch, which sliding it back lowers it. Every bent note has a sweet spot along that continuum.
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
By the way, Steve Baker's the Harp Handbook, while not an instruction book per se, is a wonderful addition to the library and knowledge of any harmonica player.
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
The embouchure you're using is known as U-blocking. It's employed by a minority of players, but has been used by some very good and famous ones.
Two points of general advice:
Relax and get rid of tension and pressure. Isolating a single note is a matter of shaping and placement, not pressure.
Free airflow is essential for good reed response and sound. Nothing should impede that open airflow - tongue, lips, throat - all should be open to allow air to move freely and easily.
The two majority embouchures are:
Puckering (using only the lips to isolate a note) also called lipping and lip blocking.
Tongue blocking, where you have several holes in your mouth and use your tongue to block out the holes either to the left or the right, in order to isolate one hole in either the right (the default) or the left corner of your mouth. The tongue is not curled around a hole, differentiating it from U-blocking.
The harmonica was actually designed for tongue blocking and many excellent effects and techniques rely on it. That aid, many great players are pucker players.
You can get some insight on both puckering and tongue blocking in the videos for CHAPTER 5: I HEAR A MELODY: PLAYING SINGLE NOTES LIST 2 of my book Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition here:
In terms of range, trumpet, flute, clarinet, and soprano sax all match the range of mid-range harmonicas. (Guitar, too, come to think of it.)
That said, the kinds of note sequences that fall easily under the fingers on those instruments can be devilishly hard on harmonica - or not. So there's no easy answer.
Still, listening to other instruments can get you away from the stereotypical lines and phrases that harmonica players tend to fal into , partly because of what lies easily on the insturment, but also just because of the monkey-see, monkey-do aproach that so many players take to learning the instrument, copying what other players do without trying to think outside that particular box.
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition
Blues Harmonica For Dummies
Learn from the best at the Harmonica Collective
My two books, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition and Blues Harmonica For Dummies, both get high marks from reviewers/readers. Both are available on Amazon. While the blues book comes with an audio CD, HFD, Second Edition comes with online audio, video, and animation.
When you bend a note, you tune your mouth to that note and persuade the harmonica reeds to go along and alter their pitch. You can do this while breathing normally. It's not a matter of overwhelming the reed with a temporary jolt of force, which might bend the note momentarily but without any sustain.
But even if you are breathing normally, the bend may be elusive. Every bent note has a sweet spot, where the placement of your tongue along the roof of your mouth will give you a place to stay and sustain that bend - the roof of your mouth is sort of like the neck of a fretless guitar that's being played in the dark - you have no visual cues, and nothing like frets to guide your sense of touch. You develop muscle memory as you learn the bends, though, and it's a matter of trial and error.
My book Harmonica For Dummies walks you through learning four stages of bending - you are currently at Stage 1.
https://www.amazon.com/Harmonica-Dummies-Winslow-Yerxa/dp/1118880765/ref=sr_1_fkmrnull_1_sspa?crid=1FIJB9HG8TDP2&keywords=harmonica+for+dummies%2C+2nd+edition&qid=1551637178&s=gateway&sprefix=harmonica+for+dummies%2Caps%2C200&sr=8-1-fkmrnull-spons&psc=1
I also cover some of the same material in the free videos for Chapter 8:
https://www.dummies.com/book-extras/harmonica-dummies-2nd-edition-resource-center/#ch8
Before tabbing, try to figure out what key of harmonica is being used. Without that information, you can't write tab - which describes which hole and breath direction (and bend if applicable) is being use to play the note.
(The alternative would be to figure out the actual pitch of the note (is it a G? an E, etc.), write that down, and then try to to transfer it to a specific key of harmonica. This exercise is great for developing your ear and your musical knowledge, but is a lot more work.)
Once you have this information, you can start transcribing.
Pour the audio file into an audio editor (such as Aaudacity, which is free and runs on all types of computers). This lets you do two things needed to transcribe music:
Test everything to ensure accuracy by sounding it out, either on a harmonica or, if you're transcribing the pitches, on a keyboard or other instrument.
Note the time in the audio file for each phrase of the music so you can go back to check or edit when needed.
Tab doesn't give timing or rhythm information, and this can be important. Count beats and figure out where the strong "1" beat occurs. Make some kind of mark to indicate this in your transcription.
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition
Blues Harmonica For Dummies
My book Harmonica For Dummies starts from the very beginning and progresses through advanced intermediate level.
https://www.amazon.com/Harmonica-Dummies-Winslow-Yerxa/dp/1118880765/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_product_top?ie=UTF8
And there is video and animation along with audio files, available for free, with no filler or fluff at:
https://www.dummies.com/book-extras/harmonica-dummies-2nd-edition-resource-center/
Thanks so much for the recommendation (and the resulting purchase)!
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition
Blues Harmonica For Dummies
Harmonica For Dummies author here.
People are sometimes surprised that there's actually 300-plus pages worth of information about the harmonica. Bu the fact is, I had to figure out what to leave out!
Still, it can be a bit overwhelming to see all that stuff. And Dummies books are actually designed to be reference books, which kind of puts them at odds with learning a skill progressively.
Picking up on the "by ear" subject. I'd suggest that you go to Chapter 5, and start working on the exercises that begin that chapter, then start working on some of the songs that come later in the chapter. The exercises prepare you for the songs, and the songs progress in difficulty and in the skills added as you go.
But how does that relate to playing by ear?
Let's compare playing by ear to singing by ear. When you know a melody well enough to hum it, the translation to singing it is seamless. There are no buttons to push, no strings to pluck, no right and wrong frets or piano keys to press on, no fingers.
But when you pick up an instrument, all those concrete physical actions come into play. A musical instrument is an external object, not part of your body. So you have to learn all those actions, and the sequences of actions that make notes, and sequences of notes (that is, melodies) come out of the instrument.
But as your mind and muscles learn to make notes come out of the instrument, your ear learns which notes are where. Even if you don't learn the note names, you still learn the relationships between the notes. And you start to develop a connection between actions and the resulting sounds. That's where you ability to begin playing by ear starts to develop.
Playing exercises gets you familiar with both the action sequences that get notes and sequences of notes to come out and which notes are where. Then you have a certain familiarity with the territory and the actions, and melodies get a bit easier to play. Meanwhile, your ear is mapping out all the results.
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition
Blues Harmonica For Dummies
You can bend with a tongue block just fine. It takes a bit of practice to learn, but once you get the hang of it, it's completely natural.
Tongue blocking has so many cool techniques and effects that you can't get any other way that it's worth learning how to bend with a tongue block.
Great players vary a lot. Pretty much all of them use a tongue tongue block at least part of the time. Some tongue block all the time. Almost none don't tongue block at all.
My own history started with being puzzled by the advice on the slip of paper that came with my first harmonica, that showed putting three holes in your mouth and then using you tongue to block out two of them. I found I could just get a single note by puckering my lips. And pretty soon I could bend notes as well.
But then I started to notice all the cool things that great players were doing with a tongue block. So I learned to incorporate it. But I could still only bend with a pucker and sometimes I would have to switch back and forth real fast to incorporate a bent note into a line that was mostly tongue blocked. You'd see the harp bobbing in and out of my lips as I switched back and forth - way in for the tongue-blocked splits, then back out for the single note bend.
Eventually I got curious about bending with a tongue block and decided to figure it out. At first it seemed hard and awkward, but after awhile I got the hang of it and didn't ned to make a lot of awkward switches just to bend notes.
So, over the course of a long time, I went from being 90 percent pucker to 90 percent tongue block.
Don't give up. Tongue blocking has too much to offer and it's already your embouchure of choice.
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition
Blues Harmonica For Dummies
The tone quality of bent notes is different from unbent notes.
However, a bent note can be just as full in tone as an unbent note.
When you bend by forcing he reed to change pitch, you'll get that strangled, thin sound.
However, if you tune your mouth to the desired bent note, you can persuade the reeds (both the blow reed and the draw reed sound the bent note) to sound the bent note with full tone.
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition
Blues Harmonica For Dummies
​
Is it worth playing? I'd ask you the same questions that I ask my new students:
The second and third questions are important because you're asking how easy it is.
One big advantage of the harmonica is that you can take it anywhere and take advantage of micro-opportunities to play a little and even do short bursts of concentrated practice.
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition
Blues Harmonica For Dummies
Check out these free videos from my book Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition.
Videos 0301 through 0304 (choose them from the menu on the right side of the Chapter 3 window)
Videos 0501 and 0502 (choose from the menu for Chapter 5, List 2)
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition
Blues Harmonica For Dummies
I disagree with the animations at harmonicaclub.com.
Actual medical imaging of note bending shows the tongue RISING at the place where you'd make the "K" sound to constrict the airflow.
The idea that you lower the tongue to bend is a widespread misconception.
When you constrict the airflow by humping up the K-spot, you create a tuned chamber between the K-spot and the front of your mouth. You can change the size (and tuning) of the chamber by sliding the K-spot forward and backward along the roof of your mouth, and by raising or lowering the front part of your tongue.
When you don't tongue block, you have more front-to-back range of motion with the K-spot.
When you do tongue block, you have less front-to-back range of motion (though you do have some). But you can use the raising and lowering motion to help tune the chamber.
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition
Blues Harmonica For Dummies
My book Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition, has helped a lot of players begin and also deepen their skills as they progress. It's written in clear language, making no assumptions about what you already know.
The book has audio and video content, which you can check out for free at http://www.dummies.com/book-extras/harmonica-dummies-2nd-edition-resource-center/
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition
Blues Harmonica For Dummies
The Manji low harps are very good, and much less expensive than the Thunderbirds, which run in the $120 range.
The 365, no longer made, came in two versions:
Original 365, which was made for the life of the model, was simply a Low C with an extra four holes at the top end, or a regular G with the same setup.
The SBS (Steve Baker Special), which came out in the 1990s, was a 365 with the first three holes in low tuning, and the next 10 in regular tuning, with an extra hole at the top. It came in Low+Regular C, D, and F, and in Regular+High G and A.
Since the 365 went away (both versions), Brendan Power has come out with the Lucky 13 - a 13-hole harp using the same idea as the SBS, but with 13 holes instead of 14 with the useless 14th hole, and with all keys in Low+Regular tuning (regular+high was a poor implementation).
The Low Eb is a cool-sounding key. But you have to get used to low harps. They take a bit more air, aren't as loud as, say, an A or Bb harp, and the low holes can be challenging to bend because the pitch is so low and the reeds carry a lot of weight to make them sound such a low pitch.
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition
Blues Harmonica For Dummies
Beginner books generally won't focus on composing, which is a more advanced subject. A beginner needs to learn which way the holes need to face, how to breathe through the instrument and get from note to note.
Harmonica For Dummies does all that and much more. It does get into the area of improvisation some, as this is an integral part of playing blues, rock and even country. You can check out the table of contents at Amazon.com to get an idea of what it covers.
====
Winslow Yerxa - available for lessons in person or online
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition
Blues Harmonica For Dummies
Relaxed shaping is best. Check out the free Videos 0501 and 0502 from my book Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition.
Go too the window titled CHAPTER 5: I HEAR A MELODY: PLAYING SINGLE NOTES LIST 2, and scroll down the list on the right to find the videos.
Winslow Yerxa
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition and Blues Harmonica For Dummies
Available for lessons in person or online
Bends in Draw 2 and especially Draw 3 can be challenging, as they bend farther than 1, 4, 5, or 6 (and yes, 5 does bend slightly, but very effectively).
It's not unusual to get the shallow bends in 2 and 3 at first, and struggle to get them deeper.
Check out some of the bending advice on the audio and video tracks for Chapter 8 of my book Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition:
http://www.dummies.com/book-extras/harmonica-dummies-2nd-edition-resource-center/#ch7
Also, pay attention to what you're doing to get the bends.
You won't get far using your lips, which some players stumble on. It works a little but not very well.
Lowering your tongue, like using your lips, has limited effectiveness.
Constricting your throat, likewise, does a little but not enough.
Raising your tongue, as if you're making the sound of "Khhhhhhh" is the most effective way of initiating, sustaining, and controlling bends. By narrowing the airflow at that point you can tune your oral cavity to the note you want. Moving that K-spot forward raises the pitch, which sliding it back lowers it. Every bent note has a sweet spot along that continuum.
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition
Blues Harmonica For Dummies
Thanks for the recommendation!
By the way, Steve Baker's the Harp Handbook, while not an instruction book per se, is a wonderful addition to the library and knowledge of any harmonica player.
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition
Blues Harmonica For Dummies
The embouchure you're using is known as U-blocking. It's employed by a minority of players, but has been used by some very good and famous ones.
Two points of general advice:
Relax and get rid of tension and pressure. Isolating a single note is a matter of shaping and placement, not pressure.
Free airflow is essential for good reed response and sound. Nothing should impede that open airflow - tongue, lips, throat - all should be open to allow air to move freely and easily.
The two majority embouchures are:
Puckering (using only the lips to isolate a note) also called lipping and lip blocking.
Tongue blocking, where you have several holes in your mouth and use your tongue to block out the holes either to the left or the right, in order to isolate one hole in either the right (the default) or the left corner of your mouth. The tongue is not curled around a hole, differentiating it from U-blocking.
The harmonica was actually designed for tongue blocking and many excellent effects and techniques rely on it. That aid, many great players are pucker players.
You can get some insight on both puckering and tongue blocking in the videos for CHAPTER 5: I HEAR A MELODY: PLAYING SINGLE NOTES LIST 2 of my book Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition here:
http://www.dummies.com/book-extras/harmonica-dummies-2nd-edition-resource-center/#ch5
====
Winslow Yerxa - Take a lesson with one of the world’s foremost experts and teachers
Author, Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition
Blues Harmonica For Dummies
Harmonica for Dummies is a pretty good place to start. I don't usually like the "for Dummies" books, but this one is a gem.