I ordered a couple of diatonic harps today and got to thinking about how many of these suckers I’ve gone through over the years. I’m sure that, by now, I’ve purchased at least a couple of hundred diatonics (the classic 10-hole instrument that people usually envision when they think of harmonicas). At an average price of, say, $17 apiece, that’s $3,400 worth of little harmonicas.
They’re not that cheap any more, either. Hohner recently raised the price — substantially — on the Hohner Special 20 harps that have been my preferred instrument for more than a decade. They’ve gone from about $18 to about $23 apiece recently at discount online retailers — a 28% price hike — making them as expensive or even more pricey than their major competitors.
I’ve played most of those competitors but have returned time and again to the Special 20, which had hit the sweet spot of great tone, good reliability, consistency in quality and decent price. There are better-made harps (Lee Oskars) that I’ve kicked aside because I’ve found them to be too bright; there are harps I’ve liked better for tone (Hering Vintage 1923) that are wildly inconsistent; there are harps I’ve liked better overall (Bushman Delta Frost) that are considerably more expensive.
Oops — let me check that last one. Thanks to the Hohner price hike, the Bushmans are now only $2/harp more than the Special 20s. They’re also louder, far easier to bend on the high notes, are durable (although not nearly as durable as the manufacturer claims, in my experience), have fantastic tone that cuts better than Hohner without sounding too bright, are bigger and easier to hold than Special 20s– and look like they’re about to become my harp of choice. When I placed my order today, I bought the Bushmans.
Perhaps I should go back to the harps I played for a while in the 1980s, when I made $15,000 a year. In those days, I played Huang Silvertones or Huang Star Performers, which were about $10 a harp — and still are. I’ve still got a few of them laying around, 20 years after I purchased them. It may be time to take a fresh listen.
