Chromatic Harmonica
Harmonicas and Stuff offers chromatic harmonicas from Seydel, Suzuki and Hohner harmonicas. The chromatic harmonica is a very popular harmonica and the sound is amazing. Take a look at our store and pick up a chromatic harmonica today!
A chromatic harmonica a button-activated sliding bar to redirect air from the hole in the mouthpiece to the selected reed-plate desired. When the button is not pressed, an altered diatonic major scale of the key of the harmonica is available, while depressing the button accesses the same scale a semi-tone higher in each hole.
The chromatic harmonica is capable of playing the 12 notes of the Western chromatic scale. The chromatic harmonica can thus be contrasted with a standard harmonica, which can play only the notes in a given musical key.
Some of the well known chromatic harmonica players are classical players Larry Adler, Tommy Reilly, Sigmund Groven, and Willi Burger,[1] jazz players Toots Thielemans, and Hendrik Meurkens,[2] and popular musicians Norton Buffalo and Stevie Wonder.
Chromatic harmonicas are usually 12, 14 or 16 holes.
Chromatic harmonicas are usually tuned to solo tuning, which has a similar layout to the diatonic's Richter tuning except that it eliminates the G on the draw and doubles the Cs that are not on the ends of the instrument. In the standard 12-hole chromatic in C the lowest note is middle C, while 16-hole variants start one octave lower. For the 16-hole variant, the layout is usually as follows. Note that the "D" in the last key-in draw note is common, though by no means presented in all chromatic.