Quick now: What did Abraham Lincoln, Billy the Kid, and John Lennon all have in common?
Well, OK, they were all killed by gunshot. But thatâs not the answer Iâm looking for right now. No, this is something they all had in common that brought them pleasure during their lifetime.
The answer: They all played the harmonica.
And once you add millions of others to their number, you see why the harmonica is one of the most loved of all musical instruments.
One reason for the popularity of the harmonica is its easy portability. After all, what other instrument fits easily into your pocket?
Another reason is the cost. Low-end harmonicas can be bought today as cheaply as three dollars, with professional-grade instruments costing only about 30 dollars apiece.
Another reason is how easy it is to learn to play simple songs on the harmonica. After all, a diatonic harmonica has only 10 holes, each of which produces only two notes, so you are never very far from the right note.
Another reason is the versatility of the harmonica, which has found a home in virtually all musical stylesâfrom blues to jazz to folk to rock to country and western and even to classical music.
Though the harmonica was originally developed early in the 19th century by several instrument makers in Europe and America, it was Matthias Hohner who found a way to mass-produce inexpensive harmonicas in 1857, which brought the instrument to the hands and mouths of the world.
It was instantly popular in the American West, where cowboys could play music around the campfire with such a cheap, portable, durable instrument. It also brought comfort to weary soldiers on both sides of the Civil War, and it is a fixture in virtually every film depicting life in prison.
But the harmonica exploded on the musical scene in the 1950âs, when African-American blues musicians carried their tiny powerhouse into the juke joints on the south side of Chicago to electrify the nightlife of the city.
They called the harmonica a âblues harp,â or simply âharp,â and they found new ways to play it. They found that they could âbendâ notesâsliding downward from one musical note to anotherâto give their music a sinewy, sensuous quality. With other tricks, they could recreate the sounds of train whistles, crying babies, or clucking chickens.
Little Walter Jacobs revolutionized the use of the blues harp by playing it through a bullet-style microphone used by taxi dispatchers. It gave the instrument a raw, distorted quality and raised the volume to compete on an equal level with drums, guitars, and pianos. Today, the âGreen Bulletâ is still the microphone of choice for most serious blues harmonica artists.
Other early masters of the Chicago style of blues harmonica were men like Sonny Boy Williamson, Junior Wells, Howlinâ Wolf, and Big Walter Horton.
When rock ân roll was in its infancy, it was British youngsters like Mick Jagger, Roger Daltrey, and John Lennon who were hungry for recordings of these Chicago blues masters, and they quickly learned how to introduce the harmonica into the rock songs they were producing.
And once the tiny ten-holed harp had hit the radio airwaves, millions of music fans the world over were hooked on the harmonica.
Today, this tiny instrument is even being prescribed by pulmonary doctors as a medical treatment for conditions such as asthma; for besides providing proven exercise for the diaphragm and lung volume, it also introduces stronger motivation for continuing the exercise over other pulmonary devices.
Besides, what asthma sufferer wouldnât want to be able to say his name in the same breath with Abraham Lincoln, Billy the Kid, and John Lennon?
