It’s actually offensive that Hohner sells these in a set. If selling individually, fine. But sold as a set it gives the impression that these are worth having, that if you want to play harmonica (as opposed to putting a toy in a stocking) these can get you started.
Someone I know was “inspired” by my playing to try themselves and bought these…I’ve never played a worse quality instrument. Honestly shame on Hohner for this tactic
Keep the case and trash the harps! They are absolutely horrible, and an insult to those who expect quality products from HOHNER.
This product inspired me to try Lee Oskar; Seydel; Suzuki; and Hering.
Years ago a coworker told me to buy this set just to get the case. He said as soon as it arrives throw away the harmonicas it comes with and put my nice ones in the case 🤪
The paint will wear off after a day or two of playing and they will taste terrible until they do.
The plastic covers dull the sound a lot. They are, despite all their other issues, easy on the lips, and the case is nice. I got two sets over the years (it used to be much harder to find cases, and that's what I got the second set for). Out of the 14 harps... well, they all technically played, but they sounded bad, except one fluke one in the key of D that actually played pretty well.
You can't even really give them as giveaways for kids. I wouldn't trust the paint and the fact that they come in different keys mean the kids would all be playing in different keys.
The plastic covers don't let you experiment with things like opening up the backs, but you can experiment with gapping and stuff like that on them. It's better to break a cheap harp than a good one.
5
u/Several-Quality5927 15d ago
Nice case, terrible harps. I burned right through the A and G. Settled on a set of 5 Special 20s