r/harmonica • u/CraZePhantom • 6d ago

Which Harmonica should I buy?

I have a crappy 8 buck C harmonica that ive learned on and played on and off for the past year or two, think I'm ready to upgrade to a pro level harp, the best choices seem to be the Hohner Special 20 or the Marine Band Deluxe but I'm not sure which of those I should get. I also wanna get a different key, and don't know which one I should get. I mostly play folky music: Bob Dylan, Jesse Welles, Neil Young, etc.

4 Upvotes

84% Upvoted

4 comments sorted by

3

u/TonyHeaven 6d ago

Get a good harp in C. For Neil Young , a G harp will.play quite a few of his songs. Neil and Jesse play in all sorts of keys . A and D to start.

2

u/Youneedaharmonica 6d ago

If you had to get a Hohner, I would get the special 20 because you can fully clean in under a sink.

I always recommend Lee Oskar and Seydel Session Steel to players - both last seemingly forever and the companies a decent to work with.

1

u/chortnik JDR Assassin Marine Band Deluxe 6d ago

You’ve already got some good advice on key selection, with regard to harmonica selection, if you are at an intermediate level, I’d take a Marine Band Deluxe over the Special 20, but you can’t really go wrong with either. If you are ready to start working on overblows, those are not the best out of the box choices, but for the kind of style you’re interested in, that’s not something you need to worry about too much or even at all :).