Blog

The multi-instrumentalist Nadishana plays more than 200 instruments. Among those the jaw harp, he says, is one of his favourites. „You can play it everywhere, even in public spots, without causing too much of a stir. I often use the time for practicing, when I need to wait somewhere.“ Notes on mouth harp playing with Nadishana./jews-harps-jawharps-guimbardes__India

The Ancient Trance Festival in Taucha started off as a small compact moment of concert for jaw harp music more than ten years ago. The festival grew within a few years. During the first weekend in August 2014 more than 4000 people were drawn to Taucha. A short history about the change and development of a festival.

DAN MOI is very happy to announce that this year we will make it to attend the Marranzano World Fest in Catania (Sicily, Italy) from July 14-17. Marranzano is the Sicilian word for jaw harp and the name giver of the local jaw harp festival. The musician Luca Recupero from Catania is the host and pro bono organizer of this happening.

It is one of the most exciting internet archives of folk music currently in existence: The collection at the "Centre de Recherche en Ethnomusicologie (CREM) des Musée de l´Homme" in Paris. At the moment, you can find 1000 hours of archived material, music recordings from all over the world. Some rare recordings worth listening to can be found by using the keyword "guimbarde", Jew's harp.

Our friend and jaw harp ambassador, multi-instrumentalist Gabriele Albanese has been at the EXPO 2015 in Milano. He sent us two video clips with a some musical impressions.

Asia is a continent with an extraordinary variety of Jew's harps. Comparatively speaking, we in Europe know very little about the use of the Jew's harp in South Asia, in Pakistan, Nepal and India. But there, too, one can discover a lively Jew's harp culture. Not least thanks to the musician Neptune Chapotin.