Happy Hour Harmonica Podcast

Richard Sleigh interview

• Neil Warren • Season 1 • Episode 138

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Richard Sleigh joins me on episode 138. 

Richard is from Pennsylvania and is a renowned harmonica customiser, player and teacher. He tells how his great uncle Bill inspired him to pick up the harp, before discovering Irish music during his travels in Europe. 

We hear about his first album Steppin’ Out, his recording with Dennis Gruenling, and his love for the Clifftop Appalachian festival.

Richard also shares the story behind his involvement with the MB30 harmonica and his customisation collaboration with Joe Filisko. Plus, we talk rack harmonica, teaching, and how he’s been “hot rodding” harmonicas for over 30 years.

Links:

Richard’s website: https://hotrodharmonicas.com/

Hot Rod Your Harmonicas - The Movie: https://hotrodharmonicas.myshopify.com/products/hot-rod-your-harmonica-videos

Richard’s Ultimate Foundation Harmonica Course: https://www.ultimateharmonica.com/p/the-ultimate-beginner-harmonica-course

Other harmonica customiser interviews: https://www.harmonicahappyhour.com/categories/harmonica-customiser/

Videos:

Paddy Fahey’s Reel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8lkMs4utYpE

Cousin Sally Brown: https://youtu.be/5VaYV1CGwo4

Cuttin’ Out with Dennis Gruenling: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYm8_EGaUqU

Help Me played on a rack tuition video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M-U4PRMY18Y

Blues Harp Bugle tutorial: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TbQMrNByJR4


Podcast website:
https://www.harmonicahappyhour.com

Donations:
If you want to make a voluntary donation to help support the running costs of the podcast then please use this link (or visit the podcast website link above):
https://paypal.me/harmonicahappyhour?locale.x=en_GB

Spotify Playlist:
Also check out the Spotify Playlist, which contains most of the songs discussed in the podcast:
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5QC6RF2VTfs4iPuasJBqwT?si=M-j3IkiISeefhR7ybm9qIQ

Podcast sponsors:
This podcast is sponsored by SEYDEL harmonicas - visit the oldest harmonica factory in the world at www.seydel1847.com  or on Facebook or Instagram at SEYDEL HARMONICAS
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Blue Moon Harmonicas: https://bluemoonharmonicas.com


Neil Warren

Richard Sleigh joins me on episode 138. Richard is from Pennsylvania and is a renowned harmonica customiser, player and teacher. He tells how his great uncle Bill inspired him to pick up the harmonica, before discovering Irish music during his travels in Europe. We hear about his first album, Steppin' Out, his recording with Dennis Groenling and his love for the Clifftop Appalachian Festival. Richard also shares the story behind his involvement with the MB30 harmonica and his customisation collaboration with Joe Felisco. Plus we talk rack harmonica, teaching and how he's been hot-rodding harmonicas for over 30 years. This podcast is sponsored by Zidel Harmonicas. Visit the oldest harmonica factory in the world at www.zidel1847.com or on Facebook or Instagram at Zidel Harmonicas.

Richard Sleigh

oh oh oh

Richard is from Pennsylvania, where he has lived most of his life

Neil Warren

Hello, Richard Sleigh, and welcome to the podcast. Hi, thanks, Neil. I'm happy to be here. So you're talking to us from Pennsylvania, yeah? That's right. Central Pennsylvania. And it's somewhere you've lived around that region most of your life,

Richard Sleigh

I think. That's right. I've moved away two or three times and moved back, and yeah, I like it here.

Richard’s great uncle Bill played harmonica and inspired him to take up the instrument

Neil Warren

You're somebody who I've known about for a long time. Amongst being a player and a writer, you're also a famous customizer. So we'll definitely cover that topic. But first of all, let's talk about how you got into playing the harmonica. Your great uncle Bill was your first inspiration.

Richard Sleigh

Yes. When I was a kid, I had my Uncle Bill, great Uncle Bill. I'm not exactly sure of the connection, but anyhow, he was in the family. He used to work on the Pennsylvania Railroad, and he was retired, and he played one of those big red 364 Marine bands, and he played a bit of a steam train imitation and some other tunes in that tongue block style. One of my favorite memories on a third floor of this old hotel building in Philipsburg where I'm visiting him in the middle of the summer and we've got the window open and he was playing harmonica and we're hanging out and then we start hearing applause and look down and there was a little crowd had gathered in the street and they were listening and it was just a fun thing to be a part of.

Neil Warren

So what sort of age were you then when you first picked up the harmonica?

Lost John by Sonny Terry really lit the torch paper when Richard was age 17 and he started playing with others

Richard Sleigh

I messed around with it a little bit when I was like 10 to 12. I had already been playing guitar for a couple of years. I started doing some Dylan Rack style harmonica with the guitar because I was listening to Bob Dylan. So that was like 13, 14. It really hit me hard when I was 17. I started going to Altoona campus of Penn State University and I was exposed to Sonny Terry and the Folkways records and Ramblin' at Jack Elliot and Woody Guthrie. And then that led one way or another to blues. And then I got an album that was called The Story of the Blues that had John Lee Williamson and Sonny Boy Williamson and Little Walter and just a whole bunch of great harp players. And it totally blew my mind. I spent weeks wandering around, basically ignoring the rest of my life, including my classes, trying to play Sonny Terry's Lost John and other stuff like that. I started playing with other people. It was hard to get in edgewise in a jam at a party with a guitar because there were so many good guitar players, but I started finding ways to fit in playing little unobtrusive lines or rhythm things with the harmonica, and one thing led to another, and I kept on going with it.

Neil Warren

I also read that you did some traveling in Europe as well, and that was quite a formative time. You set some harmonicas with you and a penny whistle.

Travelled to Ireland on this trip, which had a deep effect on Richard and the music he wanted to play

Richard Sleigh

Yes, I had gone to school, an exchange student at the Slade School of Art in London, and then after that semester was over, I got a job on an army base in Heidelberg, and then over that winter, I bought a Peugeot racing bicycle. I was working on an army base, so I could buy stuff through the PX, and a friend of mine had ordered this bicycle, and then he decided he didn't want it, and I said, I'll take it and I bought it and I fitted it with racks and pannier bags and all that stuff. And then I spent a little over four months traveling on that bicycle and I had a full set of marine bands and a chromatic harmonica and a couple of penny whistles. I knew I was going to Ireland, so I learned some fiddle tunes before I got to Ireland. Then when I got there, they were more interested in listening to me play like Charlie McCoy stuff or like James Taylor stuff on the guitar than they were listening to this American playing their music. But Ireland deeply affected my, my sense of what life is all about. And when I came home, I, to begin with, I wish I hadn't come home, but, uh, I ordered Plank's D albums and one by the Chieftains. At that time, I'd been playing a solo act for a while because it was really hard to beat just a harmonica player. So I played guitar, rack harmonica, but I would also feature a couple of penny whistle numbers during the evening. They went over really well. I haven't really kept up the penny whistle, but I really dug into the Irish tunes and adapting them to the harmonica.

Richard took up playing Irish music on the harmonica in a bit of vacuum, as he wasn’t aware of others doing it

Neil Warren

So it sounded like you were a pioneer of that because that sort of became popular later on, didn't it? So you were doing that quite early on with the Irish tunes on the harmonica.

Richard Sleigh

Yeah, it was really unusual. I mean, nobody else in my area was doing that. I would have these solo pieces on the harmonica, and some of them were the Irish stuff, and some of them were pretty rockin' tunes. And using cross-harp and just the various chords and octaves and other stuff that you can use. It's always been a thread in my music since the 70s. Yeah,

Hadn’t heard any others playing Irish music on the harmonica and then heard James Conway, who blew him away

Neil Warren

and something, of course, you continue to do, and that's what we'll get onto shortly. So were you listening to any Irish harmonica then in the 70s, and who was that?

Richard Sleigh

No,

Neil Warren

I

Richard Sleigh

was not aware of other... I mean, other than... There were a couple on records that I got from Ireland. They were not as speed fiddle type stuff that was more melodic things.

Neil Warren

Yeah.

Richard Sleigh

It wasn't until, I think James Conway was the first person I met who just like totally blew my mind. You know, I thought I was good. And then I heard him and I was like, oh my God.

Richard has various Irish tunes recorded on harmonica which he has put out

Neil Warren

So yeah, so as I say, you're still playing traditional tunes, and that's a big part of what you play still now, yes? Oh, yes. You've got various recordings out, some on your YouTube channel. There's you playing Cousin Sally Brown, for example, with some musicians in Pennsylvania there. Yeah. And also, you had a couple of albums, one called The Joliet Sessions, which had lots of tunes on it, didn't it? You had Black Mountain Rag, for example, and Devil's Dream, Whiskey Before Breakfast. Plenty of tunes in your output.

David Rice was at the Clifftop festival, and Richard rates him as one of the best playing traditional tunes on harmonica

Richard Sleigh

And the stuff that I'm playing now is a combination of Irish and old-timey Appalachian fiddle tunes. I really have been diving into those over the last couple of years. It's a really interesting subculture. Last summer I spent over a week at a festival called Clifftop in West Virginia. There were like 3,000 people gathered there and some of the best banjo and fiddle players and some really good harmonica players too. David Rice was there and he is one of the absolutely most advanced players on the planet in that style. Seth Schumatte was there, and there were some others, but yeah, I've been really digging into that music and finding people to play it with in this area, which is great. One of the things that blew my mind at the clifftop was I ended up sitting next to this fella and we got to talk and he says, yeah, I live in Ireland and I said, do you know Rick Epping? And he said, oh yeah. He says, yeah, once a week we have an old-timey session. He's living in Ireland and that's part of the music that he's playing and he knew Rick Epping, which is awesome.

Neil Warren

Well, I've had Rick and Seth Schumacher on the podcast, so you can check those two out if you haven't uh heard them already so yeah i mean i know rick moved to ireland just so he could go and play the irish music there that's that's devotion for you so yeah as i say you had this joliet sessions about in the early 2000s

Richard Sleigh

so

Neil Warren

You also released an album called Stepping Out. Was that the first one you put out?

Richard Sleigh

Yes, that was originally put out on cassette tapes, to give you some idea of the vintage, and it was recorded to two-inch tape in a studio, totally old-school analog recording.¶¶ ¶¶

Neil Warren

You also, you've recorded an album with Dennis Groenling. You're playing guitar, harmonica on a rack and singing, and Dennis is taking a lot of the solos, but you do play harmonica on there yourself as well.

Richard Sleigh

Yes, yeah, and acoustic rack and also one of my mutant tube amp green bullet element racks, a rig that I made for playing amplified green bullet element type tube amp stuff on that recording as well. Drive me out of my mind.

How got together with Dennis for the album

Neil Warren

Oh, oh, oh. Oh, oh, oh. Oh, oh, oh. So how did you get together with this

Richard Sleigh

album with Dennis? He visited me in my hometown of Phillipsburg where I had my original harmonica shop and we did that recording in my shop. We did it on his laptop and he just set it up and we just went for it.

Richard has been playing rack harmonica since the 1970s, and has some YouTube videos demonstrating the technique

Neil Warren

Well, that's great. Dennis is a fantastic player. So You know, you've got a number of recordings on Rack and you've got some stuff on your YouTube channel where you're demonstrating various things, haven't you? So yeah, Rack Harmonica is something you're still playing as well.

Richard Sleigh

oh yeah yeah i love combining the harmonica and the guitar and i've been doing it since the 70s

Key to rack to playing is to get a solid rhythm from your right arm on guitar

Neil Warren

i saw one of your videos uh about help me about how to play help me on guitar and on a rack and singing so really well put together i like the way you build it so you know kind of simple phrases that you can put in and then you start building it up as you you're practicing it so that was a really good and it's really effective because i think a lot of people want to do that but it's doing the two things at once isn't the easiest yeah the key is to

Richard Sleigh

get your right arm if you play right right-handed you know get your right arm locked in so you get a rhythm pattern that you can put on autopilot and and that makes everything else much easier so it took me quite a while to to really start doing that independently but you know funny thing is when i first started working on that i had just as much trouble singing and playing the guitar at the same time as i did playing rack harp and guitar at the same time it was like one or the other was working But it took a long time before both of them were working at the same time.

Played with Bo Diddley in 1987, who was insistent that Richard didn’t play over him when he was singing

Neil Warren

Yeah, well, it's like everything. You need to practice, right? So you think you could just pick it up and do it? You've got to practice it, right? So just picking out some more stuff you've done on your playing before we get on to the other side of your harmonica world. So I understand you play with Bo Diddley. So what happened here?

Richard Sleigh

He was coming to play for the Arts Festival here in State College and they needed a band to back him up. So I got hired as part of the band. A friend of mine was one of the people that helped connect everybody. So he shows up shortly before the performance and just assumes that we know what we're doing, that we've listened to his recordings. My friend Jerry's introducing me to him. And I have my hand out and everything, and I was going, great to meet you and this. And he just, he didn't move. He just looked at me and he said, when I sing the blues, don't play over me. And I didn't.

Neil Warren

So how much did you get to play with him? Was this like a whole set or?

Richard Sleigh

Yeah, we played an entire show. There were thousands of people in the audience, and I was in the back. Near the end of the set, he pointed at me and motioned me up and brought me up front, and he was vamping away on this song, and he would turn to me and look at me, and he'd say, not yet. And he did that about seven times. And then finally, he looked at me and just went, Go! And I just went nuts until he looked at me again. And it was really, it was an amazing experience. Hit me. Girl, put your clothes on.

Has also played with a couple of symphony orchestras

Neil Warren

Put your clothes on, girl. So another thing, you played with a symphony orchestra. What type of harmonica was that?

Richard Sleigh

It was a couple of times. I played with the Bridgeton Symphony Orchestra in New Jersey, and they did this show that included a harmonica excerpt. I was playing Turkey in the Straw. So I showed up for the practice. I'm in the middle right in front of the conductor, and they start playing, and it was so overwhelming to be in the middle of all that sound. I was terrified that I was going to miss my cue But he pointed at me, I started playing, I nailed it, and I was in. And it was just a lot of fun. So were you reading from a score or was it something that you'd memorized? I memorized it. There was this one part where I jumped in and I was featured and I played my thing. then I just hung out. I played with the Worcester Symphony Orchestra and Paquito de Rivera, the cross-country suite, and I played the harmonica part in that, including a solo. Playing with the symphony orchestra is really, really an amazing experience. I'm very Glad that I had those opportunities. And

Neil Warren

were you playing diatonic? Both

Richard Sleigh

times, yes.

Richard’s harmonica shop

Neil Warren

So let's get then onto your customization side. So you said you had a harmonica shop there. Was that what got you started? What were you doing in the shop? Were you just selling harmonicas or your custom things?

This led Richard to start working on a patent for an idea close to what became the XB40 harmonica

How formed customisation partnership with Joe Filisko

Discovered that Rick Epping and a few others had come up with the same idea of ‘primary and secondary reeds’ (which Rick patented)

Richard Sleigh

Well, what happened was in 1984, I went to my first spa convention and I went there with this question in my mind. I need somebody to explain to me what's happening with bending because nobody could explain it to me. and I wanted to know why the notes bent the way they did and why you could only bend the draw notes on the low end of the harmonica, et cetera, et cetera. I ended up at a banquet table with Chomber Hwang. He explained the whole thing to me, the way the reeds interact and why it's different to bend reeds on a chromatic harmonica and how overblows. He just, it was a detailed explanation. I went home, figured out the idea of having, called them primary and secondary reeds, and I was writing a patent for that idea of building a harmonica. I built a prototype that worked. I made valves out of paper, one-way valves, and I had created this thing, and I was delirious with this discovery, and I thought I was on my way. So I started building prototypes, and that's where I learned all the skills to work on reed plates. I met Joe Felisco by tracking him down and convincing him to allow me to go visit him and look at my prototype and stuff. I visited him for a couple of days. At that time, I was living in Philly, took a train to Joliet, met Joe, showed him my stuff, and we hung out. I also played a lot of harmonica and guitar. So he started working with me on a prototype. He made a mouthpiece for me, and we just stayed in touch. And then I found out later on that Rick Epping got the patent that covered everything I was trying to patent. And this was the XB-40. Yeah, his patent included the XB-40 idea for the 40-reed valved harmonica, as well as a three-reed per hole version of it. You know, I learned later on that Will Scarlett had come up with that idea. Brendan Power had a version of it that he had been working on with Suzuki. It was like a race, was it? The first to get it out was Rick, yeah. Right, yeah. And I remember joking with Brendan Power at one point that, you know, he had discovered somebody else in Eastern Europe that had also come up with the idea independently about the same time. And we started joking about having a support group for people who had come up with this invention, but didn't get

On the XB40 you can bend all the blow notes a semi tone and whole tone

Neil Warren

the patent. So just reminding people about the XP40, I think that one of the main characteristics is that you can bend all the blown outs as well. Yeah.

The differences with the 30 reed version, called the MB30, and similar to Suzuki’s SB30 model

The MB30 was similar to the Suzuki SB30 and Richard’s involvement in the development of the the MB30

Tom Halchak was also involved in making reed plates for the SB30

Worked with Brendan Power and Zombor Kovacs to further develop the MB30

Became a Hohner Affiliated Customiser

Made fifty of the MB30s with Brendan and Zombor but the process was difficult so didn’t make any more

Richard really loves the MB30 though and built some for himself and still plays them

Richard Sleigh

Yes, it has 40 reeds and then internal valves that isolate pairs of reeds. So any of the reeds are capable of two half-step bends, and then the draw three will give you the three half-step bends. So you can play fully chromatically by using bends. It's impossible to play overblows on it because it's configured in such a way that you can do all of those double reed bends. And then the 30 reed versions of it have the same basic idea, but they don't have, in some areas, they don't have the same options for the additional bends. Like on a Draw 5, on the MB30, you can't get a full step bend, but you can get all of the chromatic pitches through bending. The MB-30 was the 30-read, 20-valve version of the idea that was similar to the Sub-30 that Suzuki put out. Brendan showed me a prototype in 1997. of his triple reed version that was made by Suzuki. Suzuki came out with the sub 30 and I got involved with them for a while working on this sub 30. Tom Holchak had started making plates to adapt the sub 30 to make it work better. Brendan Power was also working on the same ideas and he was working with Tom Holchak on some of this stuff. Anyhow, it's just a lot of different things were going on and at one point I had come up with an internal valve system that I thought was super cool for the sub 30 and I brought it to the spa and I was going to show it to Brendan and then Brendan and Zombor were there and they had their prototypes of the MB30 and I looked at what they were doing and checked it out and I was like, this is it. They really figured this out. I loved what they were doing, and eventually I got involved with them. And I also moved on and then got involved with Hohner and got into the Hohner-affiliated customizer program and was working with Hohner stuff. Brendan and Zombor decided to make a go of making a run of the MB30, which is this 30-read version of the idea using marine band reed plates. Zombor had figured out this brilliant and incredibly complicated way of milling out the marine band reed plates so you could make a double thick reed plate that had 20 reeds in it with extra slots for the reeds to swing through. And we made 50 of these harmonicas. And one of the real tricky problems was coming up with valve material that would allow the reeds to swing freely, but they would also close instantly when you changed air direction. And to make a long story short, we built 50 of these and it was so difficult. getting everything dialed in and customized and set up and tuned. Right, and so we built 50 of these MB-30s, and then we were all just so worn out from the whole process that we didn't make any plans to make any more. And I really fell in love with that instrument, and eventually I managed to get enough parts from Brendan and Zalmbor to build myself a short set of them. I have them in A, Bb, C, D, and G. And they are a big part of what I do when I'm playing out. They allow me to play a lot of things that I can't play on a normal harp. Thank you. these instruments I have to work on at them all the time I'm constantly reworking valves and adjusting them and it's kind of a high wire act because they'll go into a gig and I don't have backups I mean I eventually I will be able to build an extra A and C and G but the B flat and D if they go out in the middle of a gig I just have to go to a normal harmonica and carry on so

Neil Warren

you're the only person uh that you know of what you're playing the mb30 now are you

Richard Sleigh

other people have them i don't know uh how much they're being used by other people i know that the people that i sold mb30s to every once in a while and i talked to them and say hey you want to you want to sell that back to me and they won't they won't let go of them so i'm sort of on the market to find more because, you know, I just like to be able to have backups.

The MB30 is almost the same size as a standard diatonic, whereas the XB40 is larger and has a different tone than standard diatonics

Neil Warren

Well, there we go. If anyone's got some who's listening, then Richard wants some. I'll barter. I make other things that you might like. Exactly, exactly. You can swap them. That sounds like a great deal. So, yeah, so what is the difference then in a nutshell between that and the XB40? It's the 30 read rather than 40 is the first one. The

Richard Sleigh

MB30 is the same size. It's slight than a normal marine band, so you can do all the hand effects.

Neil Warren

Yeah, because the XB-40 is quite big, isn't it? I own one at one point, and the size is quite significant.

Richard Sleigh

Yes, and the tone is also different on the XB-40. The XB-40 is kind of like in between a diatonic and a chromatic in its overall sound, which is great for Celtic music and certain things, but it just doesn't have the same raspy tone uh, sound that I get out of a Marine band.

Had been working on customisation for a long time before starting work on the MB30

Neil Warren

Yeah. So it's, it's closer to the Marine band. Yeah. So yeah, it sounds like a great, a great use. Yeah. So we got onto the story of the MB30 there. So, um, is that one of the things you started working on first or were you doing customization for a while before you started working on that?

Richard Sleigh

Oh, I'd been doing customizing for many years before the MB30 came along.

Neil Warren

So, so let's talk some more about your relationship with Joe Flisco because Joe Flisco's harps are, you know, pretty legendary, right? And his customization work. So you teamed up with him, didn't you, to work on what is the Flisco method harmonica. And it was you and another guy, wasn't it? You were sort of affiliated with Joe to make what was his design, was it? Well, his way of customizing diatonic marine bands, wasn't

Richard opened a custom harmonica shop from a property his parents owned and has since been working as a harmonica customiser for over thirty years

Richard is still in touch with Joe Filisko but not working on Filisko Method harmonicas now

Richard Sleigh

it? Really, what happened was I started working with Joe and he brought stuff to the table from his machine And I brought stuff to the table from my background as a printmaker. I studied printmaking... And I used to do zinc plate and copper plate etchings. And early on, when I heard about the rumors about closing up slots by burnishing, I said, well, I have a burnishing tool. And so I figured out what that meant on my own. And other people were using other methods for closing up the slots. And so what is known as the Felisco method is really a collaboration. Joe got the ball rolling and he got all the basic elements together, but we both collaborated over a period of years and did hundreds of experiments. So it's really a combination of, you know, we just ended up deciding to use Felisco method as a label for marketing. But it's really a collaboration. I have invented a lot of tools and techniques on my own for customizing harmonicas. Working on that idea got me connected with Joe. And when he got overwhelmed with orders, he talked to me about possibly jumping into doing the work. And I decided to go for it. And that's when we moved to Phillipsburg. My parents had this old hotel building that had a doctor's office that I took over and turned into a shop. The idea was to make a go of building custom harmonicas as a career, and I've been doing it since then. It's been over 30 years.

Neil Warren

You're still doing, of course, customized harmonicas now, so you're using... Are you still collaborating with Joe, or are you just doing your own thing? Are you still using these same techniques? I guess they've developed in different directions with you?

Richard developed the idea of being able to sight the harmonica reed by the use of light boxes

Richard Sleigh

Yeah, we stay in touch. We have a good relationship. I get with him... through text and swap notes and stuff like that. Probably by the early 2000s, a good basic system for creating customized harmonicas, we had hit on all of the things that you needed to pay attention to. And one of the things that I really went all in on developing was way of looking at citing the reads so you could see what you're doing as you're doing the customizing. And I've worked on a lot of different designs for light boxes and ways to, like for instance, you use one eye to look at a read. And if you can situate that eye in one place and you're not moving it left to right or up and down or whatever, if you can keep your eyeball in one place, you will see far more accurately the work you're doing. And that's one of the things that I went really deep into, and I came up with some lightbox designs to help you center your eye, for example.

Doesn’t use microscopes in customisation work as too much detail

Neil Warren

You haven't gone to using a microscope then?

Richard Sleigh

I tried that and it just drove me nuts. It, you know, it looked, it was too much.

Neil Warren

Too close, too much detail.

Richard Sleigh

Yeah, it looks like, you know, you're looking at the surface of the moon or something.

Welcomes the increase in harmonica customisers

Neil Warren

Yeah. So, I mean, again, the Felisco method hops, which, as you say, you were integral to creating were, you know, legendary then. But there's a lot of customizers around now. I mean, at that time, were you guys kind of like one of the first to really get them out? And, you know, what do you think about the fact that there are a lot of customizers now? I mean, how do you think things have developed since then? I think it's great. I mean,

Working in harmonica customisation is not an easy way to make a living

Richard Sleigh

I knew this knowledge would go out that people would be learning, either discovering on their own or learning from other people. I created a series of videos over a decade ago, maybe 15 years or so, where I show step-by-step all of the basic stuff that you need to understand to customize harmonicas. And I think it's important that that information is out there and people keep collaborating and talking to each other and pushing the envelope. You know, I think it's great. And there are some, you know, amazing customizers out there who have taken this path and, you know, and I got to hand it to them. It's not an easy way to make a living.

Neil Warren

But I mean, you've been doing it since 1994 as your sort of main income. Is that right?

Richard Sleigh

I've also done a number of other things you know I've also been performing all the long and I've been doing more and more teaching and

Neil Warren

But one of the, both of your stream, but yeah, but you've certainly been an income stream.

Richard Sleigh

Yes. Oh yeah. Major income stream for me for 30 years.

The basic principles followed by Richard and Joe Filisko are probably well covered by other customisers now

Neil Warren

So the ideas that you and Joe came up with, and again, you know, becoming the very legendary harmonicas. I mean, do you think the other customizers around now are using the same sort of ideas? You think you were doing things differently or, you know, generally is it all the same, but how well you do it?

Does understanding how the reed works helps your harmonica playing?

Richard Sleigh

You know, there are basic principles you have, you have to follow and, And if you get into this work and study the available information, you're going to come up with something real close to what I'm doing. There are certain things about the way the reed sits and how it's centered and how you burnish the slots and how you tune them that all are involved with the laws of physics and the physical material that you're working with.

Neil Warren

Do you think understanding how the reed works, and the harmonica works in other ways, really helps your playing?

Richard Sleigh

Yes, I think that for understanding the way that you change the size of the resonance space inside of your mouth and throat affects the reeds, affects the tone, and also is the way that you bend the notes. And understanding that direct relationship between that space you're creating inside of your mouth and the sound that you're getting out of the instrument is super important.

Neil Warren

I mean, and I'm somebody, I do set up my harps. Every time I get a new harmonica, I set it up myself. So I have a reasonable knowledge, but I'm not, you know, I'm not a real expert on it, but I do a sort of, at least a basic setup myself. You know, I emboss the reeds and, you know, do some gapping and things, you know, and you know, when you've got a nice setup harmonica it just plays so much better so you know what what do you think the difference is between you know people like me doing it myself doing a reasonable job and then someone like yourself who obviously has been doing it you know as part of your income for a long time

Richard Sleigh

the big difference is you you know the basics and Now, you also know that if you, I think one of the things that I do is I'm using a lot of different methods for lighting the reeds, either backlighting or silhouetting or changing the lighting conditions so I can see very, very fine increments of of differences in the shape and the way the reed goes through the slot. And so it's just like getting 1% here, 1% there, and it adds up. What you're doing and what the average harmonica player can do by just simply taking the cover plates off or taking the reed plates off, looking at the reeds, making them sit a little bit closer, check the tuning, that will give you a lot of performance for a relatively small Yeah.

Richard has a series of customisation videos to purchase called ‘Hot Rod Your Harmonica - The Movie’

Neil Warren

Exactly. Like you say, you've got the right tools, right? You've got the experience as well. And yeah, it's really working on them. So all your knowledge is available to buy, right? So you've got Hot Roger Harmonica, the movie. So Richard, you've released a series of 19 videos where you talk through various techniques, including the light box that you've been talking about, and that's available, which is a real bargain price of $49. So this is available for people to buy from your website. Yes,

Richard Sleigh

you can buy it through my website in the Shopify store. You can also order the physical DVDs through Rock and Ron in San Diego.

Neil Warren

Yeah. So, I mean, that's a great, I mean, obviously now there's lots of YouTube videos with, with customization stuff, but, uh, I think a lot of people know that it's nice to go to a definitive source and also to get like a combination rather than jumping around lots of videos. Yeah. So I'm sure, uh, you know, it's, it's worth the money for that if nothing else. Yeah.

Richard Sleigh

And it's a good solid grounding in, in the basic principles, you know, instead of learning a exactly why you're doing what you're doing.

Neil Warren

And you give a money back guarantee of this $49 too, don't you? People aren't satisfied.

Richard Sleigh

That's right. And I've sold thousands of these and I've refunded about three people.

Neil Warren

So we'll just talk briefly on this. So the name is Hot Rod. So your website is Hot Rod Harmonica. Where did the name Hot Rod come from, not Hot Richard?

Richard Sleigh

I just started thinking of Hot Rod. I've always loved antique cars, vintage cars, Hot Rods, that whole... yeah and you know and i've come up with a logo that uses like hot rod flame type you know wings that uh so it's it's just the idea of you know you have a car that looks like a ford but but on the inside it's all been hot rotted and that's the idea of the harmonica hot rod harmonica

Neil Warren

do you do work on vintage cars as well

Richard Sleigh

i used to but it's a lot Harmonicas take a lot less space and take a lot less money.

Still building custom Hohner Marine Band Deluxe harmonicas

Neil Warren

exactly exactly yeah stick to the harmonicas good to hear so you still are building custom harmonicas right and um you have your uh richard slay marine band deluxe um which is you you launched a while back yes you're still building

These harmonicas are not set-up for overblows as Richard doesn’t play them much as he uses the MB30 for the missing notes

Richard Sleigh

yeah i i and at this point i build i'm i'm focusing on building the kind of harmonicas that i personally play which are not totally hot rotted for for overblows i don't use that many overblows in my playing and I mean, every once in a while, if I need to do something that requires an overblow or an overdraw, I know how to, you know, fix a particular harmonica for that, but most of the time I'm either playing the MB-30s or I'm playing using traditional bending.

Only customises Hohner harmonicas

Neil Warren

These are Marine Band Deluxes that you're doing, so it's mainly those that you, well, is the hone, are you customizing other brands as well, I take it?

Focuses on diatonic customisation

Richard Sleigh

No, just honers. I'm a straight up honer all the way affiliated customizer. I buy the parts from Hohner and that's all I work with.

Neil Warren

And do you do chromatics or any others or is it only diatonics?

Isn’t shipping to the EU or the UK at the moment due to the red tape involved. There are good customisers in Europe (such as Joel Andersson)

Richard Sleigh

My focus is the marine bandolox, the diatonics. I know how to work on other instruments, but it's not something I do. I

Neil Warren

did notice, looking at your website, that unfortunately at the moment you're no longer shipping to the European Union or the UK due to red tape problems. Is that still in place?

Richard Sleigh

Yeah, and the thing is, Joel Anderson makes awesome customs, and there are other people in Germany in the affiliated customizer program. So there are good customizers that can handle that market. And yeah, it's just a real pain to do shipping to Europe and the UK.

Not doing as much customisation work as used to

Neil Warren

Yeah, okay, yeah. But as you say, other customizers in Europe are available. So great, good stuff. Great that you're still continuing doing your customization work. And as I say, it's been a really key part of your harmonica life, yeah.

Richard Sleigh

Yeah, I'm not doing it as much as I used to, but I'm still doing it. I've ended up extending my wait time, my wait list, but I like staying in touch. And I also repair the instruments I have built, and I put them on a faster track so that people are not stuck without their custom harp.

Neil Warren

Yeah, because you've got a waiting list of six months or so, haven't you, for new ones? Yes. which isn't bad in some of the other customizers I've talked to. So six months isn't such a long wait compared to

Richard Sleigh

some. I advertise six to nine months and a lot of times I get under six months. So it's as good as I can do and still have a life.

Neil Warren

So great. So we'll move on from your customization work. So you've touched on the fact that you've done lots of teaching and it's something that also has been part of your harmonica life. So this is something you've actually got four online courses, haven't you? You've done an ultimate foundation harmonica course. So The link for that is on the podcast page. You've also done an Irish tuition course, a bending course, a course on how to play Sweet Georgia Brown and harmonica and guitar. So they're available on your website as well. So teaching's been a key part. You've also taught at workshops, haven't you? And you've got plenty of material on your YouTube site, you know, teaching material.

Provides evaluations of student submissions for the online Tomlin Leckie harmonica school

Richard Sleigh

Yeah, those courses I have available right now through Teachable. Probably by the end of the year, I'm going to have them in some other location. And I've also been doing evaluations for the Tomlin School. As Todd Parrott and Sandy Weltman and I listen to student recordings and give people feedback, so that's another thing I've been doing. You know, I continue to make YouTube videos and other things as I can. Teaching is a big part of how I continue to learn.

An example of one of Richard’s YouTube tuition videos is on how to play a blues bugle on diatonic using arpeggios

Neil Warren

Yeah, and one of your YouTube videos, for example, is about playing a blues bugle on the harmonica, which basically uses arpeggio, so it's like an arpeggio exercise.

Richard Sleigh

I'm just taking various bugle tunes.

Neil Warren

As you say on the video, bugle tunes are kind of built around arpeggio, so they work well on the diatonic harmonica.

Richard Sleigh

Yeah, you've got that 1-3-5, it's the overtones. The bugles work on those overtones, and so the tunes designed for the bugle, they work really well as all-blown notes or all-drawn notes. And it's a great way to develop just basic skills of moving around on the instrument and playing good, clean single notes, and also absorb a bit of music theory.

Also likes to write and wrote a regular article for five years for the Harmonica World magazine and sends out a monthly newsletter to his email subscribers

Neil Warren

Yeah, absolutely. You're covering music theory too. And you also like to write. You used to write an article for the Harmonica World magazine between 2015 and 2020, so five years worth of articles in there.

Richard Sleigh

Yeah, and I'm getting back into my writing groove. I have an email list that you can join if you go to my Hot Rod Harmonica website, and I send out newsletters occasionally. trying to get it on a more of a, like a monthly schedule. And I also have other email lists that are more specialized in different topics. And so I like to write, I like to learn, I like to teach. And for me, it's just a big adventure. And as long as I'm continuing to learn, it's all good. It's what I'm here for.

Brings in elements of philosophy to his writing and how music connects him to a higher power

Neil Warren

So good, yeah. So there's sort of elements of philosophy in here and how music, you know, can be beneficial and, you know, bringing that side into the music and the harmonica playing helps you playing, yeah?

Richard Sleigh

Yeah, absolutely. I think that, like, for me, one of the main reasons I play music is because it gets me in touch with a higher power. You know, it's like a spiritual connection with forces that I don't really understand, but I can feel them. when I'm playing and that's one of the most exciting aspects of playing music for me and also sharing it with other people is finding yourself in this flow in this energy in this you know it's just a beautiful sense of aliveness and I would be doing this whether I made money at it or not because it feels so good music

Has done session work, including music for theatre productions and corporate videos where they wanted royalty free music

Neil Warren

Thank you. You've also done some session where you created music for theater productions, for TV, radio, movie soundtracks. I

Ten minute question

Richard Sleigh

ended up doing music for a series of whitewater safety films for the Red Cross. This was a number of years ago. And I actually ended up in one of the movies learning to run a kayak through whitewater and stuff. So I would get hired for these roles because they would want... Like a harmonica is a great background sound for movie soundtracks and you can riff and come up with stuff that they don't have to have a copyright for. I did music for plays when I lived in Philly and part of the what they wanted me to do. I also did slide guitar and penny whistle and stuff. And they were like, what we need is some mood music for this play. And you just need to do something that nobody's going to sue us for. In other words, they wanted something that was different. I did music for one play where I kind of took the basic idea of Ry Cooter's Paris, Texas riffs based on the slide guitar. you know, coming up with something that had that mood, but was different enough that they couldn't say I was ripping off recorded music.

Neil Warren

So a question I ask each time, which is if you had 10 minutes to practice, what would you spend those 10 minutes doing?

Works with guitar and harmonica together, ensuring they are beautifully in tune and then work out arrangements between them

Richard Sleigh

If I have like 10 minutes to play the harmonica, like if I'm somewhere and I got a harmonica in my pocket, I'd run through, I'd like to do like a little bit of a warm up or play something that has a bit of that train rhythm breathing stuff and I would probably play one of the latest fiddle tunes I'm working on. I'm constantly trying to push the envelope with learning new tunes, so I always have some new tune in the mix and some tune that I'm trying to get better at. and also some basics, you know, just like run scales.

Neil Warren

Do you try and, you know, work with the guitar when you're doing some things? Obviously, we're playing on a rack. Is that something you're very conscious of, you know, about playing with the chords and that side of things?

Richard Sleigh

Yeah, it's a combination of the harmonicas are really in tune with the guitar. So that's part of the, you know, the setup. But also, I will work out songs sometimes i work out the guitar arrangement first and then add the harmonica and sometimes i just kind of crash around with both of them and see what i can come up with lately i've also been having fun just like running pentatonic scales on the harmonica with the guitar you know note for note at the same time just to see how that works

Plays exclusively Hohner harmonicas with the Marine Band Deluxe the model of choice

Plays some chromatic, with the older Super 64X model a favourite

Neil Warren

Yeah, can be really effective. Yeah, so we'll get on the last section now and talk about gear. So we've already said that obviously you're a Horner-affiliated customizer, so you just play Horner harmonicas. Mm-hmm. Yeah, and that, obviously you talked about playing the Marine Band Deluxe. Is that your diatonic of choice from the Horner range? And chromatics, you do play some chromatic, don't you?

Also plays some Hohner auto-valve and Hohner Educator harmonicas

Uses different tunings, including Paddy Richter, Country Tuned and has invented some of own tunings

Richard Sleigh

Yeah, I have a combination of some old wood chromatics, and I like the Super 64X. I play the older version of the Super 64X. That's mostly the chromatics I have are 270s, 280s, Hohner. I also play some Auto Valve and those old Educator Harmonicas and Solo Tuned. And I also have various specialized tunings that I use for different things, like the Patty Richter or the Country Tuned. I've invented a couple of my own tunings. conglomerations. I have one harp that the only song I play on it is Shady Grove, for example.

Neil Warren

So is that how you use different tunes? Because I think a lot of people think, oh, I can't handle a different tuning. But I think one way that some people do that is exactly that. You just have a tuning for a specific song. So when you play that song, you use that harmonica, you know how to use it. Is that how you do it?

Richard Sleigh

Yeah. And there's certain Irish tunes that just flow beautifully with the Paddy Richter. For me, I also use alternative tunings all the time on the guitar. And you just get different chord voicings and different note combinations. So for me, 90% is standard Richter, and then maybe 10% in other various tunings.

Neil Warren

Which tuning system do you like to use?

Richard Sleigh

I use sort of like a variant of what they call 19 limit just. So I will make the 3rds flat enough to smooth out the chords, but not the whole way to just. And then on the draw chord, the flat seven and the nine, I've got them a little bit sharp. And depending on the key or what I'm doing with the harmonica, I'll tweak some variation of that formula.

Plays mostly in 1st, 2nd and 3rd position but uses several more for songs as required

Neil Warren

And what about different positions? Do you use a lot of different harmonica positions?

Richard Sleigh

I play mostly first, second, and third position, but I also love fifth position for some things. There are some tunes I play fourth position. Sweet Georgia Brown is in 11th position. I've also played in 10th position. I use probably half of the available combinations, at least some of the time.

Neil Warren

So you've got a YouTube video on tongue blocking. So is that your preferred embouchure?

Uses tongue switching

Richard Sleigh

Yeah, and I alternate all the time between pursed lips and tongue blocking. And I've got a whole way of playing the Irish tunes where I rapidly change from tongue blocking to pursed lips, depending on what note I'm aiming for on the harmonica.

Neil Warren

And you use some tongue switching as well, don't you?

Amps of choice include a 1942 Supro and a Wahoo amp and a Kalamazoo amp

Richard Sleigh

Yes. Yeah, I do that a lot, especially with the Celtic music in that. devil's dream. I mean, that's straight up tongue switching to get those intervals at that speed, for example.

Neil Warren

And what about when you're, you know, to amplify yourself, what do you like to use?

For a clean sound uses a Fishman amp for a mini-PA and also with a Lone Wolf pedal to add distortion

Uses custom mics from Dennis Gruenling

Harmonica rack used

Learned to play on an amp with no tone control which he believes helped develop his chops

Richard Sleigh

I have a couple ancient tube amps. I seem to favor ancient tube amps with field coil speakers and no tone control. You know, I have a 1942 Supra 10-inch speaker. That's my main amp for gigging. I also have a 1938 Oahu steel guitar amp with an 8-inch speaker that I use. These are all like Valco amps that are made in Chicago way back in the day. I also have a Kalamazoo that's been set up for harmonica that does a really sweet amp. And that's the one that does have a tone control. And I use a, uh, a fisherman amp for a guitar and like a mini PA, but I also sometimes use it with a, um, uh, the harp attack tube preamp. And, and it gives me a, Pretty darn good amplified sound. I use custom mics that Dennis Grunling has made using cherry-picked vintage elements. I also have a harp rack at this point that Greg Homert put together. for me using a vintage green bullet element. These are all some of the main gear I use. I learned on a bullet mic and a tube amp with no tone control, and I learned to play. I learned to adjust the tone by the way I played the harmonica, and I think it gave me a lot of chops that I wouldn't have gotten if I had had an amp to play around with. with all those tone controls and stuff. So there's an incredible amount of tone that you get from the way you change the inside of your mouth. And then the right gear makes it louder in a way that gives it other characteristics.

Future plans include putting out a recording of a live concert on Bandcamp and put out some more fiddle tunes played on harmonica

Neil Warren

Nice collection of gear there then. So just final question then. So yeah, just about your future plans. I know you told me you're putting together a new collection of recordings from a live concert that you'll be putting up on your band camp soon. So you're working on that at the moment, yep?

Richard Sleigh

Yeah, I want to put that out. I want to do a lot more recording, like some more live recordings, and I also want to record a lot more fiddle tunes and this Appalachian music, old-timey stuff. I'm listening to a lot of Mark Graham right now. He's kind of the gold standard in that arena.

Neil Warren

.

Richard Sleigh

Just learning a lot of these traditional tunes, and it's just exciting to be going into that community and continuing to play blues. I bill myself as Americana, which allows me to play just about anything I feel like playing.

Neil Warren

So it's been great to speak to you today, Richard. Thanks so much for joining me.

Richard Sleigh

Oh, yes. And thank you. And thank you for all of the amazing archive of recordings that you've put together. It's a real treasure trove of wisdom and interesting people.

Neil Warren

Delighted to add you to that list, Richard. Thank you very much.

Richard Sleigh

You're welcome.

Neil Warren

Once again, thanks to Seydel for sponsoring the podcast. Be sure to check out their great range of harmonicas and products at www.seydel1847.com or on Facebook or Instagram at Seydel Harmonicas. Thanks to Richard for joining me today. He really has been exploring the harmonica from inside out for decades. Check out Richard's website hotrodharmonicas.com and his YouTube channel for his customization work and teaching. There are some links on the podcast page. And if you're interested in more of my podcast interviews with Harmonica customizers, I've included a link on the podcast page to the customizer interviews category on my harmonicahappyhour.com website. I'll sign out now with Richard playing an Irish medley from his Joliet Sessions album. This is part of a medley of Devil's Dream going into Whiskey

Richard Sleigh

Before Breakfast. Thank you. so