How To Play A Single Note

     Learning how to play a clear single note is very important when you want to play the melody line to a song.  There are a few methods for playing single notes, but beginners should start with the whistle method of playing. 

     The Whistle Method - Just as the name implies, the whistle method, is basically puckering your mouth as you would if you were about to whistle.  Once you have your mouth puckered bring the harmonica to your lips and blow.  Think of blowing a straight focused column of air as you would if you were whistling a tune.  When you first start out, you probably will get plenty of double notes, but as with anything practice makes perfect.  I would recommend practice a Key of C Scale, this would be:

    Start on the 4th hole of the harmonica and play the complete scale above.  Take your time, no need to rush the scale, if you start playing it slowly at first and hit the notes cleanly, then you can move on to speeding up the scale.

    Jumping from one note to a high note a few spaces away, will take practice as well.  At the moment it will seem very hard, but you end up just getting a feeling for the spacing of the notes once you've played a bit longer.

    There is other methods of playing a single note, like tonguing, but its for more advanced players and won't be covered on this website, at least not at the moment.