It’s probably a good thing Carlos del Junco wasn’t there when the harmonica appeared in North America in the 1860s.
Neil Young and Bob Dylan can probably roll with it when he says they are mediocre harmonica players. Aspiring harmonica players Wyatt Earp and Billy the Kid might have overreacted and pulled out their pistols….
Carlos is one of those players whose music is so advanced that when it comes to awards, it’s either retire the category or rephrase the question to Best Harmonica Player Not Named Carlos. This includes two Gold Medals from the Hohner World Harmonica Championship in Trossingen, Germany, as well as multiple national awards in Canada.
To say he plays the harmonica is like saying “Jimi Hendrix plays guitar.” He blows the blues harp through a prism — suddenly it seems he’s holding every colour in the musical rainbow right there in his hands.
Simultaneously sophisticated and raw, his playing blurs the boundaries between blues and jazz (hence the name for his band the Blues Mongrels).
The emphasis is on blues, but Carlos and his band are not afraid to merrily traipse off in other directions delivering a seamless fusion of New Orleans second line grooves, swing, Latin, hip-hop or ska melodies, to swampy roots rock.
Born in Havana, Cuba, del Junco has developed the rare ability to play chromatically by using a recently developed “overblow” technique taught to him by jazz virtuoso Howard Levy.
Overall, this approach to the diatonic harmonica, although much more difficult to achieve, is in many ways more expressive and communicative than the mechanized tone produced by the chromatic harmonica. Carlos is one of the few pioneers of this overblow method, bringing musical credibility to what has still been considered by many in the music industry a fringe folk instrument. The sophisticated sound produced by del Junco is at once sensitive, soulful, and sexy while never forgetting the rawness inherent in blues music.
In 1993 Carlos del Junco won two gold medals at the Hohner World Harmonica Championship held in Trossingen, Germany. He was judged world’s best in both the diatonic blues category and the diatonic jazz category.
The Blues Mongrels are bassist Henry Heillig (founded the nine-piece Latin band Manteca, musical director for both the Genie and Gemini Awards, toured with pianist Joe Sealy), guitarist Paul Pigat and Mark Mariash on drums.
Carlos del Junco and the Blues Mongrels play at the Sid Williams Theatre this Sunday at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are available online at https://tickets.sidwilliamstheatre.com or by phoning the box office at 250-338-2430.
— Carlos del Junco
