The mode 'play' takes its arguments (holes, notes, semitones, licks, scales) and plays them. It also handles some extra keywords.

Its arguments (which mostly can not be mixed) can be any of these:

• holes (e.g. '-1') or notes
• notes (e.g. 'a4')
• semitones (e.g. '+12st')
• licks (e.g. 'st-louis')
• lick progressions
• scales (e.g. 'chord-i')
• jams, i.e. its mp3
• 'l', '2l', for the last lick, 2nd-to-last, etc.

or one of the known extra arguments (that themselves might require additional arguments):

• licks: all licks selected (e.g. by option -t). Add option '–lick-radio' to make harpwise play licks without interruption (but repeats); as an optional argument you may give the number of repeats
• pitch: play an interactive, adjustable pitch; this may help to find the key of a song by ear-comparison; the initial key, e.g. 'a4' can be supplied as an optional argument
• interval, inter: interactive, adjustable interval given as arguments
• progression, prog: take a base and some semitone diffs, then play it in a loop, allowing e.g. to shift each iteration by some semitones e.g. through a chord-progression of i-iv-v. Moreover you may specify two or more progressions with a dot (.) between; those can then be switched for each iteration.
• chord: play the given holes or notes simultanously as a chord; also useful for tongue-splits.
• user: play back (if any), what you (the user) have recorded in mode 'licks' before

Play a few holes and notes on a harp of key c:

harpwise play c +1 -2 c4

Play a few semitones:

harpwise play c +1st -4st

Play the lick 'wade'; transpose it to d:

harpwise play d wade

Play an earlier lick:

harpwise play 3l

To see a list of earlier licks:

harpwise print licks-history

Various ways to play all licks:

Shuffled and in random order, without end:

harpwise play licks

or play them one after another as they appear in your lickfile:

harpwise play licks --iterate cycle

or shorter:

harpwise play licks -i c

Only play favorite licks (tag 'fav'):

harpwise play licks --tags-all fav

or shorter:

harpwise play licks -t fav

Play licks from a progression:

harpwise play licks --lick-prog box1

Play endless, no questions asked, but various controls available:

harpwise play licks --lick-radio

Play an interactive, adjustable pitch:

harpwise play pitch

this may help to find the key of a song that is playing: change the pitch by semitones, fiths or octaves until both match.

harpwise play pitch c

Exactly the same result as above, but with the key of c given explicit. This will actually start of playing g, the root note in second position (cross-harp).

Note: As an alternative, you may try to hum the root note (or tonal center) of the song to find its key. Which is the preferred method, because it does not need a computer; but this command may help to get you started anyway.

Play an interval:

harpwise play inter c4 d4

while this is beeing played you may move it around or widen or narrow it by semitones.

There are multiple ways to specify an interval:

• Either as two notes or holes
• Or as one note or hole plus one interval (named or as semitones)

So these are more ways to play an interval:

harpwise play inter c4 12st    ## Note c4 and 12 Semitones

harpwise play inter +2 pfi     ## Hole +2 and a perfect fifth

The error message (if any) will list valid values.

Play a note progression:

harpwise play prog e3 7st 10st oct

this plays the classic box pattern interactively, you may loop it or shift it by semitones. Holes for the harmonica (if any) are printed along.

A similar progression would be:

harpwise play prog +1 5st 7st 10st

Building on the above, you may want to use the box pattern and the interactive features of 'harpwise play prog' to play (sort of) a full 12-bar blues: Start with the progression above, switch on loop and let it repeat 4 times (i.e. for 4 bars); this is the i-chord. Then shift by 5 Semitones up or 7 down, to get the iv-chord, and let this play another two times; then 5 semitones down to get the i-chord again, then 7 etc., etc. until all 12 bars have been played.

If you want to switch between multiple progressions, separate them by a dot ('.') like so (using both progressions from above):

harpwise play prog e3 7st 10st oct . +1 5st 7st 10st

Alternatively (and without using the progression feature) you may get a similar result by playing predefined licks. As harpwise comes with licks of the 'box pattern' for chords i, iv and v, you may ask the wise to play the bass-line of a 12-bar blues like this:

harpwise play box1-i box1-i box1-i box1-i box1-iv
  box1-iv box1-i box1-i box1-v box1-iv box1-i simple-turn

which also uses the simple-turn lick at the end; you may also replace 'box1' with 'box2' for a variant.

harpwise play boogie-i boogie-i boogie-iv boogie-v boogie-iv boogie-i simple-turn

which might be a starting point for improvisation.

Another way of playing would be:

harpwise play chord +1 +2 +3 -3/

plays the given holes (notes may be given too) simultanously; the given example is (by the way) a flat-seventh-chord, what you may find out by using print:

harpwise print +1 +2 +3 -3/

If you record yourself during lick-practice,

harpwise play user

plays what you have recorded before in mode 'licks' (where you need to trigger the recording explicitly).