Hello, Tremolists.
The Asian System reed placement is standard on tremolo
harps made by the East Asian harmonica manufacturers:
Suzuki; Tombo; Quimei; Golden Cup; Miwha, and other
Asian harp makers.
The Asian System is a variant of the German and Brazilian
Richter System reed placement.
The Hohner, Seydel & Hering and other harmonica makers'
tremolos and octave harps have "do" or "mi" as the lowest-
pitched reed. Asian System tremolos and octave harps
have "so" as the lowest-pitched reed.
Japanese tremolo harmonica player Hidero Sato introduced
the Asian System reed placement while competing in the 1929
World Harmonica Championship in Trossingen, Germany.
Hidero earned the World Champion Tremolo Player Award at
the contest. In 1931, he introduced Asian System minor keys
(natural minor & harmonic minor).
In 1953, Shanghai, China native Cham-Ber Huang (1925-
2014) was invited to USA citizenship, by the USA Ambassador
to China. In 1958, Huang was a USA citizen. Hohner appointed
Mr. Huang as the chief USA Hohner products designer, from
1958 through 1981.
During that time, Huang introduced octave-tuned solo system
double reed harps; solo system tremolos; Chordomonicas; the
CBH 2012 and 2016; mini-cross harps; the Chordet 20 chord
harp; single-reed 48 chord harps, with and without bass notes;
and more.
In 1953, Hohner asked Huang to develop a tremolo harmonica for
Asian players. He resurrected the Sato reed placement. Since then,
most Asian tremolo players use the Sato (Asian) system.
On the advertisement/instruction sheet included with the Hohner
Asian system tremolos, the inventor of the Asian (Sato) system
was listed as "C.B. Wang".
Best Regards, Thanks, Hidero.
JB
