Top harmonica players/bands?

Any early Muddy Waters features the great Little Walter on harmonica.

Sonny Boy Williamson

James Cotton

Sugar Blue

Charlie Musselwhite

Big Walter Horton

Sonny Terry (those whoops make it even better!)

Carey Bell

Famous Harmonica Players

Best Harmonica Players

Sonny Boy #1 (John Lee Williamson)

Sonny Boy #2 (Alek "Rice" Miller)

Little Walter (Marion Jacobs)

Big Walter (Horton)

Sonny Terry

Will Shade (Memphis Jug Band)

Jaybird Coleman

Junior Wells

Lazy Lester

Slim Harpo

Howlin' Wolf

James Cotton

James Harman

Rod Piazza

Tom Ball

Rick Estrin (Little Charlie & the Nightcats)

George "Harmonica" Smith

Snooky Pryor

John Paul Hammond

Gary Primich

Phil Wiggins (Cephas & Wiggins)

This is a long list-but it covers the majority of great blues harp players. Buy what you can find cheaply. There are also many good blues hard complilations. For either, try Amazon, eBay, Half.com, etc.

Bill Lupkin - Hard Pill to Swallow (Blue Bella Records)

Billy Gibson - Live @ the Rum Boogie Cafe (Daddy-O Records)

Rod Piazza - Thrillville (Delta Groove)

Junior Wells - Live at Theresa's (Delmark)

The Twisters - After the Storm (Northern Blues)

Paul Reddick - Revue (Northern Blues)

Charlie Musselwhite - Delta Hardware

anything by Mark Hummel

Paul Butterfield - An Anthology (Elektra) 2 Disc Greatest Hits compilation

are all some recent blues harmonica releases that are great, and probably not well known.

Quinnzelle, Odalia, Natalie, Lisette, Daphne, Roz, Brenda, Nicole, Dawn Bruce, Chad, Jeremiah, Hayden, Troy

Sonny Boy Williamson 1 and 2 - Little Walter

And for a duo try Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee.

All very classic and very famous blues

How about the BEST players (known or not) ? Try following ,in the footsteps of Jason Ricci (from Memphis); John Popper(Blues Traveler); Charlie Musselwhite, Gary Smith, Curtis Salgado, to name a few. Now, Toots Thielmans and Johnny Puleo--- OK, they're not Blues players, but they WERE good.

While I agree with many of my esteemed colleagues on the list and their lists of great harp players, there are too many CD's available for you to choose without going crazy. So, along with my list of great players and bands, I'm including some of my all-time favorite harp-centric albums.

Players:

Active Today:

Jason Ricci and New Blood (pushing out of blues, though)

Blues Traveler (John Popper) They're rock/pop, though

Stevie Wonder

Little Charlie and the Nightcats (Rick Estrin)

Rod Piazza and the Mighty Flyers

Kim Wilson

Dennis Gruenling

Billy Branch

ODBG (Old, Dead Blues Guys, It's a term of endearment, however mordid):

Little Walter

Big Walter

Sonny Boy 2

Slim Harpo

George Smith

Junior Wells

William Clarke

Some really killer harp CD's (In my opinion)

Jimmy Rogers: "Chicago Bound" (some of Little Walter's best work)

The Red Devils: "King King"

William Clarke: "Blowin' Like Hell"

Rod Piazza and the Mighty Flyers: "Live at B.B. King's"

"Big Walter Horton With Carey Bell" (on Aligator records)

Kim Wilson: "Tigerman" or "Smokin' Joint"

James Cotton: "Mr. Superharp Live"

Blues Masters Series #4 "Harmonica" (this is a great overview of classic harp tunes)

Any "best of" Little Walter, Sonnyboy 2, or Muddy Waters

Little Charlie and the Nightcats: "Captured Live"

"Blues Traveler" (the first one, self titled)

J. Geils Band: "Full House Live"

Paul Butterfield: "East West"

Jason Ricci: "Rocket #9" (this one is wild, but not a blues album)

Any of Charlie Musslewhite's first 3 records on Vangaurd

Junior Wells: "Hoodoo Man Blues"

Bharath Rajakumar (sp) ". .. Fatty" something I forget

Anything from Satan and Adam

Hollywood Fats Band (there's only like one or two available, with Al Blake on harp)

If you want to get some of this stuff and seem really hip, go to bluebeatmusic dot com. They have the stuff you won't find on Amazon.

Charlie Musselwhite is a good player, Mark Ford is one of my favorites.. (Robben's brother).