Fritz (The Harpmicman) Hasenpusch will tell you that he's a native Californian, born in San Francisco. He's descended from generations of skilled artisans adept in woodworking, metal craft, the fine arts, and strange practices involving rare pigments and exotic finishes. His interest in (and obsession with) microphones began during childhood and has only intensified with the passage of time and the experience he's gathered through years of work in audio engineering, broadcasting, recording, sound reinforcement, and performing professionally. During the '60s, he also began performing "experiments" on the microphones he would acquire, studying ways to alter their performance, appearance, and packaging. He also began doing repairs for others upon request. "Some guys hot rodded cars, I hot-rodded microphones." Being a harp-player himself ("Love Me Do" by the Beatles marked the beginning, seeing Butter and Cotton perform sealed the deal), there have always been plenty of opportunities to do test drives on the creatures he began developing from raw materials. Interest in these creations began to grow among players who learned of them... His handmade harmonica microphones have become the culmination of the widely varied disciplines he's learned to combine. "It doesn't look like I'll grow out of this...".

Fritz is an active harp-playing singer/songwriter/recording artist, performing with "Fritz and Bobo", co-author of Harmonica Microphones (part of the Gig Saver Series for Mel Bay), and spends an inordinate amount of time down in "The Dungeon", slaving over microphones. He will be surfacing regularly to share his accumulated mic wisdom here...

Fritz - The Harp Mic Man