How did you afford your first harp??

[unknown-user]

My daughter was 3 months old.

[Michael H]

Sorry to bump this thread all the way back! Well I haven’t gotten a harp yet, but I know my first harp will be the Ogden, which I plan to pick up within the following month…

Like the rest of us, I’m completely crazy for harps, my heart skips a little whenever I spot one on the telly…Shame I’ve never seen for real yet, save for a little pakistani harp. Sheesh, not even the city’s orchestra has a harpist! (We have a midi pianist…I’m sure she’s a marvelous pianist, but that’s a huge slap in the face to harpists!)

Anyway, I’ve worked for quite some time now, and I finally have enough! I’m so excited! Think they’ll let me play the harp in my school’s concert band?

[unknown-user]

If they don’t welcome you to play in your school’s band, they should. Here in the states, the pressure to march has delayed the welcome of the string bass and harp to the wind ensemble, but there is plenty of historical support for having both.

Your bigger problem, once you get yourself in, is what they’ll give you to play if there is no part for harp written in the score, and encouraging the conductor to look at pieces that are scored for harp.

It may be slow, but you’ll be a wind ensemble pioneer.

By the way, my conception of the harp I wnated a year ago is completely different from what I’m looking for now, so my stash is still safe. For now.

[Michael H]

We’ll turn heads with Vivaldi’s Harp Concerto!

Wait… Is that possible to play on that type of harp with only a few months to get acquainted with the instrument..? I have big dreams, I guess! Lucky for me though, we don’t do any marching in where I live (don’t know about the bigger Ontarian cities though!)…Although, marches do make up a lot of the material we play. I just think having a harp player would score us a gold at the Music Festival!

[jennifer-buehler]

Not meaning to hijack this thread but there is plenty of harp parts written for concert band.

[unknown-user]

Absolutely right, Jennifer, but a school band might not have the chops to do arrangements

[Cheryl Z.]

Hi Curly,

Mine is a simple story, but was a dream fulfilled.

[unknown-user]

I started out thinking I would buy an inexpensive harp–knowing nothing, I

[Julietta Anne Rabens]

While finishing up my doctorate in music I bought
my LH 85CG. Months prior to this my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer and was forced into early retirement. She was still making payments on a Yamaha upright piano. She had to reduce her monthly expenses, so I took over the piano payments assuming it cancelled out the option of buying a harp. I had been practicing on the university’s instrument. It worked out for the best.

I worked at least
half-time throughout my graduate studies, attended a land-grant
university with minimal tuition, and typically took out student loans to only
cover the tuition during the years I didn’t have an assistanceship. Towards the end of my graduate training, I took out
larger loan amounts offered while continuing to work the same hours. I made this choice for two years and maxed out one credit card which I paid off over time to buy my pedal harp. I knew it was “now or never” because my financial future was uncertain after graduate school. It was a tremendous risk for me financially, but I had made a decision to place my professional efforts as composer and performer in the area of harp, so the risk was necessary to achieve that goal. It hasn’t been easy since, but I am grateful I took the risk, because the harp speaks to me on the deepest level.

[laura-lockard]

It’s all my husband’s fault!

[Mel Sandberg]

One can cash in one fund for the other.

[Liam M]

I am so ashamed after reading these accounts.

My first harp
was bought as a toy for my grandchildren. Two octaves, steel strings,
steel frame.. A Harbert Golden Jr of Italian design and manufacture. It
came with song cards held in by clips. I tried it out, “Oh Susannah”
and after finally getting it in tune by sitting next to a neighbors
piano and tweaking had a moment of revelation!

[unknown-user]

I hope the so called music teachers who labeled children with the term “tone deaf” during the last 50 or 60 years are somewhere getting their just musical desserts.

In the course of 40 years in both music education and speech therapy, I have found fewer than 5 kids who couldn’t learn to carry a tune. With patience and kindness, it is much more accurate to say that ALL kids can carry a tune than to say that ANY kids are “tone deaf”.

You have brought many joys here, Liam, with your sense of humor and nifty conversation, and I bet you do the same with your music. More power to you!

[Liam M]

Thank you Ann, thank you ever so much.

[michael-steadman]

This is an interesting topic!

Before I was a harpist I was a bassoonist.

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