Totally NOT harp related

[Sylvia]

Goodness. Do you live in a tent?

[jimmy-h]

Wow, and I was sad that I had to change my 2nd E two days in a row.

[Sid Humphreys]

LOL, No Sylvia. I live in a typical (Dallas) town home that was built in the 80’s. That means single paned windows and poor insulation on the outside walls. When the temperature outside falls below 30, the downstairs heater can’t keep up. It runs almost nonstop which dries up the air in the house. I’ve seen the humidity on my hygrometer drop from 45% to 12% in a matter of hours, even though it may be wet outside. On days like that we have to fill the humidifier 2-3 times a day because it is working so hard to keep up.

[tonie-ogimachi]

This thread seems very harp-related to me :)! I’m wondering if anyone here has insights on harps in very humid climates. We’ve just bought a home near Hilo, Hawaii, where rain is measured in feet. I have not yet moved my harp there from the Central Coast of California, but I am thinking about it in the next couple of years. I’m worried about too much constant humidity, and the effect of that on the harp. The home requires neither heat nor air conditioning, because of the the trade winds that flow through. But I do worry about the nearly constant rainy climate.

[Sylvia]

As for windows, I had LoE2 double-paned windows put in back 7-8 yrs ago. I hope they are making better ones by now. The glass is fine, but the metal around the panes conducts heat and cold, so the total effect is you get both heat and cold. I’ve lined some of the metal parts with stick-on stuff and used weatherstripping for the bigger areas of metal. Terribly disappointing.

As for Hawaii, I’d worry about the salt in the air as well as the humidity. If the harp stays home all the time, maybe it could have its own room with climate control.

[patricia-jaeger]

Tonie, I only have second hand information about harps in Hawaii: First, if harps are used at a great distance from the area (latitude, longitude) from where they were built, their tone will not be the best. Something in the wood changed. Can an expert harp maker clarify that for us? Second: I have read that when a pedal harpist moved to the North American continent from her former Hawaiian residence, after playing for some years in hotels, and tried to sell her harp, an inspection revealed that years of high humidity in Hawaii had damaged the metals inside her harp beyond repair, and she could not sell it. I think we’d all appreciate more first-hand information on this subject.

[Alison]

What Patricia writes makes perfect sense, think about Stradivari, starting his business in Cremona, a locality where the wood was perfect for his instruments and how wood swells and shrinks even in the same place over the course of the year, due to changes in temperature and humidity/wetness, ( I went to the Strad exhibition in Oxford during the summer and they are remarkable instruments). I know my windows are noticeably tighter in the winter when the frames have swelled – and as for the metal work – brass is susceptible to rust, perhaps exacerbated by salty air. Are the pins and linkages steel ? Steel also rusts, by the way but not stainless steel.

[tonie-ogimachi]

Yes, it would be great to hear more about this. I have exchanged emails with a harpist on the Kona side, as well. I haven’t had any issues with salt air on the Central Coast of California. But we don’t have the high humidity here. My Hawaii move is still a couple of years off, but I have been wondering about this as time moves on. I appreciate everyone’s insight here.

[ellen-beckerman]

You know, you might want to contact Sylvia Woods. She just moved there, has had a vacation house there for many years. I believe she kept harps in the house as well as having just moved there (I’m pretty sure that is the case). info@harpcenter.com I hope that is helpful!

[barbara-brundage]

We have both high humidity and plenty of salt in the air on the coast in SE FL. It’s not great for gilding unless you use air conditioning, but I’ve never had, nor heard of anyone having, any of the problems Patricia describes, not even the harpists down in the islands.

As a matter of fact, my current pedal harp had spent all its life, from 1978 till the mid 2000s, in an oceanfront house that was only used about 2 months a year and was shut up with no A/C or anything the rest of the time. It was like a new harp, except for the gold and of course the finish on the action plates looks like that on any L&H that old, but most of the problems with the gold were from other causes. Perhaps in equatorial Africa or something….

And I’ve never heard a touring harpist here complain that the harps all sound weird.

[tonie-ogimachi]

Thanks Barbara!
I’d say Florida sounds like a good “test” for both humidity and marine climate. My Hawaii house is actually further from the coast than my California house. So far, my harps have not suffered from from salt air, and I live within a mile of the beach in California. I wonder most about the humidity. I think a dehumidifier might be a reasonable solution, if I get worried about it. My L&H 85 P has no gold, so that’s one less worry. I also have a carbon fiber fiber harp that I don’t worry about at all. I also have a note to both Sylvia Woods and Bonnie Mitchell on the subject.

Thanks to everyone for weighing in on this.

[kay-lister]

A BEAUTIFUL weekend here on the Eastern Shore of MD – low 60s, “Played” pick up sticks in the yard and weeded some flower beds. NOW, the temp is supposed to drop to the low 30s and they’re calling for SNOW on Wednesday! Heck with the harp (not really), MY joints are going to come apart!!! CRAZY WEATHER!!!

😉 Kay

[jimmy-h]

The nights are still chilly, but daytime temps have been around 70’s a few times here. Still too much chance of a freeze but garden time is coming fast.

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