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Hi Carl,
I am a professional lever harpist in Chicago. To address some of the previous questions (I skimmed the answers so please forgive me if this has already been answered satisfactorily!):
I first learned lever harp from a mostly pedal/some lever teacher w/ Grandjany technique and using the Grossi exercise book. As a teacher I still make use of this book as well as L&H’s “Fun From the First 1 & 2” for lever harp students whether they learn by sheet music or by ear. Some of the short pieces in these L&H books have accidentals which make for a good starting point in helping the student get comfortable with changing levers during a piece. The majority of music I now focus on is traditional Irish although with my classical background I teach that as well if relevant. Either way, I’ll make sure that lever changes are happening from one piece to the next or within the piece if possible to help w/ lever comfort/ease when the student is ready for this.
Note that a fully levered harp will offer a variety of possibilities as far as what keys are readily available at any given time, depending on how you decide to tune it. That said, I first learned & continue to tune the harp to the key of C with all B, E & A levers up. This way, keys C-E major & keys C-Eb major (& all relative minors) are available w/o any additional tuning needed. This tuning gives a more balanced overall sound and reasonable amount of standard key options/accidentals w/o having to re-tune all the time; making standard “classical” & wedding rep easily accessible to the lever harpist. Enharmonics come in handy now & then as well 🙂
As far as lever harps go, agreed there is a wide variety and to some degree will depend on the maker. The “mid-size” lever harps usually range from 30 or 32 up to 36 strings, and then of course the lap harps w/ levers avg. anywhere from 19-28/30 (not often) strings. The majority of lever harps offer standard (pedal) string spacing, although I have found that most have a *slightly* lighter string tension. That said, the “lever harp” that L&H designed for pedal harpists is much taller, similar string tension/spacing to a pedal, and basically has levers instead of pedals (I wouldn’t consider it a good representation of your average lever harp).
The other exception to string tension on lever harps would be for what you earlier referred to as “folk harp.” Most of these far lighter tension & very responsive stringed lever harps are found by makers (such as Larry Eager) in the UK/Ireland to facilitate the fast dance music & other Celtic repertoire more commonly played there (far more than in the US overall by comparison). The only other makers outside of the UK/Ireland I have come across with a similar string consideration would be Camac harps and Larry Fisher based in Winnipeg.
My understanding is the type of wood for the soundboard will dictate overall tonality vs. the structural wood, which is why I opted for Koa for my newest harp, reducing the weight by 8 lbs! from my previous Walnut mid-size lever harp, and making it much easier to move around frequently for gigs. Ultimately if you have concerns about wood, as well as string spacing/tension/material/dimensions, I recommend talking directly to the maker/manufacturer whenever possible.
Hope this makes sense and hope this helps!
All the best, Aislinn Gagliardi
