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yes it’s not exactly beginners stuff…
The Little Fountain by Samuel O. Pratt, Ana Harp: http://youtu.be/yZreDLhVuSYThe plight of young soft hands has come to the fore lately with two pupils, one keen the other new, they seem to get very sore very quickly, so I guess I know the answer to this, is gut much harder on the fingers than nylon – it must be surely – but how do you get a ‘medium’ tensioned harp in nylon ?
well then it seems to me after reading you comments, that going to bed doused with hand cream and white gloves is a good idea and not just for cosmetic reasons.
Touche – I’d never learnt downward arpeggios properly either until I played La Source and knew they were a weak spot. I regard La Source as a Grade-8 level study, so how difficult is Little Fountain ? (it’s familiar but not in my library of music) and thanks for pointing out that is it for lever harp.
Many pupils do not succeed with the harp because they don’t commit to engaging their memory when learning a piece either to get through tricky bits which are too busy to read off the page during a performance, or to use their memory well enough to achieve a reliable and repeatable performance. Orchestral harp require cramming of the really tricky bits, so you need time and good planning.
The harp requires many memory triggers to play intermediate and advanced repertoire but even elementary stuff is difficult for new learners. For myself what’s most annoying is how unreliable the memory can be when performing, however the instance something goes wrong the player spots or hears their own mistake, their memory is there, but the recall wasn’t accurate enough to avoid errors. How can this be managed ?
When I was young my parents and indeed school played and trained my memory with all kinds of games and songs and poetry, but we see fewer of these exercises nowadays, with all the technology around. I did a drama course and at first I was the only one to learn my lines, people don’t bother much nowadays and they just use Sat-Nav to get around. Finding visual and musical patterns is the most useful thing you can do on a harp, until your aural and muscle memory owns and direct the piece.I generally practise in a flat pair at home and in rehearsals, have a different pair with heels for orchestral concerts in my concert bag and occasionally find a work which definitely needs heels, such as the Debussy Dances. I wouldn’t play much in socks or barefoot, in case I hurt myself, as some pedal changes take a bit of let’s say, commitment. The dance shoes sound like a good idea. They all get a bit scuffed on top – so I don’t like using best shoes and moreover, to keep everything clean, I wouldn’t play with shoes that have been out in the street…. The worst thing for me is a wooden or parquet floor in heels, so noisy and slippy when playing as I am used to carpet. Stone floors are not so bad somehow.
Let’s close this thread now. I’ll conclude that children who have 2-3 years of piano or guitar are likely to have developed certain motor skills which present greater challenges for the transition onto the harp and teaching the hands to play in ‘different modes’ isn’t easily achieved. Perhaps this is actually easier for adults who have a broader outlook.
well I quite agree and with a young child I can stay on the 2nd finger until it’s working reasonably well, but today was different because the pupil was different (already a pianist) and whilst I know that taking it steadily is important, I needed to show her something of how fingers work on the harp and can reinforce technique next time.
I was a little surprised when she mentioned that the harp was like the inside of the piano, after reading it here…. well now, a very exacting percussionistic style on the piano is quite the opposite of the approach required on the harp and with a tendency to put a lot of finger thro’ the strings, this was technically the trickiest initial lesson I have ever had; with a child who expected it to be easier and wanted to use her hands in the exactly the same way as the piano. Learning to place and replace finger and thumb was hardly successful and placing 3-2-1 (as she wanted to pick out a tune) contravened the principles of her piano technique entirely but of course the brain trains our muscles and touch very thoroughly. So learning new tricks is very slow at first; hence the reason for my query.
BTW using D# and G# on the lever harp produces quite a pretty glissando when you suddenly need a cheerful diversion……..!!oh, what about #10 ? If swearing were allowed I would swear that there is a harp in Shostakovich 10, but I might be confusing him with another Russian composer, one of those senior moments………
I will….!! Here’s my own little story….. I fixed up piano lessons myself but broke my wrist rollerskating home one evening after a lesson, forgetting the hill was dangerously steep…… and then I broke the other arm 10 day after that one came out of plaster !! My schoolpal harpist friend remembers this interlude… By the time I was ready for lessons again, the piano teacher announced she was leaving for Australia, so I reckoned I’d never find another as reasonably priced as her lessons.
I think the emphasis on etudes is a most helpful point, to establish and build basic technique in the initial and catch-up periods; I have all these to hand, the Grossi’s etc and many intermediate sonatas when the time comes, but for now I will remember the adage that making music in the first lesson is important for any child to take away, otherwise it’s just basic hand positions and working fingers 2+1.
Every child is different !! We all are… for me a piano was always there at home as an option (& I took piano lessons aged 10 having started harp at 8). At home we explored chords and jazz & I could play Scott Joplin in my teens but I never performed the piano in public. Luckily I have a compact 6 octave Eavestaff piano here which is really useful.We say it is a ‘spread’ chord like a ripple, usually upwards but often downwards and denoted by a wavy line in front of the chord, although Debussy had his own notation. Note that the word Arpeggio is the italian for “harp-like” – well check this out. The variable speed of the execution is what matters and we pay a lot of attention to this in every piece. Once you know what to look for you can’t miss it. Understanding this is probably taken as a given in a site like this…. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arpeggio
thanks – so I should be aware of assumptions musically and capability/ expectations. No-one’s mentioned plucking, technique, placing ahead & the awkwardness.
I can’t think of anything except the obvious from the 1940’s “I took my harp to party, but nobody asked me to play” – is quite funny but VERY dated & perhaps would be better if delivered with an upbeat diction and a more agreable accent ……. When I was aged 8-10 my mother used to carry the school harp home thro’ town and passers by used to quote the first few words; being so young I didn’t have a clue what they were talking about……and nobody explained. You can find this on youtube and the words are somewhere too.
