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This reminds me of an adult lady, mid-forties, who came to study piano with me many years ago. Her goal was to learn to play “Fur Elise” by Beethoven, since her husband had bought her a fine Steinway grand piano. The tough job was teaching her how to read music, and all the additional materials like music theory and technique, to get her to the point of being able to play “Elise.” Anyway, we both persevered, with joy and some tears, and finally after about three years she was able to play “Elise” very well. After that, she did a few other fun pieces before her life became too busy to continue her piano lessons. This is just to let you know that “it CAN be done,” with enough persistence and patience!
Harp Hugs everyone,
BalfourMolly, I guess so many of us are against Suzuki because the process of learning to read music is so difficult, you really have to work on it all of your life. Even though I am a wonderful reader of music and sight-reader, I play by ear much better than I can read music, so I am always working to increase my reading ability to get it up to par with my playing ability, ha, ha! If I had not started reading music at 6 years old, I cannot imagine how hard it would have been to catch up. By then, I had played piano by ear for more than a year, so I was spoiled! I resisted reading music, and also reading anything, period. Thank goodness I had teachers and parents who MADE me do it!
If we didn’t have a written language, I could not be communicating with all of you right now. So it is with music–the written music is our universal language. It is all well and good to play by ear and enjoy it, but music also needs to be written down in order to preserve it. Folk music has to be practiced and handed down from generation to generation, but it is really wonderful when some folks who have the training actually WRITE IT DOWN!
Harp Hugs everyone,
BalfourGood to see your post, Philippa! I still don’t see Shelley’s last one, but I totally agree about violinists who learn from Suzuki. Since they are only reading a melody line, I think natural reading ability would come sooner with the violin, like it does with band instruments. The problem of reading on the harp, piano, or organ is that we have to play “all the parts,” not just a melodic line!
I imagine that the writers of Suzuki believed that harp students would come to the instrument with some background in piano, from what you said. It makes sense, and then hopefully you would already have some music-reading ability.
Wishing you all a great day harping,
BalfourShelley, your most recent post is not showing up here. But, it came to me in an email, so I will respond concerning the Bach Prelude in C. I play that piece on pedal and lever harp, and I prefer the C tuning for my lever harp. All you need to do for the Prelude is use sharps for the flats, and it is easier to play it this way, at least for me. For example, in m. 12, use A# for B flat, and do like-wise for all the other flats that follow. Accidental sharps are easier than flats on the pedal harp, since you just hold the pedal down with your foot for the time needed to play the sharp, then let the pedal go back up to natural (don’t latch the pedal!). For flats, you have to unlatch the pedal from natural and let the pedal go up to flat, then take it back down and latch it again in natural.
Also, you don’t have to race through this beautiful piece. It is quite nice played at about 80 for the quarter note (4 notes to a beat). It is very expressive on the harp–enjoy!
Harp Hugs,
BalfourShelley, have you been following the thread on here called “Is This Normal?” We have had some very interesting posts, which you might enjoy!
Harp Hugs,
Balfour (and Carol Lynn)https://www.swansonharp.com/store/bochsa-revisited-40-easy-etudes-vol-i-etudes-1-through-20-op-318
Molly, I hope this gets you to Carl’s website where the Bochsa Etudes are featured!
Harp Hugs,
BalfourMolly, so glad to hear that! Learning this piece all by yourself will give you the courage to do it again and again, with new music. I have been thinking about how much you would benefit from Carl Swanson’s etude collections. If you go to his website, you can see what he offers and samples of the music. I highly recommend these!
Thanks for letting us know about all of your progress. We are so proud of you. Hang in there!
Harp Hugs,
Balfour (and Carol Lynn)I should add that we regulate a harp as perfectly as we CAN in half steps, ha, ha! It is very likely not to be “perfect,” but if it sounds good to the human ear, it is wonderful!
Saul, it varies with each particular piano and harp. The longer the bass strings are, like in a concert grand piano or harp, the more I seem to stretch by ear. But it is usually 4 cents or less, when checked with the Korg tuner. When I was regulating the lowest E (7E) on my Atlantide this weekend, I checked it on the Korg after I had meticulously tuned the harp by ear. The 7E read 3 cents flat, so I had obviously stretched the tuning by only 1 cent per octave. This means that 7E flat, 7E natural, and 7 E# ALL read 3 cents flat, which was perfectly regulated. If that string was tuned up that 3 cents, to what the Korg says is “perfect A=440” then all 3 pitches would also be exact half steps from each other. When Carl said that he tunes exclusively by the tuner, not by ear, when he regulates harps, the half steps are perfect, regardless of whether the harpist stretches the tuning by ear or not. We only actually TUNE the flats, in C flat Major! The discs take care of everything else. The harp would be perfectly regulated in half steps, using the tuner.
I have been a professional piano tuner since I was 15 years old, so tuning the harp, even 47 strings, is extremely easy for me. I use a Korg tuner to tune and temper the middle octave of a piano or harp, then do the rest of the instrument by ear. My ear does the natural “stretching” that you guys are talking about, so I do not have to calculate it with a machine. My music professors liked my tuning so much when I was in college that I got asked to tune all of their pianos, which helped me to be able to afford to stay in college.
If you check my tuning with the Korg after I am done, the bass will appear “flat” and the treble will appear “sharp.” String players and other instrumentalists have to compensate for this when playing along with a piano, as Saul said above.
When I restrung my Camac Atlantide Prestige, I used Bow Brand concert standard tarnish-resistant bass wires. My harp sounds superb with these strings, and they do not hit each other at the mid-point when plucked HARD! The harp was originally strung with Italian Galli bass wires, which were great sounding, but they tarnished badly in our damp summer weather here in the mountains of NC. I only had to update the regulation of 4 or 5 discs, 1 natural and the others sharps, and very minimally, on the new 12 bass wires. The Camac mechanism stays where you set it, so only the normal changes in the wooden structure of the harp causes anything to go out of regulation. On my former L&H 85’s, the high discs could sometimes slip, which was very annoying after a regulation.
