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HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! Elizabeth, I laughed so hard at that. Well gosh, I should put on my resume then that I studied with Vera Dulova(one lesson, but a real one), Hans Zingle, and I don’t know who else.
Elizabeth- You’re absolutely right. I should have said that there is pain and discomfort sometimes simply from playing the wrong way, and that can lead to serious injury. But there can be temporary discomfort and pain from making big changes to ones technique. That kind of discomfort should be temporary and disappear quickly. That’s what happened to my student and to me when I worked initially with Pierre jamet. He had made some changes to my left hand, and initially I had some pain on the top of the left forearm. When I mentioned it to him he said that it didn’t mean I was doing anything wrong, just different, and that in a short time that would disappear. He was right.
I just wanted to add here that I’m talking about big changes, not the smaller(but equally important) things your teacher tells you each week about technique.
Now that I think of it, his name must have been written Swede, short for Swedish. His real name was George, but absolutely everybody called him Swede
David- Consider yourself very lucky that this imagined incident involved an adult man, and think what could have happened if she or anyone else for that matter had made such allegations concerning a child student of yours. the consequences would have been catastrophic for you, and again, you would have been considered guilty until, with enormous difficulty, proven inocent.
I was very active in Boy Scouts as a child(and came thisclose to becoming an Eagle Scout). The Scout master,Suede Nelson, was a great guy and in my 6 years in scouts-and this was in the 1950’s- there was never a hint of scandel. But recently, his widow, now in her 80’s, told me that Suede made a point, without ever telling anyone, of making sure that he was never, ever alone with any of the boys, just to protect himself from the possibility of false accusations. I would suggest to anyone who teaches private music lessons that they insist that a parent sit in on the lesson. I still remember about 20 years ago the wave of accusations across the United States of abuse of kindergarten age children. It took years, but every single one of those who were accused were exonerated. But only after spending years in prison.
I’ve been doing a slow burn over this thread ever since I read it this morning. The question at the top of the thread is rude and insulting, and all harp makers should be offended by it. It would be appropriate to ask what other’s expeience is with this or that make of instrument, even though that too is highly subjective. It would be better to post the question asking what kind of harp other readers have and why they like them. That could be very informative, although again, subjective. But the wording of that question is incredibly crass.
Michael- your post is just wonderful and should appear as a soundingboard piece, if it hasn’t already.
Esmeralda- Just a little clarification on your post. In the period between let’s say 1890 and 1920 in Paris, there was a HUGE split among French composers as to which direction French music should go. The academic composers, led by Faure, but also including Theodor Dubois, Gabriel Pierne, etc. felt that French composition should continue out of the old traditions. The Impressionists, led by Debussy, and including Ravel, Andre Caplet, Deodat de Severac, and of course Tournier, took a radically different approach. The two groups really didn’t mix at all and had little or no respect for each other. Renie, as well as Hasselmans, sided with the academics. Those opposing them called themselves ‘Debussyists.’ Pierre Jamet, at the tail end of his life, said to me, “Moi, j’etais Debussyist!” Many of the fine harpists produced by Hasselmans had enormous respect for the man and what he taught them technically, but they HATED the music he taught. Pierre Jamet was a huge proponent of contemporary music, as was Micheline Kahn. Salzedo shared the same attitudes as these other harpists, but because he had impressive compositional talents, also went off in a radically different direction. I think that Salzedo, being Salzedo, did not want to follow either of the two trends of his day(the academics or the Debussyists) and so created his own style.
Katie- Your list is a good explanation of the major problems that harpists face with many harp parts. But I don’t think referring to that list is going to get composers to write better for the harp. I think that the common denominator to many badly or ineffective harp parts is that the composer was composing at the piano and heard harp sounds in his head but in fact was writing for the piano. There’s an issue of awkwardness that occurs when someone writes for an instrument that he doesn’t play. I think that this is less of an issue with instruments that play only one note at a time(trumpet, violin, etc.) but becomes a major problem with piano, organ, harp, etc.
There are two major things that can go wrong when a composer writes for the harp. One, that the notes that he writes are, for any of the reasons you mentioned above, simply unplayable. Two, that the composer wrote something in a range of the instrument that can’t be done. Composers simply can’t grasp the fact that each octave of the harp has its own characteristics. Things it can, and can’t do. You can’t play staccato in the 6th and 7th octaves. You can’t play leggato in the first octave or really in the second for that matter. Since we don’t have a sustain/damper pedal, you can’t write constantly repeated notes. In addition to all of that, you can’t have the harp playing when the whole orchestra is playing and expect it to be heard. The best thing a composer can do is consult with a harpist during the composing process so that he ends up writing a part that does what he intended it to do, and which is playable.
That’s probably true Tacye. It may in fact be Salzedo who was the first to write things down the way the harpist would want to see them(not counting the harmonics issue). If I think back on all of the music I’ve played, he was probably the first one to write everything down. There is very little editing to do when one plays a transcription or composition by Salzedo, provided you agree with what he decided. If that is true(that he was the first to notate what the harpist really needed to see) then that is an enormous contribution.
I can’t think of any 19th century publications or working editions of harp music that I’ve seen that had pedals, fingering, etc. written in. Maybe some of you English harpists can shed some light on that.
+++I sometimes get a little irritated by all the Salzedo bashing…+++
Well now you know what it’s like to have the shoe on the other foot! For 40 years I have had to listen to many(but not all!)Salzedo teachers and many(but not all!) Salzedo students make snide and demeaning remarks about anyone who doesn’t play Salzedo method. “Well, of course you can’t hear her, she’s got no sound at all.” “If you don’t play Salzedo method you have no chance of getting an orchestra job.” That one was put up on a harp chatroom by a college level harp teacher! “If you don’t play Salzedo Method, you simply can’t get any sound out of the left hand.” That is a direct quote from Lucile Lawrence! “Well I understand that the orchestra is already trying to get rid of her. They realize they’ve made a bad mistake.” I have sat at the kitchen table in Camden and listened silently as several former students of Alice, names you would instantly recognize, make the above remarks. When I’ve heard performances at a Harp Society Conference, the Salzedo harpists make glowing remarks about the Salzedo players on the program. The non-Salzedo players are not even on the radar screen. It’s as if they didn’t even play. I’ve attended all but 5 of the harp conferences since 1975 and I can’t think right now of a single exception to this. Sorry to spout off like this, but you really touched a raw nerve.
Salzedo’s greatest contribution to the harp world was the pedal diagram. That was pure genius. When something is a good idea, people grasp it willingly and immediately, and that’s what happened with the pedal diagram. As for his negative impact on the harp world, as seen by many non-Salzedo harpists, well, there isn’t enough space here to deal with that.
The question was, who makes a good teacher. And my answer is, someone with something to teach AND the ability to teach it. There are many great musicians who have absolutely no idea how to explain what they are doing. Often the most gifted are the worst teachers because everything came so easily to them that they can’t conceive of anyone else having problems. But there are rare exceptions. Grandjany, Jamet, Borot, Renie, and many others were harpists of phenominal ability who were able to explain in detail how they did what they did.
I could(but won’t!)name several important orchestra harpists with important teaching positions who are dreadful teachers. Having an orchestra job is absolutely no guarantee that that person can teach and prepare his/her students for a professional career.
