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Elettaria- I’ll consider changing the original etude 7 so that there are no squiggly lines and just a footnote, like the etude variation. That makes more sense to me too. As for fingering, I have to assume that most if not all students playing these will be working with a teacher, and the teacher will make sure the student is using consistent fingering. Some students only need to see the fingering for a particular pattern once and they automatically figure out that they should use that each time. Others may need to see it more than once, in which case the teacher can write it in where it is needed. One of the important things that can be learned in etudes is thinking, and figuring out how to play a passage. So with minimal fingering its up to the student to remember how that passage is played. In places where I changed the fingering for a passage that had already been played differently, the idea is to show the student that there is more than one way to play something, and that the choice of fingering depends a lot on the individual person and hand.
I currently have a student who is a phenomenal sight reader. I’ve never seen anyone sight read on the harp like she does. But she had several teachers before me, and no one taught her the importance of good fingering. Frankly, when she sight reads, she doesn’t even bother looking at written fingering, nor pedals for that matter. So the result is that she tends to play pieces with the most harebrained fingering you can imagine: 2,2,2,1,1,1,3,3, things like that. I’ve really had to hold her feet to the fire to plan and use good fingering, and she’s much better at it now. Etudes in general, and these Bochsa Revisited etudes in particular, are a perfect place to learn many fundamental skills, including fingering.
Elettaria-I have the music in front of me. The original etude was printed exactly as it was in earlier editions. The first three lines all have squiggly lines next to each chord and then it stops. They come back occasionally throughout the rest of the etude. So in retrospect, I think I should have just put a footnote saying that all the chords should be rolled. That’s what I did for the etude variation. I didn’t use squiggly lines anywhere and just put on the very first chord saying that all chords should be rolled. Maybe I’ll add a footnote to the original etude when it goes into reprint. Thanks for telling me about this.
There are arrangements of the Magic Fire Music that combine the parts. Hans Zingel made one years ago that works well. There may be others.
Tacye- I didn’t stick rigidly to the same fingerings for the original etudes and their variations. In all cases, the fingerings are “suggested” and it’s up to the teacher and student to make the final decision. I did want to show that the same passage could be fingered in different ways. I would hope that by the end of that book, the student would have in his or her technique multiple ways of fingering the same type of passage. For the same reason, I didn’t always put pedal markings below the bass staff. I sometimes stuck them between the staves so the student could get used to reading pedal markings wherever they are. But I’m really glad you’ve taken a look at the book!
Elettaria- Thank you so much for your very kind post. I’m really glad you are enjoying the Bochsa Revisited edition. And I’m glad to hear that it is being sold in Wales. I don’t think you should have to do too much adjusting of the material if you play a 34 string instrument(instead of 36). I don’t think I used those last two strings very often. And thank you for telling me about the misprint on the back cover. I’ve already sent a note to my editor at Carl Fischer to make sure it gets corrected.
In Etude 7, all the chords are meant to be rolled. I just didn’t see the point of putting squiggly lines next to every chord in the piece. My rule when I put together these editions is to de-clutter the page as much as possible. For the Bochsa, I reduced the number of systems per page from 7 to 4 or 5. I have the pedals or lever changes printed as large as they would be written in by hand. I put fingering in where there is a clear question as to how something should be fingered, but if that same passage appears several times, I only write the fingering in once, assuming the player has the brains to figure out that it is played the same way each time.
The bit about making a jump BEFORE you need to play something is a big deal for students at this level, both on harp and piano. After all, they are learning to use their hands independently of each other, and I found when I taught students at this level that the only time they displace one hand or the other is when it needs to play something, and the result is that they are always late getting it.
Concerning 36 string instruments: That’s usually as big as they get in the U.S., and it usually runs from C to C, not A to A. There seems to be little to nothing written that includes low B and A. You could ask your builder to string the instrument C to C if you’re not likely to play pieces that require low A and B.
Jeesh! I must be really lucky. I almost never break strings. I leave them on my harp for years at a time, both gut and nylon. If a gut string breaks at one end or the other, I patch it and get a couple more years out of it. Because I am a harp repairman, I have a big box of old strings(so did Mildred Dilling!) and I fish around in that for replacements when I need them(so did Mildred!). I don’t pay any particular attention to string brand, simply because my sound comes from how I play the instrument, not from the brand of strings I use. But that’s just me…
One way to play a fingering like this is to place in sequence, meaning that you place only one finger at a time ahead of the one that is playing. So for the fingering you are talking about, you start with only 4 and 2 on the strings. Play 4, and at exactly the same time as you play 2, you place 3. At exactly the same time as you play 3, you place 1. Placing in sequence is an advanced technique, and is used to avoid buzzes, or to avoid stopping the sound on a string that has just been played. It is NOT a sloppy way of placing, but is in fact a very precise way of placing.
If the new string is nylon, crank it waaaaay high, and then bring it down to the correct pitch. That helps keep it from sagging too much. If the string is gut, do the same thing, but don’t crank it up as high or you risk breaking the new string. Both nylon and gut strings want to go back to the tension they were at before being tuned to the correct pitch. Often when I get a rental harp back, many of the strings are to high. I tune them down to the correct pitch, and then when I go back to tune them again a couple of hours later, they are again high. So out of tune strings don’t always sag. If a string breaks on the day of a performance, tune the new string a whole step or more sharp and leave it there. Then, just before the performance, bring it down to pitch.
I should mention here that if I am tuning a harp that is way out of tune, either high or low, I tune the whole thing(using a machine, tuning all the C’s, all the B’s, etc.) and then when I have finished, I immediately do the whole thing a second time, and then a third time. By the third time, the strings are pretty much staying in tune. So the take away here is: 1) if you are tuning a brand new string, start by cranking it way over pitch and bringing it down to pitch, and 2) if you are tuning a whole instrument that is way out of tune, tune it completely three times in a row(or more).
Somebody, I can’t remember who, published a book of arrangements of the Schubert Ave Maria in every possible key. See if you can find that.
There are many good reasons to buy, or not to buy an instrument. It all depends on your particular circumstances. Since you and your daughter are brand new to the harp, I would suggest waiting at least 6 months or a year. The reason? You know very little about harps at the moment, and even less about what your daughter wants to do with it. If you wait to get into the harp market, you will be going in with much more information and general knowledge about harps, and your daughter will also have much more specific ideas about what she likes or doesn’t like. It could be frustrating to buy an instrument that your daughter is going to quickly outgrow, or which doesn’t meet her needs.
Biagio- I appreciate the recommendation. But I only work on pedal harps. I hope there is someone around who is willing to work on this instrument.
Actually it was the flutist she was coaching who caught it. Kathy emailed me to ask if in fact this was a mistake or if Debussy wrote it like that. The same figure appears on the previous page and is an F# there. Thus the question. Debussy tended to make little changes to the same figure that repeats in a piece. But not this time. I had to pull out the manuscript and sure enough, it was a mistake. So far, it’s the only one in the printed edition that anyone has found. I already emailed my editor about it, and before the next printing, I’m planning on going through the entire Sonate again to see if I can find anything else. Kathy has been using this edition exclusively since it came out and she loves it.
I would love to see a photo showing the baseplate that is screwed to the neck. From the picture on the site now, it appears that the holes in the baseplate for the screws are not very long, meaning that there is very little to no adjustment possible in the positioning of the baseplate. This is my main complaint about virtually all levers. There is no way of adjusting the position of the baseplate and therefore no way to regulate the instrument. I would also like to know what the cost of these levers is.
Janna- It’s been years, no decades, since I hired myself out to play the Ceremony of Carols. But looking at this from a purely business perspective, I would say that your fee depends on a couple of things, and therefore would be different in different situations. The first two factors in coming up with the fee is the number of times you have to schlep the harp out and the distance you have to travel. If the job involves one rehearsal on the day of the performance and the performance(in the same venue as the rehearsal), then that will be your cheapest fee. If there are two rehearsals and therefore two round trip moves, plus the performance(a third round trip move) then the fee has to reflect that. In other words, the core of your fee is not how much you have to play but how much moving and driving you have to do. You should discuss these issues with whoever is planning on hiring you to play so that they know that 1) the fee is based on those factors and 2) the fee could go higher or lower depending on what the person who hires you wants to do.
