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Hi Gregg,
The gist of the type of humidifier I am talking about is that there is a reservoir of unheated water that is absorbed into some kind of absorbent material, and there is a fan blowing on that soaking wet material, thereby evaporating the water into the air. I have a large living room and I keep two such humidifiers running all winter. Each one holds about 7 gallons of water, and there is an absorbent belt that rotates through the reservoir of water and then comes up in front of the fan. When it is really cold out and very dry, I have to fill both humidifiers every two or three days. The two that I have are both at least 30 years old! I have to put a couple of drops of sewing machine oil in each motor at the beginning of each season, and then they run fine all winter long. Charles and Bill are much more versed in this than I am. I would look for the type of machine they each talk about.
You need to humidify the whole room, not just the harp, which would be very difficult to do. You don’t need to cover it when you are not using it. The humidifier you use should put out invisible humidified air. It should not look like steam or vapor. If the air coming out of the humidifier is invisible, then you can put the humidifier right next to the harp and have it blowing directly on the harp. It won’t cause any damage, and the humidity will be highest close to the humidifier. The farther you get from the humidifier the lower the humidity will be. Harps don’t dry out instantly. It takes time, and the damage that can occur from too dry air usually shows up at the end of the winter. If the room where the harp is is fairly large, I would buy a humidifier that holds 6 gallons of cold water or more and keep it running all the time.
I rent harps in the northeastern United States. Contact me through my web site:
http://www.swansonharp.comI think you could try to remove as much of the grease as you can, using paper towels maybe wrapped around a table knife to try to get it off. After all, any lubricant that you can see, oil or grease, is not lubricating anything! You could also try oiling those joints that had grease on them with a thin machine oil. That might dilute the grease over time and work down into the area that really needs the lubrication.
Harp actions, as well as harp pedal mechanisms, need lubrication, and that lubrication can be in the form of oil or grease. But oil and grease function in two completely different ways and are not interchangeable. In moving metal parts, oil is used when you want it to creep into the moving metal joint that you can’t reach directly, such as the riveting of the linkage. Grease will not creep anywhere. It sits where you put it. Grease is used in places where moving parts can be reached directly and where there is pressure to squeeze it out. It is used for example in the holes in the front action plate where the spindles are tightly fit into those holes. Grease is also used in the main action blocks where the main action mechanism, which takes the movement from the pedal rod and divides it between the natural and sharp chains, is tightly fit. Grease will sit for a very long time (many years) without being squeezed out or drying out the way oil would.
The grease in your mechanism, while not doing any harm, is also not doing any good, because it cannot reach or lubricate the joint where two metal parts (the rivet and the link) are moving. It’s an idiotic and pointless attempt to lubricate the linkage. Oil would have been much better there because it would have crept into the joint where it is needed.
It would be nice if the major companies understood this. At least one of them sticks a blob of grease on each of the pedal fulcrums (where the steel pedal bar is riveted to a metal piece that is screwed into a bracket at the bottom of the harp to hold it in place. Grease down there 1) does not lubricate anything, and 2) the lack of oil where the rivet, steel pedal bar, and fulcrum all move causes this joint to seize up. I can’t tell you how many times I have had to remove those rivets and put new ones AND OIL in so that they move properly. In the case of the oil in your mechanism, the presence of grease there may actually prevent oil from reaching the moving parts if you or a technician were to oil those joints. So in that way, the grease might actually cause damage.
Dear Charles, Balfour, et al: I know I’m going to sound incredibly snotty with what I have to say, but I need to say it. I have read or skimmed over all of the posts in this thread, and this is what happens when well meaning (I think) but totally unknowledgable people(where harps are concerned) try to “repair” harps. Over my career I have, a number of times, had to repair instruments that someone else, who had no knowledge of the harp or harp construction, had worked on. It always involves ripping out everything that they did and then doing the correct surgery that the instrument needed. This instrument is a classic case of this. He had no understanding at all of how the harp has to function, and no knowledge or understanding at all of the stress on the instrument. In addition, he didn’t even know how to take the harp apart. He has destroyed this instrument beyond repair. And he clearly was so sure of himself and confident in his ability that he didn’t even try to consult with anyone who does know this.
Three years ago I decided that I wanted to train several people to repair harps. The first one was a young man(19 at the time) who was in a cabinet making course in Boston. He is now 23 and has more or less completely taken over my business. He is a master craftsman and a far better woodworker than I ever was. I can’t wait to show him this video! He has already had to undo the damage that other people have done to good instruments, and I had warned him early on that my biggest fear was that, if I didn’t train people to do major harp repair, then that would leave the door open for catastrophes like this.
Balfour- Thank you for the kind words. I wrote A GUIDE FOR HARPISTS because of the dearth of information in Sam Pratt’s book. I think his book was the first time that anyone had tried to write about harps and harp maintenance, and so it was groundbreaking. But I felt that it was really written for a knowledgeable technician to read, not your average harpist who knows nothing about how the harp works. When I was writing each of the chapters, I had two professional harpists here in Boston read the draft I had written and then do the repair or adjustment while I just watched. I asked them to “think out loud” so I could see how they were interpreting what I had written. Because of that experimental feedback, I re-wrote several of the chapters 4 or 5 times before I was satisfied that an unknowledgeable harpist could understand what I was explaining and do the work.
Concerning the issue of having qualified technicians available: There are quite a few trained regulators around, thanks to Lyon & Healy’s training program. But not one of them does major harp repairs, such as replacing necks, soundboards, repairing baseframes, re-riveting, etc. Right now, as far as I can tell, there is just Tom Bell(who is a very good friend of mine) and my workshop. My understanding is that Lyon & Healy will only work on Lyon & Healy and Salvi harps. That leaves out Wurlitzer, Venus, Swanson, Horngacher, etc. During my career I worked mostly on Lyon & Healy harps, but also worked on other makes as well. For that reason, I have started to train harp repairmen who can do the major surgery that harps eventually need. My fear is that, without trained rebuilders around (who know what they are doing) there will be no one who is able to work on all makes of harps, and that will leave the door open for well meaning woodworkers who know nothing about harps to make catastrophic mistakes attempting these repairs, and also complete charlatans trying to make a quick buck. Of course, the people I train have to know how to regulate. But I am not interested, nor do I have the time, to train people just to regulate. I’m focusing totally on creating a new generation of harp rebuilders who can repair and restore harps to their best condition.
I’m on my 5th Dodge Grand Caravan in a row! I can carry 4 pedal harps at a time in this car(and I frequently have to). This one I think is a 2018, and all the seats fold flat into the floor. It’s the high end version this time, with built in GPS, a CD player, and a hard drive that I can load CD’s on to. I currently have about 325 CD’s on the hard drive! I understand they don’t make the Caravan any more, and I don’t know if the Pacifica is the replacement vehicle. Each of my Caravan’s I drove to about 140,000 miles without any repairs. It’s a great car.
Don’t grease the pedal springs. Use a heavy duty motor oil, like a motor oil. You want a lubricant that will creep around to places you can’t reach with grease. And if your harp has a glob of grease on the pedal fulcrum, where the end of the steel pedal bar is anchored to that bronze bracket, then wipe as much of the grease off as you can and replace it with oil, for the same reason as mentioned above. Putting grease on that pedal fulcrum is one of the more idiotic ideas that one of the major companies has been doing for years. Grease can’t creep into the area where steel is moving against steel. So in fact, with grease on it, there is in fact no lubrication at all.
I wrote a reply to this several hours ago. I have no idea where it went.
Washburns were made in the 1930’s for sale in retail music stores, not direct from the factory as the other Lyon & Healy models were. Lyon & Healy wanted to keep their name for themselves and for sales directly from the factory. So they came up with the name Washburn. I have no idea what or who that refers to. They have a serial number series that is separate from the usual Lyon & Healy series. The W in the serial number probably just means Washburn.
At the moment they are not published. Lemoine, who was Tournier’s publisher, told me recently that they will be publishing them sometime this year. I’ve got my own set of the parts, and I may publish my own edition of them at some point.
That’s a piano part, not a harp part. I’m guessing you were working that out on a keyboard with the “harp button” on. If that’s what you did, then that’s what it is written for. You’ve got five note chords. We only use 4 fingers of each hand when we play. You’ve got chords that reach 2 and 3 octaves. How are we supposed to play that? You’ve got fast repetitions of a single note or a single chord. That just doesn’t work on the harp. It sounds cumbersome at best, and doesn’t resonate the way it would on a piano. It’s clear from this part that you don’t have a clue about writing for the harp. And it’s anybody’s guess what else is going on while the harp is playing this part. My guess is that it would be a completely inaudible part, no matter who was playing it.
If you want to write effectively for the harp, take harp lessons for several months. That way, you will at least think like a harpist. And if you are working out a harp part on a keyboard, take some masking tape and tape your 5th finger (pinky) securely to your 4th finger on each hand, and then play your part. That’s what it will be like for a harpist to play the part.
I misread your original post and put a reply up here that didn’t match at all what you were asking. So sorry.
The problem of a slipping pedal might have something to do with the felt wrappings, OR, it might have something to do with the pedal spring. First the felt. If the felt wrappings are too many or too thick, or are too loose, that could cause the pedal to slip. The fix would be to rewrap the felt, using fewer wrappings or thinner felt, so that the pedal can fit into the natural slot without a problem.
The pedal spring performs two functions. One of course is to push the pedal back up into flat. The other function is to pull the pedal into the natural and sharp slots. It does this by virtue of the fact that the arm of the spring that goes into the pedal bar is slightly twisted, so that the little right-angle bend at the end of that arm is not at a right angle to the coils of the spring, but rather points slightly up from a right angle. It’s that slight twist to that arm that pulls the pedal into the slot. If the spring for that pedal does not have that twist, or it is not enough, then twist the right angle end of the arm a little more. You’ll need to put the spring in a vise and you’ll need a pair of pliers to do it.
Hi Harry,
Aoyama harps are fine instruments that any knowledgable technician can work on without any problem. If you are interested, I know of an Aoyama Musa 47-C that is up for sale that you could have for about $11,000 US. Shipping to Australia would be around $700 to $800 (I’m guessing). The harp is 25 years old, is a natural (not gilded) and is in excellent structural and cosmetic shape. I’m not making any money on this myself. I’m just trying to help out an old lady who needs to sell it. If you have any interest, email me privately.
Carl Swanson
When a teacher is teaching a student who has never studied an instrument before, that teacher has two big things to teach. 1) how to read music, and 2) how to play the instrument. That’s a lot for both the teacher and the student to tackle. You are very limited right now in what you can play because you are working very hard on both of these issues.
Does your teacher know what kind of music you are ultimately interested in playing? If not, you might take the time to discuss that with him/her. If it is possible, your teacher might be able to find some pieces that you like that are within your skill level. I would also suggest that you consider, if it is available someplace and you can find the time and money to do it, taking a music theory course. That way, you can learn music reading away from the harp, and that might provide more time at your harp lesson to work on pieces. Is there a center for adult education near you? You might find a course there.
