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No, it’s because they minimized or eliminated the curve that the rod had to go through to reach the pedal bar.
I suppose that idea that the stress is greater on the inner rods is because they sometimes have to go through more of a bend as they exit the bottom of the column and connect to the pedal bars. All of the rods have to go through a curve as they exit the column and this puts stress on the threading on the lower end of the rod, where rods always break.
The bottom end of the column should be hollowed out in such a way as to minimize that bending. But that doesn’t always happen and so rods occasionally break. They break more on some harps than on others, again, because of the way the bottom end of the column is hollowed out.
Years ago Lyon & Healy tried extending the brass tubes in the column from their standard 3 foot length so that more of the rod was protected within the brass tube. But that only made things worse, because the required curve that the rod had to go through had to happen over a shorter distance, thus concentrating the stressed area even more.
The current pedal coupler design, which completely covers the threading, has helped to eliminate broken rods. By the way, I don’t know of any pre-World War II harps, or Wurlitzer harps that ever broke a rod. The same is true of Erard harps.
Years ago I was loading a harp into my car in front of my house. Two adolescent boys, maybe 12 or 13, were walking by. “Hey mistah(Boston accent),” one of them said to me,”Is that a hahp?” “Yeh” I said. The kid turned to his friend and said, “See, I told you it wasn’t a banjo!”
I can’t say that I’ve ever seen a string break at that white spot when the string got kinked. maybe I was just unaware. Also, I rarely use first octave gut, and certainly they would be more prone to breaking at the kinked spot.
I once saw a sign at a gift shop that said, UNATTENDED CHILDREN WILL BE SOLD INTO SLAVERY. Maybe we need a sign next to the harp that says, people, or children, who touch the harp without my permission will be sold into slavery.
David- You should have stopped playing, looked at the little girl and said, “See Susie how rude your daddy is? If he was polite, he would have waited until I was finished playing and then asked permission to touch my harp. This is an important lesson for you sweetie.”
I am soooooooo jealous! I have been trying to get my hands on the serial number ledgers for years, with no luck. I’ll be in Nice this fall. But the exhibit will be over by then I believe.
Deb- I think if you are going to begin formal lessons with a teacher(who you respect and trust implicitly) you should expect that teacher to do whatever it takes to correct your bad habits. It will seem like starting over, but you will progress much faster than if you were a rank beginner. Let me tell you a little story.
Years ago a professional harpist asked me to overhaul her technique. She was a good professional who played with a very fine orchestra. I asked her why she wanted me to do that. She explained that when she played she felt like she was just barely in control and always on the edge of disaster. By sheer force of will she made it through difficult orchestra parts, concertos, etc. The problem was that she had had only about 5 years total of formal training 20 years earlier, and had studied with someone who was an awful teacher to boot. What little technique she had had devolved into something just awful and bearing no resemblance to any known school of playing. I’m not kidding.
I called two college level teachers who I respect enormously and asked each of them what they would do with this situation. “Do you do the major surgery and correct all of the technical problems? Or do you just tweak what she’s doing?” I asked both of them. One teacher said to me,”Boy, that muscle memory is awfully strong. I think I would just tweak what is there.” The other teacher said,”Do the surgery. It will take her 3 months to make the changes but she’ll be much better off in the end.” I told this teacher that I was planning on using the 50 Bochsa etudes as the basis for my work with her because she was such an advanced harpist. “I wouldn’t do that,” she said. “I’d use the 40 easy etudes(of Bochsa).
I went with the advice of the second teacher and basically started the student over. I warned her that for a while she would find it very uncomfortable, not because she was doing anything wrong, but because she would be fighting old muscle memory and until that faded, the new technique would not feel natural. I used the 40 easy etudes as the basis for what I was doing.
That teacher whose advice I followed was right on the mark. It took the student 3 months to make and get comfortable with the changes, and the 40 easy etudes were exactly the right pieces for making those changes.
The woman studied with me for about 6 or 7 months initially. When her schedule got too busy the lessons stopped for a while. About a year after making those changes she called me one day. “I just wanted you to know that this past week the symphony played Symphonie Fantastique”(of Berlioz with the killer second movement harp parts). “It was a piece of cake” she told me.
The whole point of this is that good technique pays enormous dividends and is well worth the effort. And loosing bad habits is well worth the effort in the long run.
Deb- Maybe I’m assuming too much in my previous post. But a professional or student on a professional track should have studied technique in particular very intensely and for a long period of time. Such a person has learned a lot of repertoire at all levels and so should have a very well rounded technique with lots of experience at every possible problem that could come up. An amateur, be it an adult beginner or a child just taking lessons, has not covered that amount of repertoire nor learned that level of technical skill and so will encounter problems with almost every piece they work on. Unless the person’s teacher has focused on learning technique and has made rigorous use of etudes and exercises, giving the student a complete technique at a given level, I find that most students can play certain things at a given level well but not everything at that level.
Another way of stating it is that when a student has studied (well) for a long enough time, their technique and musical understanding are so complete that they no longer have to think about it. That’s probably the point when they no longer need a teacher, at least for weekly lessons.
-When I ask myself ‘Who am I?’ I always answer ‘ A flutist.’-
You’ll always be a flutist. I have never stopped identifying myself as a harpist. Whether I repair or build harps for a living, or if I retire someday (fat chance!), I will always identify myself as a harpist. The great thing about having some other way of making a living(other than playing your instrument) is that it takes the pressure off to play it, and take every gig available, just to earn money. You can then decide what you want to do with it and not worry about income. You can teach, play the occasional gig that interests you(maybe only orchestra gigs which don’t pay enough to live on but which you enjoy for example). Or maybe chamber music or the occasional solo recital. I’ve given about 15 solo recitals over the past 10 years, none of which paid me a cent, but which I really enjoyed doing. Several were fund raisers to which I donated my services. So as you go through this metamorphosis, don’t stop thinking of yourself as a flutist. You’re simply adding something else to the mix.
Rod- I think there’s a difference between professionals and amateurs on the issue of lessons. Professionals, or students who are on the track to become professional, should take lessons until they have developed an advanced technique and understanding of repertoire, period style, musical expression, etc. After that they can work occasionally with a teacher, particularly one who specializes in what they want, like orchestra parts or competition repertoire and preparation. But the bottom line with professionals is still a well developed and advanced technique.
Amateurs(and I’m not using that term in a derogatory way), are playing the instrument more or less as a hobby and purely for fun. They will probably need a teacher to help them with every piece that they are ever going to learn. They are also going to develop their technique much slower than a student on the professional track, if only because they don’t have the 4 or 5 hours a day to practice. For both amateurs and professionals, going regularly to a teacher can be a huge help in learning new repertoire, just because it supplies deadlines(the next lesson) for getting things done. Without that even professionals can drag and dawdle on getting new pieces learned and finished.
Harp Guy- I’m really bothered by your ‘loss of self worth,’ but I understand. As I said in my previous post, it took me two years, at the end of my 20’s, to redefine my self worth. Turning 30(many many years ago) was a hard time for me. I didn’t own a house, didn’t have a career to speak of, didn’t have much money saved, and didn’t know what I was going to do with my life. These were all the things that I thought, at the time, should have been in place by age 30.
A year later I bought the house that I’m still in. I started repairing harps full time, which is my main occupation to this day. I loved the changes I made to my life and still do. You have to explore various things and find what fits best for you. What concerns me is that if you get really depressed in the process it will make it that much harder or impossible to get on with your life. Changing careers is not failure. Whatever you do in the future is not second best to what you started out doing.
You’re not the first person to go through this and you won’t be the last. I’ve spoken to many people over the years who trained to be professional musicians and who changed careers because they could not control the nerves in performance. One of them is now the president of a music school. A friend of mine in the harp world, whose name you would know told me that one of the graduate harp students at the major music school near her-a girl who was competition material-recently announced that she was going into nursing because she couldn’t make a living as a working harpist. A friend of mine who regularly plays Broadway shows told me that the most frequent conversation among the pit musicians, many of whom are in their 40’s and 50’s, is what they could do in the non-musical world so that they could get out of professional music, because they were having such a hard time making a living. You’re lucky in a way. You’re facing all of this now before you have a family to support or kids to put through college.
Since your options are wide open at this point, I would suggest going to a career counselor and discussing all of this. I believe there is a kind of test that you can take to measure your aptitude for different careers. I would suggest that to. It could provide a list of occupations that you had not even thought of. Good luck.
Thank you Misty. I really appreciate that. As far as my posts are concerned, I don’t expect everyone to agree with me and I find the Harp Column Forums most interesting when people don’t agree. I really enjoy reading other perspectives.
Dear Harp guy- Boy, does your story resonate with me! I spent my whole life from age 16 to 28 totally immersed in harp study, thinking I would be a career orchestra player. Undergraduate degree, then three years of private study in Paris, then Masters. After playing a few auditions and feeling that 1)the process was usually rigged and 2)that I really didn’t like playing in orchestras, I faced the same crisis you are now going through. I had to redefine myself and find a way of making a career that 1)made me happy and 2) allowed me to earn a living. I had started buying and fixing old harps while getting my masters degree, but didn’t look at it as a potential profession. It was like a hobby at the time. But then I realized I could make a living doing that and that I really liked it. It took me 2 years to change my brain around and redefine myself as a harp repairer. Once I made that change, I never looked back. I’ve had a great life doing what I do. I haven’t made a fortune, but have always had work and live comfortably. I have no bitterness or regrets and I’m very glad I spent those years studying the harp to an advanced level. It’s a huge part of who I am. I’ve met people and had entre into places I would never have encountered had I been a professional harpist. So hang in there and look for something that makes you happy. It’s out there. You just have to find it. And give yourself two or three years to change your thinking around so you can see that you have value and purpose at something other than what you started out doing.
