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I’ve been carefully reading Rick’s site and plans, they’re great.
I do have a harp maker offering me offcuts of birch ply, as it so happens, which we’d have to put in the post. Presumably if it ends up being the same price or cheaper to get local timber that the guy making it can just pick up (he’s old friends with the guy who runs the sawmill), I’m better off doing that, though, and just using birch ply for the soundboard? The price the same harp maker quoted me for nylon was slightly more than I’ve been quoted for KF from another harp maker, at which point I may as well get KF and enjoy it.
Note on neck-pillar construction – copied into my notes along with other useful things you’ve said, thank you!
Good point about the harmonics, I hadn’t thought of that. How much difference do you think it’d make? The thing that’s putting me off a fifth interval is if the two sides are further apart in pitch, I presume it makes it harder to get the stringing right. I want it to be very low tension so that we can keep the frame light, and have been aiming for stringing not much heavier than the Waring harp even if it’s with a wooden soundbox. I also want to minimise wound strings because I have to import them and that ends up expensive, as well as making it harder to tweak. So two or three wound strings on the left is one thing, but Mae ended up with two octaves of them and that’s more than I can afford. On the other hand, I am still learning about the ways of KF and I don’t know how far we could push it using that, as it sounds more flexible in this respect.
Here is the current sketch, about 26″ tall, and quite slim-built as it started off looking like the Waring. I’m not going to ask anyone to put levers on it, that takes it up to a whole new level of time and skill and expense and weight, so the plan was to skip bridge pins as well. Here are the current string lengths, which I originally designed to run down to the F below middle C. I now have string charts all over the place with various options, including moving the left side down to E for the bottom note and the right side down to A. If I do that, the left side matches the string lengths from the Musicmakers Limerick fairly well, and the right side matches the string lengths for Biagio’s little 23 x 2 harp.
I was planning to go for a very simple design, since whoever is building it won’t be experienced in making harps, so no levers and just 20 strings each side. Does the major/minor thing matter if it’s all purely diatonic anyway? I hadn’t thought of that, thanks for flagging it up. Realistically the plan is to keep chatting to local folks about wood and such, and hopefully try Mae’s harp some time (she lives fairly local to me) and see how I get on with it. Since it’ll need to be a small harp with fairly short string lengths (a bit longer than the Waring ones but shorter than yours), I assume that means less flexibility in how much we can change the notes around. According to my string charts, a fourth should be doable and matches other string designs in terms of length, I’d just need to work out wound strings and such. (I keep staring at photos of small harps like the Blevins ones to work out how many of their bottom strings are wound, and comparing measurements to get an idea of the string lengths.) I got hold of string designs for a number of small harps – yours, Eve, Brittany, Limerick, Waring – and put them all into a spreadsheet with graphs to compare the length, gauge and tension, which is being helpful. Plus the magic spreadsheet for calculating everything you linked me to, of course, which is where they all start.
I’ve not been playing the harp much recently due to illness, but yesterday I was trying playing without looking at the strings to see how I got on. It went fairly well. The pain flare afterwards was crap, and for some reason my fingertips hurt even though they weren’t cold, but playing without looking wasn’t too bad. I’m already used to it from piano, and orchestral percussion way back in the day, although with piano you get more clues from your peripheral vision. I gather you move around the right side by memory, mostly? I’ve been watching Carolyn Deal’s videos, and I found it very reassuring when she said not to worry about seeing two distinct rows of strings, she gets double vision and hasn’t a hope of doing that, but she still manages to play it using other ways of keeping track of the strings. It does sound a little harder to do that if the sides are offset (does “offset” make sense for stringing one side down to E and the other down to A or whatever?), but on the other hand you then get more of a range and by the sound of it, better-sounding strings. Apologies for doubting you when you suggested a double strung the other year, you were quite right!
Although if it’s a cardboard soundbox, I imagine I’ll revert to the lighter stringing plan I have that’s a tweaked version of the Waring, and not mess about with offset sides. I rang one local-ish sawmill and got a delightful chap, who said he has an old friend who makes ukuleles and such, and who may be able to put together a small harp for me on a budget. I am waiting hopefully to hear back from them. There may be a chance of spalted beech *swoon*.
I grew up playing the piano and singing, and was able to do both together, including with another singer which adds even more to focus on. More recently I’ve taken up the harp, and am finding it harder to sing with than I expected. Levers are completely throwing me if I’m singing, it’s a whole extra physical thing to keep track of. So I agree about keeping it simple while you get the hang of it. That could include minimising lever changes and only singing in languages you’re really comfortable in, or indeed just your native tongue. You’ll relax more once you get past the “arggh three lines I’m meant to be doing WHAT?” stage.
I’m a member of the Clarsach Society, and they are mostly about lever harps. They have a wire branch, but it’s much smaller and occasionally on the verge of closing down. The Clarsach Society rents out harps, I’m renting from them myself, and as far as I know they’re all lever harps. Pilgrims, usually, with the odd Starfish.
I have been planning to get a small harp built locally for ages, Biagio was giving me advice a while back, and I have finally fallen for double harps, as he had indeed suggested. Right now I’m still looking into materials and sorting out string charts and such, so it may end up being very lightly strung with a cardboard soundbox, or it may be all wood, depending on various factors. If it’s wood, Mae McAllister is talking me into considering having the right side strung higher than the left side and putting a few wound nylon strings in the bass on the left side. I’m thinking a third or fourth higher, but hopefully I will meet Mae and her double strung harp first (which has the two sides a fifth apart but is also built a lot more sturdily). I remember Biagio saying that it would make sense to build a harp that way a while back in this forum.
Thank you! It must be hard to imagine what it’s like having muscle strength this limited, as people keep cheerfully suggesting harps which are evidently very lightweight if you’re healthy, but far too heavy for me. The Eve sounds like a lovely harp, I hear so many good things about it, but it’s 8lb and I can’t manage that. My lyre is 3lb.
It’s a gorgeous little thing with a warm, soft voice that is incredibly therapeutic. There have been nights where I can’t sleep and creep into the other room and play it sleepily, no need to worry about waking anyone. I am mostly treating it like a wire harp with wider spacing and a deeper voice, and working from wire harp repertoire. Improvising is finally happening! I’m damping a bit but it’s not too much to handle. I do need to keep an eye on positioning so I don’t end up with a sore wrist, though.
The bottom two strings sound a little dull (we were guessing wildly at how to string it, so I expected to do some tweaking), so the string maker has sent me replacements with a different core, and I will put them on later today. Guitar tuners are indeed blissfully easy to use. The luthier was really impressed by the wound bronze strings and has started stringing more lyres that way, including a new 14 string.
The working theory is that it’s actually magic. Everyone wants to try it, and it’s not too intimidating. Well, one friend played it flat on the table just in case, but you can easily play it that way and the table adds resonance. The people who thought they couldn’t play music find that they can after all, and the musicians do fabulous things with it.
The evening that was really special was when a friend was staying and had brought another friend of theirs with them. The friend I’d known for years doesn’t play anything, said, “Oh, I’m tone deaf, can’t play a thing.” But they shyly gave it a try, and were soon plucking away happily. Then their friend had a try. She’s a fairly serious folk musician, I think, but eight years ago she had a stroke and mostly lost the use of her left hand. She thought musical instruments were over for her now. Happily, she found that she could hold the lyre with her left hand and play with her right. She curled up on the sofa with it – its an ideal size for curling up with – and played and sang with it for ages. It was spellbinding.
One of my PAs does sound meditation classes and she’s very interested in getting one too. My partner couldn’t keep his hands off it when it first arrived. As a harp-adjacent instrument goes, it’s filling its role beautifully.
Being me, I am plotting a slightly wider harp-lyre hybrid. I think we could make something with 20 or 22 strings going down to tenor C, using fluorocarbon for the range down to middle C, and then either just wound bronze or that combined with a few wound nylon strings to get the lowest octave without needing the strings to get much longer. Once I’ve got a decent recording of this lyre, I’ll post about that separately. It’s definitely very promising.
It’s finally finished and will be with me on Wednesday!
Here is a sample video from the luthier.
I can upload the photos he sent me too if anyone wants. It’s come out looking lovely.
I’m particularly glad that I went for the tenor range, as I have been having a nightmare time of it lately with high-pitched sounds being painful. It’s ruling out both the wire harp and my piano, and pretty annoying when watching TV. I’m due to get sent to a neurologist at some point for other stuff that’s been happening lately. Bloody brains, eh.
Excellent. I have been having fun working out a couple of pieces for that range. It wants to sing in the minor, I think, considering that it has E minor or dorian, and if you use the bottom string for the dominant instead, A minor or dorian. G major is useful as well, although it doesn’t fit as well in the bass, nor does D major.
I will spend a few weeks getting the hang of my lyre and seeing how it suits me as an instrument to play in bed, I think. The silly thing is that my friend lent me her 19 string wire harp, but I cannot keep up with the tuning routine for wire harps, so it doesn’t make a good instrument for when I’m exhausted. With my bigger wire harp, I’m not even getting through tuning it before flaking out at the moment. Thankfully a PA tunes my 34 string lever harp once a week and I can handle the odd bit of tweak-tuning in between, so on days when I’m at my flat and can manage to play a bit, I have that. It’s my partner’s flat where I don’t end up playing anything at the moment.
Thank you for all the sympathy, too, everyone! Being this ill is bloody hard, I’ve been climbing the walls with boredom, and merrily overdid it this weekend due to a bit more energy and actual sunbeams. We got out the hammock for my partner’s garden and curled up in it together, at one point with his bouzouki as well. Then we had a couple of friends round for board games the next day, which we usually do every weekend but had missed for months as I’d been too ill. But I’m still having to be really careful, getting warning signs such as my heart rate zooming up from the excitement of…wait for it…putting my socks on.
I still cannot believe that [unnamed big energy supplier in Scotland] refund. I spent years trying to get the money back. I must have made eight complaints to the Ombudsman, who are beyond useless. At one point I managed to claw a couple of hundred back via my bank, as they were specifically unauthorised payments after they’d agreed to stop taking money (they will take anything up to triple the amount you actually spent), and next thing I knew I was getting threats of court action and bailiffs. Also it’s more than twice as much as I thought they owed me. I should probably at least wait and see what happens in the election before deciding whether to squander it on a small harp, the Tories getting in again could mean very bad things for my finances, but it’s pleasant to dream, at the very least.
Is it OK to store a small harp lying on its side on a large shelf? It doesn’t have a flat back, so it can’t lie on its back. He does send out a little stand, so it’s more stable when standing up, but I’m not sure I can think of a place to keep it. That’s if I get the wee Welsh one, of course. It really is the only harp in this small size and price range you can get in the UK, and there’s nothing in a similar price range you can import either. The idea of it is growing on me, though.
Yes, it’s being built with wound phosphor bronze strings to drop the range to tenor. It’s in the process of being made, huzzah, and will hopefully be here in a few weeks. I’ll see what style of playing suits me when it turns up. There are quite a few lyre players holding them in a similar way to harps, although generally on the left rather than on the right. He doesn’t always play them on his lap, if you hunt through his videos, sometimes he holds them up in the traditional fashion.
Meanwhile, this morning I got a cheque from my former power supplier refunding me with a rather exciting amount of money, years after I’d given up hope of seeing a penny of it back. So I am contemplating getting this small harp from Wales. I’ve had a chat with the man building them and also a woman who helped design them and plays herself. She played for the recordings on the site, and mentioned to me just now that she plays with her nails, which presumably makes it a little brighter sounding for those recordings. He’s going to have a look into what the lightest weight might be. He uses nylon strings from Robinson’s and is now using Rees levers, having found that Robinson levers weren’t great.
I’m not going to rush into anything, I’ll think it over for a month and see how well the lyre meets my needs, and I also have the options of waiting until the deluxe Waring harp comes out, or of getting local woodworkers to build me a little harp from birch laminate with no levers. This does seem to be my only other choice for a harp this size (as mentioned above, Harpsicles are too big for me) and in this budget. I thought about the Sasha kit from Harps of Lorien, but it’ll come to a lot more by the time you include shipping and customs, and that’s before you get to needing to have it built.
So my questions are:
a) Is E-E a good range, and if so, should I go for CF levers or CFB? Lower notes do sound nicer, and it gives you E minor and E dorian for the full range.
b) How good are Rees levers? I can live with not being able to flip them quickly during pieces, but do they alter the tone significantly or cause other problems?
I’ve heard that there’s a tradition of tuning to Ab in Scotland, but I have yet to meet anyone who actually does it. It seems to be Eb for fully levered harps, and that’s certainly true of harps I’ve tried from Scottish luthiers at the Edinburgh festival, and the harps owned by the Clarsach Society. Is it on the folk scene or something?
If you use printed music, I’ve found that books of medieval music most often use C major or the associated modes such as D dorian (same levers).
Charles – thanks,that’s helpful. I tried reading up on it and gathered that it’s complicated and you can’t just try a different one. I also couldn’t work out why you’d want anything other than equal temperament if you were playing in a variety of keys on a lever harp, so good to have that confirmed and I’ll go back to equal.
What about the wire harp? No levers, tuned in C major (and using the associated modes), playing fairly traditional wire harp stuff. My teacher has me working on the traditional first pieces taught to wire harpers, Fair Molly and the Burns March so far (I’ve not been having lessons long), and I’ve also been using Ann Heymann’s Coupled Hands for Harpers, which is folk music from various traditions. I sometimes retune the drone string but I’m staying in C major so far.
Plus I am getting a little lyre built for me, 12 wound phosphor bronze strings, tuned in D major from tenor B up to F sharp. I might tune the Cs to naturals sometimes, it’ll have guitar tuning heads which will make that easier, but I don’t anticipate much retuning apart from that. I’m going to be treating it as a very small harp that I can play in bed more than a traditional lyre, and it’s a more modern build. What would work for that?
I have Cleartune, and it does have a variety of temperaments available, but I have no idea which one I should be using if not equal temperament. I have a lever harp tuned in Eb and a wire harp tuned in C. Due to disability, I’m mostly getting someone else to do the tuning for me, so while they are both musicians, they’re not harpists and I can’t give them complicated instructions.
I found someone in England making double strung harps! Simon Capp, making medieval-style 20 string harps with two rows of strings tuned the same. Any use? He may well make other types of harp that way.
Hello, I was the one who mentioned there’s a cardboard double harp around, and it’s Waring, not Blevins. For a Blevins double, add a zero to the price, and they don’t end up as lightweight.
I don’t know of anyone who has bought the cardboard double harp. If you look up cardboard harps on YouTube, make sure you trawl through the videos thoroughly. Some are made by beginners who don’t know how to play the harp yet and haven’t tuned it well, plus they haven’t recorded it well either. Others are by serious or even professional harpists do a much better job, and you can get a better impression of what they’re like. People here generally speak well of them.
There are two American companies making cardboard harps, Waring and Backyard. The Waring one is 19 strings, and that’s the one also available as a double. It has a basic triangle frame, no option for levers, and relatively short string lengths. The double strung version simply puts two of the triangle frames together on the same soundbox.
The Backyard Fireside harp is bigger, both the height and the soundbox, and has 22 strings, a harmonic curve, and the option of levers. It’s not available as a double. Both of them have the G below middle C as the bottom note. The Waring seems more popular. Quite a few people here have used the cardboard harps.
I’m told by a friend of his that Dennis Waring is considering bringing out a “deluxe” version of his cardboard harp, which looks like it will have the same size soundbox, a taller pillar, a harmonic curve, and 24 strings, probably spaced a bit closer together and definitely with better string lengths, and going down to F below middle C. I’ve seen a photo of the prototype, it looks good. I think this may turn out to be the best cardboard option, and I’d suggest contacting him and asking how that’s coming along and whether it’ll also be available as a double. I don’t know whether doubling it up on the same soundbox will work with a larger frame. You can message him on Facebook.
My friend said Violaine Alfaric was very reasonably priced, actually, and I think a lot of her work is custom so that’s not an issue. Worth a call? Luthiers working alone can be cheaper than companies, for instance in the UK because they don’t have to pay VAT. You’d also save on import costs.
<span style=”font-size: 16px;”>The problem with getting a shop to order it in is that they add a mark-up, but in the other hand, ordering in lots of harps is cheaper than paying shipping for just one harp, so apparently it may balance out, but is worth checking. </span>
<span style=”font-size: 16px;”>I’ve been told by Cindy Blevins that multi-course lap harps can suffer from a drier tone, as there are more strings competing for the same relatively small bit of soundboard. On the other hand, you get the strings vibrating in sympathy, so I have wondered if that cancels out that problem. Cindy had been talking about cross-strung harps rather than double-strung, too. People who actually play them will know! From what people using double-strung harps here have reported, it can help to replace the lower four strings with KF, that sort of thing.</span>
Stoney End are really friendly if you chat to them, I’ve found.
I’m glad you’ve borrowed a harp, that sounds excellent! Learning on that for a while, then buying a 34 string, then getting a smaller double-strung further down the line sounds like a sensible plan to me. You may fall in love with the bass range, for instance, as so many of us do. A double-strung is more of a specialist instrument, so it makes sense to develop your taste in harps more before you get one. You’ll know more about exactly what range you find most useful, what you like in the way of tone and feel.
If you want something really portable and cheap and cheerful, you can actually get a 19 string cardboard harp kit as a double strung! Dennis Waring may be bringing out a 24 string version of his basic 19 string harp kit some time this year, with a harmonic curve and better string lengths, and if he offers that as a double-strung as well, I for one will be very interested. The sound on a decent cardboard harp can apparently be as good as the mid-range lap harps out there. I’ve been chatting with Dick Ranlet of Wickford Harps, who is working with him on it, about this. I’d love to see a double-strung version of Dick’s harps, come to that. Pricier, but very portable.
Yes, the Harpsicles, Christina and such are much too big. I am lying in bed. Even if I sit up in bed, I’m limited to about 70cm tall (and that’s probably too big as well), and harps of that sort are more like 80-95cm tall. The Bardic 27 is 6kg, I couldn’t even lift that. They all weigh far more than I can handle, and the very few harps that would be small and light enough cost far more than I can afford, and tend to sound tinkly. Seriously, it’s OK, I have looked into this! I have also had sensory overload episodes set off by tuning the top strings of a harp when I’m really tired. That’s why we’re planning to use wound bronze strings and drop the range to tenor.
A Reverie is tuned pentatonically, and I agree that I’d find that too limiting. I’m talking about a small diatonic range. There are plenty of folk instruments using a range that size and I’m looking forward to the challenge. I just want to figure out a soundboard/back combination that will sound nice and won’t produce overwhelming amounts of sustain. Right now I am reading up on birch plywood.
