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I think if a harpist is consistently unable to play certain figures, cannot get a piece up to speed, or is developing injuries, then they should take a hard look at their technique and analyze what is holding them back. Athletes take videos and watch them in slow motion to pick apart where the inefficiencies are. Sometimes the problem only arises in certain registers, and the technique has to be adapted only in those instances. I don’t think you are ever too old to change. If
There is a product called “Liquid Bandage” which she could try. Here is the web site for it. http://band-aid.com/liquid_bandage.shtml. Has she tried pricking the blisters, then soaking her fingertips in salt water to draw them out?
I LOVE it!! And then there’s “The Swines of Rome” by Roast Piggy (Respighi?). And let us not forget Taco Bell’s Canon!
It depends on what kind of job you’re doing. If you are sitting for great lengths of time, such as in opera, ballet or symphony, you want a very comfy seat with a back that can be adjusted to your body type. I have a Concert Design chair, which has adjustable levers for chair height, angle and back support, and it’s heaven. Their gig stool is much lighter, but you have to set it to your own specifications with a screwdriver, so it’s not as ideal for teaching. These are not cheap chairs, but if your back is bothering you at all, it’s worth the investment.
If you are auditioning for an orchestra position, make sure you know how the orchestra sounds around the harp excerpt. Sometimes there are expressive things that are not marked in your part, even ritardando’s! Also, be aware that some things that look like cadenzas are not. An example is the Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra by Britten. It is conducted. If you played it freely like a cadenza, you would not make it past the first round. Play through your excerpts well in advance for a harpist who has played them all in an orchestra, and they can tell you these little tricks. There are also well-known “trick” fingerings for some standard excerpts. Beatrice Schroeder Rose’s “The Harp in the Orchestra” has some good ones! When you are playing in front of the committee, keep that orchestra in your head as you play your excerpts. That could make the difference if everyone is playing at a high level, but you are the only one who knows the context.
I used to have a layered cut which caused my hair to form “wings” that would regularly get caught in the discs. I would have to wait until the next flat pedal change to release myself!
For tips on how to maximize the impact of your practice time, get Philip Johnston’s book, “The Practice Revolution” from http://www.practicespot.com. Ditto everything Carl said. Also, be very analytical when you practise your technique. Slow down and really listen to the sound each finger makes, then make changes if that sound is not what you want to hear. Buy some good technical exercise books such as Lariviere, and go through them with your teacher. Identify what you feel is weak about your technique and set about isolating the problem, fixing it, and repeating the fixed technical excerpt until it’s as natural as walking. Practise scales, arpeggios, trills, octaves, inversions, ornaments, harmonics, any patterns that you can think of, and also practise dynamics and shading. Do all this while scrupulously staying relaxed and breathing through it all. If your fingers or arms feel tight, imagine how tight they will feel in a performing situation!
My very first harp was a very old, third-hand Lyon-Healy gold 22, which had ivory pegs in the soundboard and had been rebuilt before I bought it. I was such an idiot; I didn’t know what a great little harp I had and sold it to one of my first students. It had a lovely tuning key that fit the pegs like a glove and never
wore out. I kept it when I sold the harp and cried when I lost it! I guess the pegs and tuning keys are made of different grade steel now. My next, brand-new harp was a real clunker with terrible, dead tone, so I had to sell that one and buy yet another! I spent several years nagging that student, trying to get her to sell the first harp back to me but she wanted to keep it in spite of the fact that she had quite lessons and was hardly playing at all. My third instrument started off sounding quite green but developed into a beauty, thank heavens!Perhaps the neck-craning is more a bad habit than a result of not being able to see the strings. (On the other hand, it could be time for a new prescription.) I think David was trying to point out that it looks very uncomfortable and is certainly hard on the neck muscles, therefore it is difficult to watch, out of sympathy rather than contempt. I have experienced “sympathy pain” while watching not only harpists, but other musicians, when they are playing in a contorted and obviously unhealthy posture.
Rhythm is much more easily learned away from the instrument, by clapping out figures and seeing what they look like on the page while hearing what they sound like. An excellent book for this is Phil Perkins’ A Logical Approach to Rhythmic Notation. Practice skills can be taught using Philip Johnston’s The Practice Revolution or Not Until You’ve Done Your Practice! Technique and relaxation are very important. Here’s your chance to do these kids an enormous favor. Do not let them get away with inefficient, uncomfortable technique. Teach progressively more technical figures with exacting attention to the correct way to accomplish them. Note reading: try turning the page sideways to equate the staff lines with the strings on the harp. Start with a recognizable note like middle C and set a goal for a different note name leanred every week. There’s a great article on teaching beginners in this months’ Harp Column magazine with lots more great suggestions; thanks to the wonderful teachers who contributed to that article!
Do you think it might be because they are so overwhelmed by the amount of music they need to learn for the competition? Perhaps they are afraid to take any practice time away from that repertoire. Or are you thinking of the kids who are not already taking part in the competition?
I just read Saul’s post after I posted mine. Saul, I have seen photos of Salzedo’s hands, and they are a lot bigger than mine. I generally LOVE his ideas for fingerings, and base my fingering ideas on his concepts. But sometimes I just cannot reach the spans that he could. I have rather short 4th fingers, so, in a widely-spaced figure, my third finger is brought right up against the string and causes a buzz or a complete dampening. Since I was taught that buzzing is a capital crime (well, a bit of an exaggeration), I opted for changing the fingerings.
