[john-strand]

Yes, I have had my share of strings break – and they do make quite a thunk – the one that unnerved me was a 5th octave that broke in the middle of the night and woke me out of a sound sleep – I did have an extra light guage E electric guitar string go on me once, and it did slice me along my arm enough to draw blood – however, the one that was really the most shocking and badly timed was some years ago when I was playing for an elegant “candlelight dinner” at a retirement home – no amp, but they had put a wireless mike under the harp to just add a bit through the ceiling speakers and that is the night I had a pedal spring come loose from its mooring on the pedal bar – it whacked the inside of the pedal box with a sound like a shotgun blast and then reverberated around through the overhead speakers – I am really glad springs are contained in a box, because i imagine one of those things loose and flying could do some really serious damage – needless to say, I regularly check to be sure all the spring ends are properly seated just about every time I put the harp in the car –

[john-strand]

I came to dislike banks and now belong to a credit union which is a not for profit organization – they have been wonderful about loans on items that banks wouldn’t touch such as professional recording gear and my harps – all have been financed and the last one was a home equity loan.

[john-strand]

Stella Castellucci has a lovely arrangement that is not difficult – you can probably get one direct from her if you can’t find it elsewhere – she’s listed in the harp journal or you could probably just google –

John

[john-strand]

I have an old Aslanian – “the Duchess”

[john-strand]

Interesting subject that I have indeed thought about from time to time over the years – I have an eye muscle imbalance which means that it is impossible for me to jump my eyes back and forth between a music stand and the strings – it takes a while for my eyes to lock onto whatever I am looking at and it also means I have no depth perception – fortunately for me, the muscles will lock into place when I focus on something down and to the right – just exactly where the strings are – and frankly, if it weren’t for that I would probably not be enjoying playing the harp – therefore, I do memorize everything I play and I have wondered what I might do to continue playing if I happened to lose my sight –
It seems to me I read once that the blind Irish harpers of old either tied knots in the centers of some strings or used an extra thick string where we are used to colored strings –
Back in the early 60’s Jean Langlais the blind French organist came to play a recital at the college – all the organ students got to visit and watch his rehearsal which I understand was pretty much standard wherever he went – and remember, he would play on totally different consoles at the different recitals – he would be seated on the bench and fix himself dead center and then his hands would explore the banks of stops wherever they were, the rocker tablets and piston buttons and the number of manuals – he would pull each stop individually, listen to a couple notes played on it and then go on – when he was finished, he had a map in his head of where everything was and what it did – all stored in muscle memory – when he played and wanted to change an individual stop, he reached to the top of the stop jamb and felt his way down to the one he wanted and then pulled it, but it all happend faster than it took you to read this sentence – same for changing pistons – he was famous for the French method of improvisation and he also played the standard concert organ literature with all the bravura pieces – I think he was the very definition of “muscle memory” which is all about the body knowing where it is in a given space – the same idea that lets you touch your index fingers together with your eyes closed or eat with a fork and not be stabbing yourself all the time –
The book is called “The Body has a Mind of It’s Own” by Sandra and Matthew Blakeslee –
A few years back I loaned a pedal harp to a blind guitar player friend of mine – he was fascinated with the sound – he did want a marker for the middle c so we put a small piece of masking tape on the soundboard right next to the string – he enjoyed messing with it for about six months playing some of his own made up melodys but for him the guitar was his main love – (he did have a seeing eye dog and watching that was amazing) – Interestingly enough, he never learned Braille, but he has all the extra gadgets to work a computer –

Well, this all gets into the techniques of memorization and oral, aural, and kinesthetic learning styles – to quote Mr. Spock, “Fascinating”

[john-strand]

Hi Melissa –
I would suggest that you take your harp with you to the dealership and actually try loading your own harp in whatever car you are interested in buying – don’t let the salespeople help if they should offer – there could be details peculiar to your harp and your loading technique – it’s worth the time and effort to discover if there will be problems and just exactly how your harp and your “stuff” (and also you)

[john-strand]

Yes, it’s a wonderful recording – I found a copy in very good condition on Ebay a few years ago –

[john-strand]

David Williams of Williams Harp Galleries makes an aluminum frame cart with two large wide air filled tires – I find it a much smoother ride for my concert grande especially over rougher surfaces as well as mushy ones like lawns – it also takes thresholds and those little floor level differences at elevator doors quite nicely – I particularly like it on stairs as the air filled tires are acting like springs cushioning from one step to the next both up the stairs and down them –

[john-strand]

ooppssss – make that “Aria “

[john-strand]

Liszt – “Un Sospiro” – some of the chord progressions touch me deeply –

Renie – “Legende” – I love the melodies near the end –

Grandjany – “Sonata in a Classic Style” the version with strings – such a totally

[john-strand]

Hi Rod – well this is one of my all time favorite songs – did you know that it is actually from a 1955 prison movie called “Unchained” – the verse is sung by a guy sitting on a prison cell bunk with his guitar – the B section isn’t sung in the movie – TCM runs it every now and then – the star was Elroy “Crazylegs” Hirsch who was a big football star in the early 50’s – Hy Zaret the composer, died recently – well, there’s your mini history lesson for the day –

Two suggestions – the sheet music arrangement is in G – use that, but transpose it to C – then the only two pedal changes are Bb and Eb in the

[john-strand]

re – your jazz inclinations and pedal work – have a listen to some of the Mimi Allen arrangements – she was particularly noted for her Gershwin arrangements and the speed and complexity of her pedal changes – also, Stella Castellucci is a marvel of jazz voicings on the harp – also noted for complex pedal work and textures – she also has a book

[john-strand]

PS – have a look at the little “Wagner” harp that is somewhere on this site – it looks like a lever harp on a stand with 3 pedals connected by rods – I don’t know why they only did 3 pedals, but it seems like it might be something in the direction you are going –

[john-strand]

Michael – you will have to dig around some to find this – I think it was in a harp journal around close to 20 years ago – a harp was built using a computer module that was attached to the music stand – the module controlled a system of oil filled plastic tubes in the base

[john-strand]

Please – my

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