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Hi, Lisa,
Thank you so much for posting the update! I’m so glad you mentioned that the Salvi natural finish looks better with more color than on the website. I never liked that “white-washed” look in that photo, either! I’m so jealous of your pretty gold levers! As I previously mentioned, I got a Prelude earlier this year, and I just don’t understand why L&H continues to put gunmetal gray levers on an otherwise pretty harp!
Hi, Saul and Balfour,
I just emailed Steve Fritzmann at L&H asking about this, and he says they have not changed their mechanism layout and have no plans to.
-Gregg
I forgot to mention the fact that those largest Marini Made models show to be 6′ (72″) tall, which would seem to confirm that the bottom octave is, in fact, the contrabass octave.
Hi, Wil,
I just checked the Ana 40 Pedal stringing on harp dot com, and the bass wires indicate Bow Brand Concert Pedal wires, so I’m wondering how well those work on the bottom 2 notes with levers. Apparently, the issue can be when the levers are disengaged, because the vibrational displacement of the wires can possibly rattle in the lever cams when the levers are down.
It would be nice if someone with an Ana 40 in pedal stringing would see this thread and provide feedback about that.
-Gregg
Hi, Wil,
So you’re saying that, even when the Ana is strung in pedal-tension, that only applies to the gut and nylon strings, and the bass wires are still lever-tension? That seems odd. Also, where you put that pedal wires are too heavy for levers, you must mean only below 6C, since, as you point out, the Prelude uses pedal wires, correct?
Thanks!
-Gregg
Lisa,
Another thing to mention is the fact that the Ana comes with levers on the bottom 2 strings, whereas the Prelude doesn’t. When I asked L&H about this, I was told that the reason is that the bass wires in pedal tension vibrate too much to work with levers. Since the Ana in pedal tension would presumably still have levers on those 2 bottom bass wires, maybe the lever style has something to do with the difference.
When there are no levers on certain strings, it’s customary to tune them in natural, which means that you no longer have low Ab or Bb on the Prelude unless you tune the strings down to those notes. Neither model has levers on the top 2 strings, while the Camac Madamoiselle has levers on all 40 strings.
I’m overall happy with my choice to get the Prelude, but I do have curiosity about the Ana in pedal stringing but didn’t have the opportunity to try either one.
I hope this doesn’t further add difficulty to your decision, but I did think I should point it out!
-Gregg
Hi, Lisa,
I recently bought a new Prelude in natural from the Virginia Harp Center earlier this year. I agree that the Ana looks nicer, in certain respects, especially the gold-plated levers! I don’t understand why Lyon&Healy doesn’t offer nicer-looking levers. Anyway, I wanted the lever harp model that is designed to be as close to a pedal harp in terms of feel/sound/look as possible, which is the main reason I chose the Prelude. While the Ana can be strung in pedal-tension gut, it is primarily designed (for whatever reason) as a lever-tension harp. (Does anyone know why this is the case??) The Camac Mademoiselle bothers me (as a pre-pedal harp) in that the wire strings continue up 3 more notes than pedal harps up to 5C, so you don’t get the gut feel and sound until 5D. When I’ve heard them played in demonstration videos, my ear picks up on that wire sound going up higher. Plus, that creates a very different feel for those 3 strings compared to pedal harps.
I was lucky that the Virginia Harp Center just so happened to have a Prelude in natural finish in stock (I specifically wanted natural), because someone else had ordered it several months before but became unable to pay for it once it arrived. I happened to inquire about that model before they even put the harp up on the website!
Just a word of warning, though, the base on mine is a little crooked to where the bottom of the soundbox corners aren’t the same distance from the front of the base by a difference of about 3/8″. It’s not readily apparent, but I’m surprised it made it out of the factory like that. I’ve just learned to live with it.
Do let us know what you decide!
I was going to ask if there’s some reason that the answer to the original question isn’t simply the string length multiplied by the 12th root of 2, but, of course it wouldn’t be that simple! As Carl mentioned, however, maybe that’s a good starting point, especially in the longer strings.
Oh, well, the image that had too large of a file size is the one to which I originally provided the link.
-Gregg
Let’s see if I can post the actual photos I found of various Paragons, all with action stopping at 7E.
-Gregg
Hi, Balfour,
I wonder if Roslyn simply had misinformation. In a quick Google Image search, I found the following website with several photos of a Venus Paragon. If you scroll down to the 6th photo, it’s a clear close-up of the top half of the harp, and the discs stop at 7E (disappointingly!):
Paragon hugs!
-Gregg
All very interesting, Saul! So is there more tension with the “heavy” (original) gauge strings than with the now-regular gauges? Why were they thinned–was it due to complaints regarding tension? How does the sound and feel compare between the 2 gaugings?
Hi, o.t.,
Forgive me for being nearly 12 years late to this thread, but did you end up getting either a 23 or a Trianon 47? I’m curious to know how those 2 models compare to each other.
Thank you,
Gregg
Hi, Wil,
I agree that there would likely be evidence if the turned body happened in transport, and I would think the whole base would be noticeably loose, but the bottom of the harp all seems plenty tight. Since new harps of this model and finish have become so rare (this was the only new one I could find!), and the wait time to have one made is as long as 6 months, I’m just glad that I was able to get this one and that the misalignment isn’t severe enough to be noticeable by most people unless pointed out to them. I was quite upset when I first noticed it (didn’t notice it until several hours after unboxing it), but it’s actually not bothering me so much anymore, especially since I only notice it if I quickly look back and forth between the 2 corners of the bottom of the soundbox. We’ll see what the harp center and L&H come up with.
Thanks,
-Gregg
