Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
No one there now remembers them getting it so that would probably be 30+years and maybe it wasn’t new then! .
I have played both and agree that they are too variable to make a choice without hearing them and preferably playing them. There is a particularly dead sounding Daphne that I try never to play in my university harp room but it has had a hard life. I prefer the Camac top end but have small enough hands to convert easily. What is not variable is the weight – 32kg versus 39kg I think but check them. If you do a lot of stairs 32 is much more manageable.
Thank you everyone. Such beautiful Isabelle videos. I love the delicate and relatively slow Chatelaine opening theme ( for me that was one of the hardest 5-6 mins of harp music to pull off convincingly that I have ever performed). I am inspired to have another go.
Sorry if you couldn’t find it. Wil-wetens vimeo link works well, Elizabeth’s home webpage for the organisation requires you to have some patience as you look at a little bird for a while after you think something might happen (having clicked go) but then the intro starts. On the Facebook page you have to scroll down to a rather randomly placed video labelled April 1. As I said, no tech experts were present and this is a very new venture! Thank you Elizabeth – gosh, I was 12 then. Wonderful days in a heavenly place though.Do you ever hear from Laura Caramellino – we lost touch?
Thank you very much Gretchen and I am so glad you enjoyed it. I got a lot more positive feedback online than I do playing in the church where they usually hold their concerts I have to say. Even if some of it was more about my skirt!
I perform on piano and harp. I really like to have played in a venue before I perform there – solo or chamber – so I try to arrange a rehearsal a few days before the concert day and always try to play there for around an hour or so earlier in the day. Like Elizabeth it settles my nerves. If possible I want someone siting near the back to see how the quiet bits are sounding (are they audible) and what the contrasts sound like. And check an ensemble’s balance. I would certainly do all the openings and finales and usually a full run through. Harp in a big venue can have problems with pianissimos being too soft. I might “practise” the odd phrase but usually I play through to get a good feel for the piano and the acoustics. I play better if I go out warmed up so where possible I play for at least 20 mins until the point I have to move the harp to its final destination.
Here is a third example from small to average amazing hands – its all brilliant but especially the 3 min mark final variation!
Even at 14 Heidi had pretty large hands. If you have never seen her playing Handel and Ravel with a young Bernstein and very young looking Abbado at that age you tube you are in for a treat! If I buzz going fast its usually because I am bending at the second joint from the end of index and middle fingers not keeping them down. She taught me to trill by pointing really down – more successful for me than other methods.
Don’t you have to get it signed off by your teacher? I know what mine would say – too predictable. She would not like Zabel and Faure (?Roussel Impromptu instead of Zabel), add something contemporary and much less well known, put in something fast and Spanish, maybe something classical period like Spohr Fantasie. Ballade is a great piece and about 10 mins but the hardest of all those mentioned by some way. How long have you got to learn it? Caplet Divertissements?
I am far, far more worried about it getting hit during a stage change/interval or a pile of amateur orchestra people coming on and off if I have dashed to the ladies and left it than I am about people trying it. If you have clean hands and no sunblock on I will give you a tiny lesson….I find people very careful and tentative. On the other hand it has very nearly come to grief twice in 10 years on stage from so called stage managers. On one occasion a friend in the audience shrieked at the piano movers to stop just in time
as it came within an inch.What does your teacher say? I agree maybe urtext Handel or The Vivaldi Concerti – I think they are D major and C major – arranged by Kathy Bundock Moore are the easiest. Not for full orchestra either! Maybe Dittersdorf (or one movement of it). I think all those are on you tube. Isn’t the Suzuki graduation level 4 piece Handel 1st movt?
Another vote for Ipad Pro 12.9″, Forscore. I scan with Turbo scan using app on same iPad. I do keep my emails coming into the device as well. Back up to drop box from button within Forscore. Apple pencil (lives in an elastic band device around the cover for iPad as never found a working magnetic storage system for it.
Have you thought maybe about enquiring whether the teacher at the school would take him privately now for some lessons if his current teacher agrees? I am sure she would if that is where he wants to go. If he has become highly motivated to change his technique it would be really helpful for him to start understanding now what she/he wants him to work on to achieve that and how he/she will be teaching that. And potentially good for the audition if they knows he is serious about this and able to adapt!
1. Scholarships from the US – you will have to internet search this – not my country. But even in a small country like mine things exist if you search very hard. Look for things just to do with “the arts” as well as classical music.
2. Scholarships from the UK and the conservatoire you want to go to – did you get a scholarship there? Follow every link they suggest. ‘
3. Grants – find a benefactor. Look at your local biggest symphony orchestra’s subscribers – see if anyone sponsors the harp seat and start there then expand to all large donors to the orchestra or any classical music famous group in your area. Nice handwritten letter with attachments not some generic mail out you are clearly sending to everywhere – you need to create the personal touch.
4. Study at a US university that is linked to where you want to go – that way the fees are usually cost neutral with an exchange.
5. Make sure you have a great CV ready and very good recordings to send to all the above with your applications.
